The origin of arts according to Harvard

cjfrbw

Well-Known Member
Apr 20, 2010
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Well, gee, if Harvard says so. Wonder what Stanford, Yale and Princeton have to say, maybe we could start a food fight.
 

flez007

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Aug 31, 2010
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It is a long essay, but found it very relevant, particulary on how we are "prepared" to interact with reality thru our limited senses.
 

mep

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Apr 20, 2010
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I never understood why this is considered a conundrum because the answer is so obvious. If a tree falls it makes a lot of noise. Whether someone (or a microphone) happened to be nearby to hear it is irrelevant.

--Ethan


We have been down that philosophical road before and it led to nowhere.
 
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NorthStar

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I never understood why this is considered a conundrum because the answer is so obvious. If a tree falls it makes a lot of noise. Whether someone (or a microphone) happened to be nearby to hear it is irrelevant.

--Ethan

That is the entire point Ethan; where were you when that tree fell? :b
...But it goes much deeper than that ...

We have been down that philosophical road before and led to nowhere.

What was then is not representative of what's now. :b

__________________________
__________________________

Flez007 started a magnificent thread here; and the link from his first original post is a fabulous one! :b And the quote in his post #4 is also magic! :cool: ...Magic in its truth.

The link I provided myself from wiki (about the philsophical thought experiment on Observation & Knowledge), is also "sound". :b

We go from these writings, and we explore ourselves the various 'dimensions'.
...And what we found is that everything visual and auditive in life is related.
...To our inner vibrations (sensitive strings, or emotions). And from there we act, react, and interact. ...Science become discipline of the the new open frontier ...

It is from exploration, communication (discussions), experimentation, curiosity, challenging passions, new tool's creation, that we evolve.
And for this to be truly effective and positive, we need to clean our 'environment' in order to let the sun shines and the sound rings clearly and valuably.

Pure ART in its true context has no definitive shape, form, sound, and is unspoiled by any type of pollution and corruption and lies.

This is an audio/video forum, with a variety of people and their own experience and knowledge.
For some of us it is a way of living, a profession. For others it's a deep connection.
We all share what is, was, and could be. ...And we all create our own ART sort of.
And only when we appreciate true ART that we liberate ourselves from all life's constraints.
...I think.

To be able to fully appreciate (all our senses), one must be stress-free of any inhibition.
Suppose that we all are here; then we should grow in total harmony and full discovery of all things (and people and animals) we love. ...ADVANCING in WISDOM.

The sixth sense; the mind's corridors.
...And all the numerous passages towards fulfillment and total satisfaction from all our other five senses.
And to be able to balance and control all our senses is the true ART, the balancing ACT. ...The real beauty.

Me, that's how I see things, and people, and animal life, and the world. :b
{Take the simplicity of it.}

* And sorry for any typo.

"I am taking my time to think & write." - Bob
 

NorthStar

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---In my above post (unedited), there is one word that I would remove; can you guess which one?

Also, it should have been "most valuably."

** Typo from the above post: "Science becomes discipline ..."
 
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flez007

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Aug 31, 2010
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"unperceived existance" is, at least for me, one of the key issues - since I deliberatly left a space for someone interested in the fact of additional and non-measurable variables that could lead us to better understand any given audio setup and most importantly, our reaction and "false judgement" built under our limited capacity to understand and process while hearing music.

On one hand we have all that additional information that we do not measure and perceive initially, but creates an ambience, decays and gets us closer to the composer intention that seats on the other one hand - a matter of balance I should say.
 

opus111

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Feb 10, 2012
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I never understood why this is considered a conundrum because the answer is so obvious. If a tree falls it makes a lot of noise. Whether someone (or a microphone) happened to be nearby to hear it is irrelevant.

I see you make the same error as in your recent book. When a tree falls, it creates vibration and vibration is not the same as noise.

If a microphone records the vibration it transduces the vibration into an electrical signal. Still not noise.

Sound, like colour, is a percept.
 

Ethan Winer

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Jul 8, 2010
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That is the entire point Ethan; where were you when that tree fell? :b

It doesn't matter where I was, or anyone else. When the tree falls it creates acoustic waves. So the answer is still Yes. People can argue over the difference between acoustic waves versus noise (whatever that's supposed to mean), but the fact remains that acoustic sound is acoustic waves. According to Wikipedia, the phrase is:

Wikipedia said:
"If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"

This is the wording I quoted in my book. If anyone believes that sound is not acoustic waves, or that those waves are created only when someone is nearby, I'd love to hear the technical explanation.

Sheesh, I can't believe we're even discussing this!

--Ethan
 

NorthStar

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--- Ethan, you can be funny at times; I like it! :b

* When I asked you about where were you when the tree fell; that was exactly what I meant:
it just don't matter. :D

____________________

>>> Did you know that Blue whales can communicate with each other under water over distances of more than 1,500 kilometers! Yeah, it's a fact.
 

opus111

Banned
Feb 10, 2012
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This is the wording I quoted in my book. If anyone believes that sound is not acoustic waves, or that those waves are created only when someone is nearby, I'd love to hear the technical explanation.

Its a major distraction to introduce belief. By reasoned deduction, sound is not acoustic waves. No belief involved.

This deduction follows from YouTube's video (there's more than one) of the McGurk effect. Watch and learn.
 

Gregadd

WBF Founding Member
Apr 20, 2010
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I suppose the real question is whether the forest needs any acoustic treatment. LOL
 
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Gregadd

WBF Founding Member
Apr 20, 2010
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If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"

The importance of a statement is not dependent upon who hears it.

Is what Ethan says about room treatment diminished soley by the fact that audiophiles pay little attention to it.
 

jkeny

Industry Expert, Member Sponsor
Feb 9, 2012
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So we're now back to insults again? Are you guys incapable of making even one actual on-topic technical point?

--Ethan
The technical argument has been placed in front of you already by Opus111 & yet you persist in your mis-statement. Please explain what "the scientific method" means to you as I'm struggling to understand your logic!
 

Phelonious Ponk

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Jun 30, 2010
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The old tree/forest question is just a thought-provoking riddle. The tree falls to the ground, it creates exactly the same sound waves whether anyone is there or not. The rest is philosophy, not science, not art, and frankly, not terribly meaningful. But it amuses the easily amused.

I confess, I didn't read the Harvard article. I find that academics in general, and academics working in the arts, in particular, often have very little real understanding of the arts. Even less wisdom regarding the arts, though they can usually come up with a few thousand words quite easily.

The arts are about human experience. Do you relate to the art in question on a personal level? Does the experience being communicated resonate with your own? This is what matters. Any academic analysis beyond that may or may not be mildly interesting, but it's irrelevant. And when the Harvard article openend with the limits of human vision, they lost me. Cats, and laser night vision goggles see things humans don't. No question about it. Those things are outside of the human experience, like that tree that fell in the forest. They may open the door to a philosophilcal discussion that is wholly unrelated to human experience, but they can tell us nothing about the arts.

Etc.

Tim
 

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