All sound begins with some kind of motion, something that disturbs molecules in air, water, steel, wood, or other medium. Isaac Newton noted that light waves are colorless; the perception of color only occurs in the brain of a living organism. The same is true of sound. Thus perception of sound begins at our eardrums—before it hits our eardrums, it is nothing more than the disturbance of molecules. We can measure that disturbance with gauges and instruments, but until it hits a brain, it is not sound. You may have heard the old philosophical riddle, “If a tree falls in the forest and no one is
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