When a tree falls in a lonely forest, and no animal is nearby to hear it, does it make a sound? Why? Charles Riborg Mann and George Ransom Twiss in Physics, 1910.
Long before these two science educators posed these questions in their collaboration, philosophers, scientists from all fields and children have pondered this age old riddle. Likewise, if any one of us speaks and everyone around tunes us out, have we actually made any sound?
My husband and I began discussing sound after he watched a thunderstorm roll in across the marsh. The scientist in him knew that a clap of thunder follows lightning and that each second between the two represents how far away the lightning is from the listener.
But the philosopher in him questioned how lightning makes its own particular sound. Humans, animals, birds all have some form of vocal apparatus which vibrates creating sound. Also through vibration, manmade items emit the screeches and clangs of object against object.
According to an article from the Library of Congress, “the grumbles and growls we hear in thunderstorms actually come from the rapid expansion of air surrounding the lightning bolt...Like an explosion, the rapidly expanding waves of compressed air create a loud, booming burst of noise.”
During the time we were discussing the sounds of thunder, we chanced to hear Wynton Marsalis, trumpeter, composer, music educator and artistic director of Jazz at Lincoln Center in New York City, discuss his newest protégé, Joey Alexander, a 12-year-old jazz pianist from Bali, Indonesia.
Marsalis told Anderson Cooper on “60 Minutes,” “I’ve never heard anyone who could play like him.” As Marsalis continued to praise this young musical genius, he related a conversation he once had with Miles Davis, another jazz musician who played at least five instruments, including the trumpet. “I asked him, ‘Man, how do you get the sound you get?’ He said, ‘Man, nobody knows about sound. Sound just is...’ And I think that about Joey’s abilities. They just are...”
In other words, two musicians can play the same notes on the same instrument. And while one may be an accomplished technician, the other may create sound that stirs our souls. How can we explain two people playing the exact same notes with the exact same beat, yet there is a noticeable difference in sound? The sound that makes us sit up and take notice “just is...”
A variety of websites add their take on the sense of hearing which allows us to listen to sounds of all kinds. Brain Facts says, “Often considered the most important sense for humans, hearing allows us to communicate with each other by receiving sounds and interpreting speech...Hearing also gives information vital to survival; for instance, by alerting us to an approaching car, it enables us to get out of harm’s way.”
The Hearing Institute Atlantic adds these facts: Hearing loss is the third most common health problem in the United States. Excessive noise exposure is the number one cause of hearing loss. In World War I, parrots were kept on the Eiffel Tower in Paris because of their remarkable sense of hearing. When the parrots heard enemy aircraft, they warned everyone of the approaching danger long before the human ear would hear it.
As a college freshman, our granddaughter chose to write her research assignment about the Deaf Community subculture - those who voluntarily choose to learn and use American Sign Language. She acknowledges not every deaf person identifies with the subculture because modern technology has made real progress in restoring hearing to some.
She begins her paper, “Imagine if you couldn’t hear your favorite music artist or the voice of a loved one?”
Her question reminds us to appreciate gifts, like hearing, that we often take for granted.
So we return to our original riddle. Whether we are present to hear a specific sound or not, whether we choose to listen to another political diatribe or not, those of us who can hear must be grateful for this important sense. With aging, people, some more, some less, begin to lose a bit of this miraculous sense which reveals so much about our surroundings and about us. Too often, too many of us fall into old Benjamin Franklin’s well: “We know the worth of water when the well runs dry.” Or, we appreciate our sense of hearing only after sounds begin to fade.
If we cannot hear or if we choose not listen, does the falling tree make any noise?
2016
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