If a tree falls in the forrest and no ones around to hear it

posted on August 6th, 2010, 12:19 am

Hey, wow you have a Guruji?


"Our need to know trivial and useless things will be the end of us."

Anyway i wholeheartedly agree.


Here:

Roshi about sound.  ^-^
YouTube
- ‪Shunryu Suzuki Roshi‬‎

posted on August 6th, 2010, 12:27 am

You could argue that sound is a concept created by humans, but regardless of what species is the recipent, the actual mechanism that is sound remains the same. "Sound" is simply the word used by humans to describe it. Whether we can hear the sound or not is irrelevant, it is still produced.

the question is whether there's a sound made, not whether there is air vibrating, there is always air vibrating (as the forest isnt at a temperature of absolute zero), but is there always sound? my point is that to define sound in such a way that this question can be answered requires an arbitrary human decision of what constitutes sound, and what constitutes normal vibrations of atoms.

posted on August 10th, 2010, 12:08 am

If a tree falls on a man in a forest and kills him instantly, and nobody else is around to hear it, does he make a sound?

posted on August 10th, 2010, 12:20 am

hehehe... Are you prepared to find out

posted on August 11th, 2010, 3:53 pm

Just a hint regarding that famous tree-falls-in-the-wood-question:
It's  not a question of natural science but a question of epistemology.

And the need to know useless and trivial things is what made humanity what it is. Who decides what's important and what's trivial anyways?!