Pella Posted August 29, 2005 Share Posted August 29, 2005 The oldest one in the book, but since someone asked about a flat or round earth, we might as well question the full nature of reality or what we percieve as reality So if a tree falls in the forest and nobody is around to hear it, does it make a sound? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wargames Posted August 29, 2005 Share Posted August 29, 2005 yes the tree falling and hitting the ground does make reverbirations int he air that make a sound a very loud sound. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
frodoxxx Posted August 29, 2005 Share Posted August 29, 2005 The tree falling does not make a sound. What we define as sound is simply a response to vibrations in the air that stimulate the human ear. Being as that range is between 20 and 20,000 Htz. we , for sake of convienance, call anything within that range "sound" So what the tree falling actually does is cause vibrations in the surrounding atmosphere. O.K. It also scares the crap out of any bunny rabbits that happen to be in the vicinity. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nimrandir Posted August 29, 2005 Share Posted August 29, 2005 Personally I think that quetion is wrong, a very difficult feat to achieve as it appear much easier to answer questions wrongly instead, but let me to try to make my point clear. My point is : if the the fact that nobody is near the tree to hear it fall make the sound produced by its fall to disappear, then there is really no tree, since there is nobody near it to even see it make it to disappear. I remember first thinking of this while reading a paper by Einstein and a response by Bohr in wich they argued about weather or not Quantum Mechanics could be a complete description of physical reality or there have to be some "hidden variables" not included in QM (the main issue of the discusion is there exists such things as, for example, position or momentum if the fact of measuring one precludes the knowledge of the other). While reading those papers I found hilarious that what they were dicussing was essentially the question "if a tree falls in the forest and nobody is around to hear it, does it make a sound?", but what they were really doing was correcting the question based on Quantum Theory to "Does it really exists a tree in a forest if you can't know whether has fallen or not" (or if you preffer, Can you tell if a tree in a forest has fallen or not, with the slight addition that saying no means that there is NO tree). So i guess the point finally is that existance is defined by the possibility of interaction, and in the question "if a tree falls in the forest and nobody is around to hear it, does it make a sound?" the role of the sound is a interaction wich enables you to realize the tree has fallen, so if you can know if the tree has fallen or not (say by treking by a forest and seeing a fallen tree) then you know the tree made a noise when it fell since it hit the ground (of course, provided there is air to transmit the sound). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beawulf Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 I cant see the tree for the forrest. :cyclops: I voted yes Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
S0V13T Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 hang on, how did this tree fall, exactelly? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pella Posted August 30, 2005 Author Share Posted August 30, 2005 woodworm. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TFMF Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 hang on' date=' how did this tree fall, exactelly? [/quote'] presumable to the gorund Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lamp Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 try to realise the truth, there is to spoon/tree Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MrDad Posted August 30, 2005 Share Posted August 30, 2005 If a man is walking in the forest and a tree falls on him and kills him, does it stop making a sound as he dies? Or does it cease to exist even, since there is no longer an observer? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GorunNova Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 *science mode: on Since all movements through fluids cause disturbances in those fluids, and since air is a fluid and those disturbances are interpreted by our ears as sound, a falling tree must therefore create sound unless it's falling in a vacuum. *science mode: off Edit: Apologies for the switch to science mode, but this -is- the Modern Science area... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest c4evap Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll pop? And, if no one is around to lick it...does that negate the whole lick thesis (IE: I lick, therefore I am)? c4 :p Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ZaphodiLe Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 Of course... What we define as sound will happen if, as someone mentioned, it falls in everything but vacuum. And since trees can't live in vacuum I suppose it will make what we call a sound. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GorunNova Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 <- is busy trying to discover the Tootsie roll thing ^^'... had to substitute with a conventional lollipop, though, and so the experiment is probably not very relevant... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
negger Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 maybe you all dont exist and the internet/TV is a big lie to make me accept that there is something like earth population out there...I am probably the only being in this world caged in a laboratory exposed to certain experiments of certain other beings which are not of my species.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pella Posted August 31, 2005 Author Share Posted August 31, 2005 How do we know that the above wasn't a computer generated response? :stare: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
howiepoohs Posted August 31, 2005 Share Posted August 31, 2005 Isnt this the same a schrodinger's cat? Sound is a wave as has already been said, which needs a devive, such as an ear, to be heard. So, therefore, to test the theory, you need someones ear to hear if the tree makes a noise or not, thereby negating the test. As soon as you try to measure the test, you falsify the answer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pella Posted September 1, 2005 Author Share Posted September 1, 2005 Isnt this the same a schrodinger's cat? Sound is a wave as has already been said' date=' which needs a devive, such as an ear, to be heard. So, therefore, to test the theory, you need someones ear to hear if the tree makes a noise or not, thereby negating the test. As soon as you try to measure the test, you falsify the answer. [/quote'] Schrodinger tried to poison his Kitty - that wasn't very nice!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
psheldrake1 Posted September 1, 2005 Share Posted September 1, 2005 Isnt this the same a schrodinger's cat? Sound is a wave as has already been said' date=' which needs a devive, such as an ear, to be heard. So, therefore, to test the theory, you need someones ear to hear if the tree makes a noise or not, thereby negating the test. As soon as you try to measure the test, you falsify the answer. [/quote'] I hear the screams of the trees in the fiorest all to well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lamp Posted September 1, 2005 Share Posted September 1, 2005 i think that it is the forest that falls to the tree a tree falls in forest and a deaf man witnesses it, does it make a sound Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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