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Looper's Delight
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Good story. I've always hated it when people ask that question about the falling tree, because the answer seems obvious to me depending on what you agree as the definition of sound. If you define sound as fluctuations of air pressure, then of course the tree makes a sound when no one is there...because in science and realism (the metaphysical theory that supports modern scientific thinking), humans don't have to be around for there to be physical changes in the environment. But if you define sound as humann perception, then of course there is no sound if one there to hear it. It is one of those questions whose answer is either intuitively obvious or obviously false depending on the semantics. I'll check out that neo-Platonist movement writing...though I am typically very suspicious of anything based on Plato's work, who is for all practical purposes anti-science and art in terms of the implications of his works. Plato thought very lowly of most artists and musicians, and his metaphysic contains a great distain for empirical data as a basis for knowledge. He comes directly from the line of pre-Socratic Greek philosophers called Eliatics (mystics, mathematicians, and idealists), who were in direct opposition to the Ionians (pre-scientists who based their view points on empirical data and experimentation). Kris ----- Original Message ----- From: "mech" <mech@m3ch.net> To: <Loopers-Delight@loopers-delight.com> > At 10:53 PM -0600 7/20/06, Krispen Hartung wrote: > Oh, in more than merely this theory. I can remember in College Physics > 101, our professor took about 15 minutes to tackle the issue regarding, > "if a tree falls in the woods and there's no-one there to hear it...". > His main point was that very definition of Sound requires a receiver > (listener) to interpret the vibrations in the air and convert them into > Sound. Otherwise, as you stated, there's no difference between >generating > Sound and merely moving air. (So, that falling tree moves air, but >since > there's no observer it doesn't generate sound). Sound only occurs in >the > brain, at least according to basic Newtonian Physics. > > Thus, if Music is a subset of Sound, then the brain/mind is an > indispensable component in the chain. Some aspects of psychoacoustics > also attempt to chart the characteristics of Sound/Music that occur only > within the mind, completely divorced from the physical world. > >>Man, I love this shit....I'll never be able to get to sleep now. > > Kris, if you ever get a chance, I think you'd also get a kick out of > reading writings from the philosophers of the Iranian Neo-Platonist > movement -- around the first millennium AD (starting with Ibn Sina, but > primarily Suhrawardi and Qutb al-Din Shirazi). It's not so well-known > here in the West, but the Islamic world actually spent quite a bit of >time > and thought extrapolating on the concepts first voiced by the great >Greek > philosophers. Much of that philosophy was incorporated into the > Illuminationist school of Islamic thought. > > I've never been able to get very far in my reading of it for two >reasons: > A.) I don't already have the required background in the teachings of the > Classical Greeks, and B.) I'm not really smart enough. :P > > It sounds like something that would be right up your alley, though, if >you > haven't already delved into the writings of that philosophical school. > > --m. > -- > _______ > "Take a packet of seeds. Take yourself out to play > I want to see river of orchids where we had a motorway..." > >