Not surprising
Via Science Codex, a slightly odd translation of an important finding. (The main website for the project is here. Looks like a good resource.)

Are wind farms harmful to humans? Some believe so, others refute this; this controversial topic makes emotions run high. To give the debate more objectivity, an international team of experts dealt with the fundamentals of hearing in the lower limit range of the audible frequency range (i.e. infrasound), but also in the upper limit range (i.e. ultrasound).

Sort of irrelevant in the big picture. Windmills are a fantastically stupid source of electric power because the wind blows EXACTLY AND ONLY when you don't need extra power. This super-simple fact should have eliminated windmills from any consideration from the start, but nothing stops Goldman from exploiting a source of subsidies. Any device or tactic that will squash the poor and enrich the chosen must be fully implemented.

Still, if the annoyance can be fully quantified it could slow down the Gaian devils slightly. The annoyed people include some of the same rich fuckheads who benefit from the subsidies.

So far the Gaian devils haven't figured out how to squash medical research by shouting DENIER! DENIER! DENIER! I'm sure they're working on it.



More on the quantifying:

An audible loud sound may damage hearing - as well as getting on your nerves. But what exactly is an "audible" sound? And what does a human being really hear? In order to find out more, an infrasonic source which is able to generate sounds that are completely free from harmonics (which is not as trivial as it may sound!) was constructed within the scope of this project. Test persons were asked about their subjective hearing experience, and these (also quantitative) statements were then compared by means of imaging procedures, namely by magnetoencephalography (MEG) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). The results have shown that humans hear lower sounds - namely from 8 hertz on - which, after all, is a whole octave than had previously been assumed: an excitation of the primary auditory cortex could be detected down to this frequency. All persons concerned explicitly stated that they had heard something - whereby this perception had not always been tonal. In addition, the observations showed a reaction in certain parts of the brain which play a role in emotions.

None of this is surprising. The usual 20 to 20K range was determined strictly by CONSCIOUS perception. This is the range that a young healthy ear/brain combo can CONSCIOUSLY respond to, by lifting a finger or pushing a button or whatever. Beyond simple frequency, our awareness focuses entirely on complex speech-like signals. We pay no conscious attention to steady hums or broadband noise at any frequency; we only notice those things when they abruptly turn on or off. But those hums and hisses can have a distinct effect on emotions.

There's nothing to prevent the cochlea itself, plus the non-conscious channels in the brain, from responding WAY below 20 cycles. Above 1200 cps, the cochlea uses a fluid standing wave to stimulate different areas of neurons. Below 1200 cps, each cycle directly triggers a neural response. There isn't an obvious lower limit to those direct triggers. I'd guess that a wave slower than 5 seconds per cycle will give the air pressure in the middle ear enough time to equalize the outer pressure, leaving the eardrum without any net motion. (Bear in mind that the lower limit of detectable motion at the eardrum is about the diameter of an atom.)

The cited study seems to miss another sensing element. The semi-circular canals are designed to sense linear and rotational accelerations of the entire head. Their response range is focused around one motion per second (frequencies associated with walking), but they can reliably pick up vibrations up to 20 cps.

Low-freq sounds often produce dizziness through this effect, plus emotional responses that are harder to directly associate. Seems familiar, eh?

= = = = =

SerenGIFity again: I applied the wavy vibration ONLY to the grassy terrain. I meant to add some motion to the concrete base of the wind turbine, but I forgot. The GIF (or more precisely the vagaries of visual perception) took care of adding that motion!

Labels: Carbon Cult, Metrology

  ¶ 3:42 AM