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I want to ask you to do something that's a little

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unusual for a second. Oh, starting with an experiment

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today. I like it. Yeah, just a quick one. Right

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now, wherever you are, whatever you're doing,

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I just want you to pause. Don't change anything

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about your environment. Just listen to the room

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around you. Like, really listen. It's harder

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than it sounds. It really is. Because what do

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you actually hear? Is there a low, almost invisible

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hum of a refrigerator? Or maybe an HVAC system

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in the background. Or the distant, continuous

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drone of traffic outside your window. Right.

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Or the high -pitched, barely perceptible whine

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of a computer fan. You probably weren't noticing

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any of these sounds a minute ago. They were just,

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you know, there. Perform the invisible wallpaper

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of your daily life. Exactly. But today, we are

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going to completely rewire how you perceive that

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invisible world. We are taking a deep dive into

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an absolute masterpiece of a book. Oh, it really

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is. I am looking at my copy right now, and it

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is heavily dog -eared, sitting on top of this

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massive stack of acoustic ecology research papers,

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historical sonography data, and our own expensive

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notes. It's a hefty stack. It is. The book is

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R. Murray Schaeffer's groundbreaking work, originally

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published in 1977 and updated in 1993. It's called

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The Soundscape, Our Sonic Environment. and the

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tuning of the world. And our mission today is

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pretty ambitious. Oh, very. We are going to go

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concept by concept through Schaefer's framework

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to start treating the entire world as a macrocosmic

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musical composition. I love that phrase. Right.

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A composition where you and I are simultaneously

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the audience, the performers, and ultimately

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the composers. It is a profound and honestly

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necessary shift in perspective. Because when

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we usually talk about the sonic environment,

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particularly in an urban setting, we tend to

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talk about noise as a nuisance. Like something

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to just be blocked out. Exactly. Blocked out

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or legislated against. But Schaefer... elevates

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the stakes entirely. He builds this comprehensive

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argument that noise pollution isn't just a minor

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annoyance or some unavoidable byproduct of industry.

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He views it as the auditory symptom of a society

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that is fundamentally losing its connection to

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humanism, which is a heavy claim. It is for decades.

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The dominant cultural approach has been entirely

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negative. We rely on noise abatement. You know,

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we ban things. We build those massive concrete

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sound walls along highways. Which never seem

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to actually work, by the way. Right. We fight

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these endless exhausting battles against the

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sludge of modern sound. And Schaefer basically

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posits that this negative approach is a losing

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game. So what's the alternative? Well, to truly

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save our auditory sanity, we have to shift to

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a positive, creative approach. The goal of this

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book and the entire field he pioneered is to

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move us away from being passive victims of noise

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and transform us into active architects of what

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he terms acoustic design. Okay, let's unpack

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this, starting with that very word, soundscape.

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Right. Because it's a term Schaefer himself actually

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coined to describe the sonic environment as a

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rigorous field of study. It functions exactly

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the way a landscape describes the visual environment.

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Yeah, that visual parallel is key. But to really

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study a soundscape, you need a specialized vocabulary.

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I mean, you can't fix what you can't accurately

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describe, right? Yeah. And Schaefer provides

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these three foundational terms to classify sounds

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that just immediately click once you hear them.

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So first, he introduces the concept of keynote

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sounds. Which, for anyone familiar with music

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theory, the keynote is the anchor. Right. It's

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the fundamental tone around which a composition

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resolves. Yeah. But in our physical environment,

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keynotes are the ubiquitous sounds that form

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the background of our lives. Yeah, the sounds

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you don't even realize you're hearing. Totally.

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If you live in a maritime community, the keynote

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is the constant rhythm of the sea. Or if you

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live in a rural farming community, it might be

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the wind moving through acres of crops. You overhear

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these sounds constantly. but you rarely listen

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to them consciously. And that lack of conscious

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listening is the defining characteristic of a

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keynote. It is the anchor. It's the foundational

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layer. Okay, so what's the next layer? The second

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category he introduces sits directly on top of

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that foundational layer, and those are signals.

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Signals. Yeah, signals are the foreground sounds.

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These are the acoustic events we are either biologically

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or socially conditioned to listen to consciously.

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So like a police siren. Exactly. A police siren,

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a train whistle, the notification ping on your

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phone, a dog barking abruptly. They are specifically

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designed to command attention and convey immediate

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information. Okay, that makes sense. Background

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and foreground. Right. But then he moves to the

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third category, which is perhaps the most culturally

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significant. And he calls these sound marks.

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Sound marks. Thrive from landmarks, obviously.

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Exactly. A sound mark is a community sound that

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is entirely unique to a specific geographic place.

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It possesses qualities that make it specially

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regarded or noticed by the people who live there.

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I love this concept so much. It's brilliant.

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Schaefer's argument here is that once a sound

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mark is identified by a community, it deserves

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to be protected and preserved with the exact

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same rigor we apply to historical architecture.

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I find that classification system so helpful.

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Yeah. And just to put this into a more domestic

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analogy, keynotes are like the literal wallpaper

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of your living room. You stop seeing it the minute

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you move your furniture in, but its color and

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pattern deeply subconsciously affect your mood

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every single time you sit on the couch. Oh, that's

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good. And then signals are like the text messages

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popping up on your screen demanding your immediate

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conscious engagement. And the sound mark is that

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weird. beautiful, intricately carved antique

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clock on the mantle that your grandfather built.

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It doesn't just tell time. It defines the unique

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character of the house. That analogy holds up

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really well, especially when we connect it to

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the broader framework of human psychology, because

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Schaeffer's classifications perfectly map onto

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the psychological concept of figure and ground.

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Oh, right. The visual psychology thing. Exactly.

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Psychologists use this dynamic to describe visual

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perception. The figure is the subject you are

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actively looking at, say, a bird in a tree. And

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the ground is the background, the leaves, the

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sky, that gives the figure its spatial context.

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And Schaefer basically just translates this into

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audio. Yes. Brilliantly, I might add. He translates

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this visual psychology directly into an auditory

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framework. So keynotes function as the ground.

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Signals and sound marks act as the figure. Okay,

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I see where this is going. The crucial psychological

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insight here is interdependence. You cannot accurately

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perceive the figure without a stable ground.

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Right. If the background is a mess, you can't

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see the bird. Exactly. If the acoustic ground

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becomes too chaotic, too cluttered, or too loud,

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the figure loses its shape entirely. It just

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gets swallowed up. And as Schaefer meticulously

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documents throughout the book, That is exactly

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the auditory crisis of the modern world. The

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ground got too loud. Way too loud. Before we

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delve into how that crisis developed, I think

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we really need to establish just how powerful

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and ancient our sense of hearing actually is.

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Oh, absolutely. We take it for granted. We really

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do. But Schaefer explores this fascinating idea

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of clairaudience. Clear hearing. Yes, clear hearing.

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Yeah. He reminds us that for the vast majority

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of human history, hearing was actually considered

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superior to sight. Which feels so counterintuitive

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today. Right, because we are such a heavily visual

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culture now. But the written word is a relatively

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recent invention in the grand sweep of human

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development. For millennia, the word of God,

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the history of the tribe, the approach of a predator,

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it was all processed acoustically. It was heard,

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not seen. There is a deep ancient reverence for

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the ear across multiple cultures. And Schaefer

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digs into religious history to illustrate this.

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Like the Zoroastrian stuff. Yes, look at the

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Zoroastrian. Perdition, the priest Srosh, who

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represents the genius of hearing, is the pivotal

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figure who stands between humanity and the divine.

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His specific role is to listen for divine messages

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to transmit back to the physical world. Hearing

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as a literal conduit to the sacred. Exactly.

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And you see a similar reverence in the Sufi tradition.

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The specific word for spiritual audition or deep

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listening is sama. Right. The whirling dervishes.

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Yes. When the followers of Rumi engaged in their

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famous whirling dances, those slow, deliberate

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gyrations were thought to physically represent

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the movements of the solar system. Wait, so the

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spinning was about listening? Yes. They were

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attempting to induce a mystical trance, specifically

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to hear the music of the spheres, the profound

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extraterrestrial harmony of the universe itself.

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The ear wasn't just a biological tool. It was

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the primary organ of spiritual reception. That

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is wild. Let's ground that in biology, though,

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because the physics of hearing are just as profound

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as the spiritual history. For sure. I know you

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listening are generally familiar with acoustic

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physics, so we don't need to labor over the basics.

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But think about the philosophical implication

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of the lower threshold of human hearing. The

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20 hertz threshold. Right. When audible sound

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drops to around 20 hertz, it crosses a threshold

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where auditory perception basically fuses with

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tactile vibration. You feel it. You stop merely

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hearing a deep bass note and you start physically

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feeling it vibrating in your chest cavity. Schaefer

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points out that touch is considered the most

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personal, intimate of our senses. But hearing,

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fundamentally, is just touching at a distance.

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I love that phrase, touching at a distance. It

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changes everything. The sound wave is physically

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interacting with your body. And the intimacy

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of that physical interaction is vital to his

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entire argument because the ear actively soaks

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up information. It draws the external world inward

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into the body. It's an open door. Exactly. And

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critically. Unlike our visual system, we do not

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have earlids. Earlids? I hadn't even thought

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about that until I read that. Right. You cannot

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organically close off your hearing at will. When

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you fall asleep, your perception of sound is

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the absolute last door to close in your brain,

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and it remains the first door to open when you

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wake up. It's an alarm system. From an evolutionary

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standpoint, the ear functions as a permanent

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360 -degree early warning system. It literally

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has no physical defense mechanism against an

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intrusive acoustic environment. Right. So, OK,

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we have this incredibly sensitive, historically

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revered, physically intimate radar system that

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is permanently switched on. How then did we end

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up designing a modern world that seems custom

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built to physically and constantly assault our

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ears? I mean, it feels like an evolutionary contradiction.

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It does. And to understand that contradiction,

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we have to look at the historical pivot point

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Schaefer identifies. He dedicates a massive portion

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of his research to the transition from what he

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calls the hi -fi soundscape to the lo -fi soundscape.

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Ah, okay. The hi -fi versus lo -fi shift. This

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explains the auditory assault you're describing.

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Let's clearly define those terms because they

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are basically the bedrock of his historical analysis.

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Go for it. So a hi -fi or high -fidelity soundscape

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refers to the natural or pre -industrial world.

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In a hi -fi acoustic environment, The signal

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-to -noise ratio is highly favorable. Meaning

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the background ground isn't drowning out the

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figure. Exactly. This means discrete sounds can

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be heard clearly over vast distances. Because

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the background keynote is low and unobtrusive,

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a specific signal has room to travel. You can

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hear a shepherd's flute echoing across a valley.

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You can hear the snap of a twig or a single bird

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calling in a dense forest. There's actual acoustic

255
00:11:33,029 --> 00:11:36,029
space. It has room to breathe. Yes. But a lo

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00:11:36,029 --> 00:11:38,590
-fi soundscape, which is what we have now, is

257
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characterized by severe sound congestion. In

258
00:11:40,950 --> 00:11:43,950
a lo -fi soundscape, that favorable signal to

259
00:11:43,950 --> 00:11:47,190
noise ratio completely collapses. It drops to

260
00:11:47,190 --> 00:11:49,389
nearly one to one. Which is basically static.

261
00:11:49,629 --> 00:11:52,110
Yeah, it's a literal overpopulation of sounds

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00:11:52,110 --> 00:11:54,590
occurring simultaneously. Everything masks everything

263
00:11:54,590 --> 00:11:57,629
else. The ground becomes so dense that the figure

264
00:11:57,629 --> 00:11:59,970
just vanishes. It's like living inside a waterfall.

265
00:12:00,379 --> 00:12:03,100
Exactly. In a modern urban environment, it becomes

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00:12:03,100 --> 00:12:06,159
incredibly difficult to know what, if anything,

267
00:12:06,500 --> 00:12:08,840
you should be listening to because your ear is

268
00:12:08,840 --> 00:12:11,200
constantly overwhelmed by a wall of competing

269
00:12:11,200 --> 00:12:14,120
frequencies. And the great historical catalyst

270
00:12:14,120 --> 00:12:16,679
for this catastrophic shift from hi -fi to lo

271
00:12:16,679 --> 00:12:19,659
-fi was unequivocally the Industrial Revolution.

272
00:12:19,659 --> 00:12:22,700
The machines. And Schaefer gives this genuinely

273
00:12:22,700 --> 00:12:24,860
heartbreaking example of the lost work song.

274
00:12:25,179 --> 00:12:27,679
to illustrate this shift. Oh, this section is

275
00:12:27,679 --> 00:12:30,299
brilliant. It really is. Before the proliferation

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00:12:30,299 --> 00:12:32,500
of factories, work and song were fundamentally

277
00:12:32,500 --> 00:12:35,419
united. The biological rhythm of the human body

278
00:12:35,419 --> 00:12:38,460
engaged in physical labor was perfectly matched

279
00:12:38,460 --> 00:12:40,960
by the human voice singing. The song literally

280
00:12:40,960 --> 00:12:44,460
set the pace. Right. The work song set the pace,

281
00:12:44,600 --> 00:12:47,159
coordinated the team, and provided a creative

282
00:12:47,159 --> 00:12:50,250
outlet. But the machine killed the work song.

283
00:12:50,779 --> 00:12:53,480
And he turns to literature to prove this, acting

284
00:12:53,480 --> 00:12:55,620
almost like an acoustic historian. Which is just

285
00:12:55,620 --> 00:12:58,539
a unique methodology. It is. Look at Tolstoy

286
00:12:58,539 --> 00:13:00,279
writing about the Russian countryside in the

287
00:13:00,279 --> 00:13:03,840
19th century. The peasants are still singing

288
00:13:03,840 --> 00:13:06,460
in harmony over the rhythmic, physical swinging

289
00:13:06,460 --> 00:13:08,460
of their sickles. Classic hi -fi environment.

290
00:13:08,860 --> 00:13:11,940
Exactly. The human voice has the acoustic space

291
00:13:11,940 --> 00:13:15,639
to exist. But then you read Thomas Hardy's Tess

292
00:13:15,639 --> 00:13:17,759
of the d 'Urbervilles, which was roughly contemporary

293
00:13:17,759 --> 00:13:20,500
with Anna Karenina. Tess is working in the English

294
00:13:20,500 --> 00:13:23,519
countryside, but that countryside has been mechanized.

295
00:13:23,580 --> 00:13:26,179
And she's not singing. She's not. Hardy describes

296
00:13:26,179 --> 00:13:29,539
her standing completely mute. Her work, her voice,

297
00:13:29,639 --> 00:13:32,360
her actual presence is entirely smothered by

298
00:13:32,360 --> 00:13:34,899
the, and this is a, quote, concatenated roar

299
00:13:34,899 --> 00:13:37,340
of the mechanical threshing machine. The machine

300
00:13:37,340 --> 00:13:39,639
robbed her of the acoustic space required to

301
00:13:39,639 --> 00:13:42,309
sing. It represents a profound loss of human

302
00:13:42,309 --> 00:13:44,490
expression and autonomy. Because the machine

303
00:13:44,490 --> 00:13:46,929
didn't simply automate the physical labor, it

304
00:13:46,929 --> 00:13:48,970
completely automated the soundscape. It pushed

305
00:13:48,970 --> 00:13:51,269
us out. It pushed the human voice out of its

306
00:13:51,269 --> 00:13:53,769
own natural environment. When the background

307
00:13:53,769 --> 00:13:56,450
noise exceeds the capacity of the human voice,

308
00:13:56,710 --> 00:14:00,049
the human is effectively silenced. Okay. But

309
00:14:00,049 --> 00:14:01,870
I have to push back on this historical narrative

310
00:14:01,870 --> 00:14:04,470
for a second, though. Or at least ask the question

311
00:14:04,470 --> 00:14:06,590
that immediately came to my mind while reading

312
00:14:06,590 --> 00:14:09,460
his sources. Sure. We read these historical accounts

313
00:14:09,460 --> 00:14:12,360
of the new factories. There's that famous passage

314
00:14:12,360 --> 00:14:14,960
by Stendhal in The Red and the Black where he

315
00:14:14,960 --> 00:14:18,559
describes an entire town dominated by 20 ponderous,

316
00:14:18,559 --> 00:14:21,980
terrifying sledgehammers crashing down, making

317
00:14:21,980 --> 00:14:24,620
the very pavement of the street shudder. A horrifying

318
00:14:24,620 --> 00:14:26,919
soundscape. Right. So if these machines were

319
00:14:26,919 --> 00:14:29,720
so incredibly loud, so jarring, so physically

320
00:14:29,720 --> 00:14:33,059
painful to ears that it only ever known the quiet

321
00:14:33,059 --> 00:14:36,389
of the hi -fi natural world. Why didn't people

322
00:14:36,389 --> 00:14:38,610
rebel? It's the million dollar question. Why

323
00:14:38,610 --> 00:14:42,210
did society on a massive scale just accept this

324
00:14:42,210 --> 00:14:45,509
brutal influx of mechanical noise? And Schaefer's

325
00:14:45,509 --> 00:14:48,309
answer provides one of his most brilliant sociological

326
00:14:48,309 --> 00:14:50,870
insights. To understand why there was no mass

327
00:14:50,870 --> 00:14:53,450
auditory rebellion, we have to explore the concept

328
00:14:53,450 --> 00:14:56,600
of sacred noise. Sacred noise. Okay. If we go

329
00:14:56,600 --> 00:14:59,940
back to ancient times, extremely loud noises

330
00:14:59,940 --> 00:15:03,159
like thunderclaps, erupting volcanoes, massive

331
00:15:03,159 --> 00:15:06,919
violent storms, they evoked fear, sure, but also

332
00:15:06,919 --> 00:15:10,139
immense respect because they were undeniable

333
00:15:10,139 --> 00:15:13,240
physical representations of divine power. Right,

334
00:15:13,299 --> 00:15:15,159
you hear thunder, you think the gods are angry.

335
00:15:15,340 --> 00:15:18,580
Exactly. Now, over centuries of cultural development,

336
00:15:18,799 --> 00:15:20,960
humanity transferred that respect for naturally

337
00:15:20,960 --> 00:15:23,960
occurring sacred noise to the institutions of

338
00:15:23,960 --> 00:15:27,590
the church. Oh. The bells. The massive booming

339
00:15:27,590 --> 00:15:30,750
church bell ringing across the valley. The thundering

340
00:15:30,750 --> 00:15:33,350
pipe organ that literally made the wooden pews

341
00:15:33,350 --> 00:15:36,090
wobble in the cathedral. These were socially

342
00:15:36,090 --> 00:15:39,190
sanctioned sacred noises. They held the acoustic

343
00:15:39,190 --> 00:15:41,529
power of God and they commanded the community's

344
00:15:41,529 --> 00:15:43,830
attention. So historically, the church essentially

345
00:15:43,830 --> 00:15:46,190
held a monopoly on the loudest sounds within

346
00:15:46,190 --> 00:15:48,070
any given community. Precisely. The loudest sound

347
00:15:48,070 --> 00:15:50,639
was the most culturally important sound. But

348
00:15:50,639 --> 00:15:52,740
then, what happens during the Industrial Revolution?

349
00:15:53,039 --> 00:15:55,659
Schaefer builds this argument that the industrialists

350
00:15:55,659 --> 00:15:57,879
essentially adopted the mantle of the church.

351
00:15:58,139 --> 00:16:00,899
They stole the sacred noise. They did. They built

352
00:16:00,899 --> 00:16:03,759
the steam engine, the blast furnace, the massive

353
00:16:03,759 --> 00:16:06,720
mechanized loom. These enormous machines become

354
00:16:06,720 --> 00:16:10,320
the new, unquestionable gods of power, progress,

355
00:16:10,600 --> 00:16:13,299
and economic survival. And because we were already

356
00:16:13,299 --> 00:16:16,279
conditioned? Exactly. Because society had already

357
00:16:16,279 --> 00:16:19,340
equated massive noise with supreme power, the

358
00:16:19,340 --> 00:16:21,779
industrialists were implicitly granted a societal

359
00:16:21,779 --> 00:16:24,559
dispensation to make as much noise as they wanted.

360
00:16:24,759 --> 00:16:26,799
That makes so much sense. From their perspective,

361
00:16:27,039 --> 00:16:29,419
it wasn't seen as a nuisance. It was the awe

362
00:16:29,419 --> 00:16:32,240
-inspiring, tangible sound of economic supremacy

363
00:16:32,240 --> 00:16:35,740
and human triumph over nature. In fact, Schaefer

364
00:16:35,740 --> 00:16:37,740
speculates that if completely silent machinery

365
00:16:37,740 --> 00:16:40,200
could have been miraculously developed in 1800,

366
00:16:40,700 --> 00:16:42,759
the industrialists probably wouldn't have even

367
00:16:42,759 --> 00:16:45,429
used it. Wait, really? Because the tremendous

368
00:16:45,429 --> 00:16:48,409
noise actively advertised their dominance. That's

369
00:16:48,409 --> 00:16:51,730
a fascinating sociological frame. The idea of

370
00:16:51,730 --> 00:16:54,509
noise not as an accidental byproduct, but as

371
00:16:54,509 --> 00:16:57,490
a deliberate psychological tool of cultural dominance.

372
00:16:57,629 --> 00:17:00,750
It was a flex. It totally was. And that equation

373
00:17:00,750 --> 00:17:04,089
noise equals power obviously didn't stay confined

374
00:17:04,089 --> 00:17:06,049
to the factory floor of 19th century England.

375
00:17:06,329 --> 00:17:09,809
It began to colonize the entire world. Schaefer

376
00:17:09,809 --> 00:17:12,750
borrows a concept from the historian Oswald Spengler

377
00:17:12,750 --> 00:17:16,650
to explain this. Sound imperialism. Right. Spengler

378
00:17:16,650 --> 00:17:19,369
wrote extensively about imperialism, and Schaeffer

379
00:17:19,369 --> 00:17:21,809
takes Spengler's theories and applies them directly

380
00:17:21,809 --> 00:17:24,009
to acoustics. It's such a clean application,

381
00:17:24,210 --> 00:17:26,869
too. Spengler originally talked about imperialism

382
00:17:26,869 --> 00:17:29,990
as the aggressive extension of an empire or an

383
00:17:29,990 --> 00:17:32,650
ideology to remote parts of the world, dominating

384
00:17:32,650 --> 00:17:35,549
local cultures. Schaeffer takes that and says,

385
00:17:35,670 --> 00:17:38,029
when sound power creates a large enough acoustic

386
00:17:38,029 --> 00:17:40,670
profile, it becomes inherently imperialistic.

387
00:17:40,670 --> 00:17:43,130
How so? Like, give me an example. His core example

388
00:17:43,130 --> 00:17:46,089
is simple but profound. A man with a loudspeaker

389
00:17:46,089 --> 00:17:48,250
is inherently more imperialistic than a man with

390
00:17:48,250 --> 00:17:50,710
a shovel. Okay, because of the range. Simply

391
00:17:50,710 --> 00:17:53,150
because the man with the loudspeaker has the

392
00:17:53,150 --> 00:17:55,410
technological power to dominate and interrupt

393
00:17:55,410 --> 00:17:58,890
a vastly larger amount of acoustic space. No

394
00:17:58,890 --> 00:18:01,349
one three blocks away is forced to listen to

395
00:18:01,349 --> 00:18:03,779
the bitch digger. But everyone within a three

396
00:18:03,779 --> 00:18:06,140
block radius is absolutely forced to listen to

397
00:18:06,140 --> 00:18:08,819
the man with the megaphone. And so Western industrialized

398
00:18:08,819 --> 00:18:11,579
society, Schaefer argues, leaves its acoustic

399
00:18:11,579 --> 00:18:14,339
calling cards all over the globe. We show up

400
00:18:14,339 --> 00:18:17,099
with our Western made machinery, our jet engines,

401
00:18:17,279 --> 00:18:20,079
our modern airports, our heavy construction equipment,

402
00:18:20,140 --> 00:18:23,400
and we just pulverize the local traditional acoustic

403
00:18:23,400 --> 00:18:26,539
cultures. We overwrite their soundscape. We blast

404
00:18:26,539 --> 00:18:28,619
their hi -fi environment straight into the background.

405
00:18:29,690 --> 00:18:31,730
As I was reading his analysis of this industrial

406
00:18:31,730 --> 00:18:34,529
shift, I realized it's not just the volume of

407
00:18:34,529 --> 00:18:36,210
the Industrial Revolution that changed the world.

408
00:18:36,309 --> 00:18:38,450
It's the shape of the sound itself. Yes, the

409
00:18:38,450 --> 00:18:40,309
texture of it. And this brings us to a concept

410
00:18:40,309 --> 00:18:42,549
that completely shifted how I hear my own house.

411
00:18:42,950 --> 00:18:45,750
The invention of the flatline in sound. This

412
00:18:45,750 --> 00:18:48,289
is a vital concept for understanding why modern

413
00:18:48,289 --> 00:18:51,789
acoustic environments feel so fatiguing. Think

414
00:18:51,789 --> 00:18:53,789
about the acoustic properties of the natural

415
00:18:53,789 --> 00:18:57,730
world, with very few exceptions. Maybe the continuous

416
00:18:57,730 --> 00:19:00,750
drone of a swarm of cicadas and high summer sounds

417
00:19:00,750 --> 00:19:03,109
in the natural world are discrete and interrupted.

418
00:19:03,410 --> 00:19:05,470
They stop and start. Right. They have a distinct

419
00:19:05,470 --> 00:19:08,509
beginning, a middle, and an end. In acoustic

420
00:19:08,509 --> 00:19:11,150
terms, they have an attack, a body, and a decay.

421
00:19:11,549 --> 00:19:14,789
They breathe. They are tied to biological events.

422
00:19:15,289 --> 00:19:17,670
And Schaefer tells this amazing anecdote to illustrate

423
00:19:17,670 --> 00:19:20,690
this. He was in Tehran listening to traditional

424
00:19:20,690 --> 00:19:23,369
stonemasons working. He's actively listening

425
00:19:23,369 --> 00:19:25,490
to the rhythm of their hammers, and he suddenly

426
00:19:25,490 --> 00:19:27,750
realizes that in all pre -industrial societies,

427
00:19:28,150 --> 00:19:30,490
the vast majority of human -made sounds were

428
00:19:30,490 --> 00:19:33,190
discreet. Like a heartbeat. Exactly. The hammer

429
00:19:33,190 --> 00:19:35,630
strikes a stone, making a sharp sound, and then

430
00:19:35,630 --> 00:19:37,630
there is a necessary physical pause as the human

431
00:19:37,630 --> 00:19:40,269
arm raises to strike again. Tap, tap, tap. There

432
00:19:40,269 --> 00:19:42,829
is rhythm. There is a sense of biological duration

433
00:19:42,829 --> 00:19:45,740
and physical effort embedded in the sound. But

434
00:19:45,740 --> 00:19:48,119
the industrial and subsequent electric revolutions

435
00:19:48,119 --> 00:19:50,720
introduced something entirely alien to human

436
00:19:50,720 --> 00:19:54,500
biology. The continuous, unyielding line of sound.

437
00:19:54,700 --> 00:19:57,730
The flatline. The flatline. When you take the

438
00:19:57,730 --> 00:20:00,089
rhythmic impulses of a machine and speed them

439
00:20:00,089 --> 00:20:03,390
up fast enough, those individual impulses fuse

440
00:20:03,390 --> 00:20:06,210
together into a continuous drone. Like a sewing

441
00:20:06,210 --> 00:20:09,190
machine. Exactly. The sewing machine, the electroclom

442
00:20:09,190 --> 00:20:11,529
of a power grid, the diesel generator, the constant

443
00:20:11,529 --> 00:20:15,109
rush of a ventilator. These sounds form flat

444
00:20:15,109 --> 00:20:17,390
lines in space and time. They do not breathe.

445
00:20:17,490 --> 00:20:20,089
They do not have an attack or a decay. They do

446
00:20:20,089 --> 00:20:22,190
not die. They're completely super biological.

447
00:20:22,750 --> 00:20:25,490
They exist entirely outside the physical limitations

448
00:20:25,490 --> 00:20:27,869
of the human body. And once you notice them,

449
00:20:27,950 --> 00:20:30,529
you realize they are everywhere. I mean, I'm

450
00:20:30,529 --> 00:20:32,369
sitting here right now, and if I really focus,

451
00:20:32,470 --> 00:20:35,329
I can hear the flat line of the studio's HVAC

452
00:20:35,329 --> 00:20:38,630
system pushing air. It never wavers. It just

453
00:20:38,630 --> 00:20:41,049
sits there, taking up space. And Schaefer actually

454
00:20:41,049 --> 00:20:44,230
references the philosopher Henri Bergson to explain

455
00:20:44,230 --> 00:20:47,089
the psychological toll of this. Bergson talked

456
00:20:47,089 --> 00:20:49,410
about how certain constant sensory inputs act

457
00:20:49,410 --> 00:20:51,809
as a narcotic to the brain. A narcotic, wow.

458
00:20:52,319 --> 00:20:54,740
Yeah. Schaefer applies this to the soundscape,

459
00:20:54,839 --> 00:20:57,700
arguing that the flat drone of modern life, the

460
00:20:57,700 --> 00:21:00,259
constant unyielding hum of our infrastructure,

461
00:21:00,559 --> 00:21:03,880
is essentially an anti -intellectual narcotic.

462
00:21:04,000 --> 00:21:06,259
It strips away our sense of duration, our sense

463
00:21:06,259 --> 00:21:09,380
of time passing. It's just a static wall of sound

464
00:21:09,380 --> 00:21:12,319
that subtly numbs our cognitive faculties. It

465
00:21:12,319 --> 00:21:15,579
creates a deep, pervasive listlessness. Because

466
00:21:15,579 --> 00:21:18,140
we are biological creatures, right? Our brains

467
00:21:18,140 --> 00:21:21,480
and bodies inherently expect cycles. We are hardwired

468
00:21:21,480 --> 00:21:23,880
to expect daylight and darkness, waking and sleeping,

469
00:21:24,180 --> 00:21:27,299
action and rest, silence and sound. It's an oscillation.

470
00:21:27,380 --> 00:21:29,599
Exactly. When you surround a biological creature

471
00:21:29,599 --> 00:21:31,859
with a super biological drone that never ever

472
00:21:31,859 --> 00:21:34,720
stops, it creates profound, subtle cognitive

473
00:21:34,720 --> 00:21:37,400
exhaustion. The brain is constantly processing

474
00:21:37,400 --> 00:21:40,410
an acoustic input that never resolves. So the

475
00:21:40,410 --> 00:21:42,329
factories gave us the drone, the flatline, the

476
00:21:42,329 --> 00:21:45,049
lo -fi environment. But here's an aspect of Schaefer's

477
00:21:45,049 --> 00:21:47,029
historical analysis that really surprised me.

478
00:21:47,089 --> 00:21:48,589
What's that? We tend to think of this as just

479
00:21:48,589 --> 00:21:51,490
a blue -collar industrial problem, factory noise.

480
00:21:52,009 --> 00:21:54,309
But it wasn't just the factory floor that changed.

481
00:21:54,490 --> 00:21:57,210
The supposedly high culture of the era completely

482
00:21:57,210 --> 00:22:00,130
mirrored this industrial transformation. Oh,

483
00:22:00,210 --> 00:22:02,690
the orchestra comparison. Yes. Schaefer argues

484
00:22:02,690 --> 00:22:04,950
that the classical symphony orchestra actually

485
00:22:04,950 --> 00:22:07,759
evolved in lockstep with the factory. He draws

486
00:22:07,759 --> 00:22:11,140
heavily on Lewis Mumford's historical critiques

487
00:22:11,140 --> 00:22:14,019
here to make a brilliant parallel. Look at how

488
00:22:14,019 --> 00:22:16,319
the symphony orchestra physically changed in

489
00:22:16,319 --> 00:22:18,880
the 19th century. It got huge. It got massive.

490
00:22:19,180 --> 00:22:22,259
As city densities thickened and the ambient noise

491
00:22:22,259 --> 00:22:24,819
of the streets grew louder, the orchestra grew

492
00:22:24,819 --> 00:22:27,640
massively in both physical size and acoustic

493
00:22:27,640 --> 00:22:31,349
volume. It had to compete with the new polynoise

494
00:22:31,349 --> 00:22:34,009
of the industrial world. But the parallel is

495
00:22:34,009 --> 00:22:36,009
deeper than just volume, right? Much deeper.

496
00:22:36,450 --> 00:22:38,750
Mumford points out that the strict division of

497
00:22:38,750 --> 00:22:41,309
labor within a large, modern symphony orchestra

498
00:22:41,309 --> 00:22:44,230
corresponds exactly to the division of labor

499
00:22:44,230 --> 00:22:47,130
in an industrial factory. Okay, I see the analogy,

500
00:22:47,289 --> 00:22:49,769
but let me complicate that for a second. We usually

501
00:22:49,769 --> 00:22:51,750
think of an orchestra as the pinnacle of collaborative

502
00:22:51,750 --> 00:22:55,630
human art, whereas a factory is about rigid mechanical

503
00:22:55,630 --> 00:22:58,990
output. How exactly are they mirroring each other

504
00:22:58,990 --> 00:23:01,450
structurally? It comes down to hierarchy and

505
00:23:01,450 --> 00:23:04,230
synchronization. In the evolving 19th century

506
00:23:04,230 --> 00:23:06,430
orchestra, you have the conductor. The conductor

507
00:23:06,430 --> 00:23:08,390
acts essentially as the factory superintendent.

508
00:23:08,809 --> 00:23:11,250
The conductor doesn't actually produce the sound,

509
00:23:11,269 --> 00:23:14,150
but controls the pace and output. Like a manager.

510
00:23:14,390 --> 00:23:16,329
Right. Then you have the composer, functioning

511
00:23:16,329 --> 00:23:18,470
as the inventor or the engineer drafting the

512
00:23:18,470 --> 00:23:20,829
complex blueprints. And you have the musicians.

513
00:23:21,630 --> 00:23:24,470
functionally divided by highly specialized tasks.

514
00:23:24,829 --> 00:23:27,029
The string section, the brass, the woodwind.

515
00:23:27,109 --> 00:23:30,529
Exactly. And they are producing a collective,

516
00:23:30,589 --> 00:23:34,150
synchronized unison that was actually perfected

517
00:23:34,150 --> 00:23:36,569
in the orchestra pit long before it was adapted

518
00:23:36,569 --> 00:23:39,390
for the factory assembly line. The orchestra,

519
00:23:39,529 --> 00:23:43,470
in this structural view, was the ideal artistic

520
00:23:43,470 --> 00:23:47,309
prototype for the new mechanized society. It

521
00:23:47,309 --> 00:23:49,789
was human beings acting with the precision and

522
00:23:49,789 --> 00:23:52,470
volume of a machine. That reframes classical

523
00:23:52,470 --> 00:23:54,789
music history in such a wild way. I'm never going

524
00:23:54,789 --> 00:23:56,589
to watch a symphony the same way again. Right.

525
00:23:56,670 --> 00:23:59,109
And as we move into the 20th century, Schaeffer

526
00:23:59,109 --> 00:24:01,549
notes that the line between musical art and industrial

527
00:24:01,549 --> 00:24:05,269
noise began to dissolve entirely. Because modern

528
00:24:05,269 --> 00:24:07,990
music eventually had to directly react to the

529
00:24:07,990 --> 00:24:09,829
lo -fi world. It couldn't ignore it anymore.

530
00:24:10,069 --> 00:24:12,710
You have avant -garde composers like... Luigi

531
00:24:12,710 --> 00:24:14,809
Russolla, who wrote the manifesto The Art of

532
00:24:14,809 --> 00:24:17,930
Noises, or John Cage, who famously started bringing

533
00:24:17,930 --> 00:24:20,150
the sounds of traffic, radios, and mechanical

534
00:24:20,150 --> 00:24:23,549
objects directly into the concert hall. The traditional

535
00:24:23,549 --> 00:24:26,470
definition of music had to expand until it literally

536
00:24:26,470 --> 00:24:28,869
swallowed the noise of the modern street. And

537
00:24:28,869 --> 00:24:31,369
we see the cultural migration of that sacred

538
00:24:31,369 --> 00:24:33,730
noise concept play out again. Oh, yeah. Think

539
00:24:33,730 --> 00:24:36,369
about it. The church held the sacred noise, then

540
00:24:36,369 --> 00:24:38,670
the industrialists adopted it with their blast

541
00:24:38,670 --> 00:24:41,450
furnaces, and then, in the mid -20th century,

542
00:24:41,980 --> 00:24:45,319
The youth counterculture essentially stole the

543
00:24:45,319 --> 00:24:48,259
sacred noise from the industrialists. Rock and

544
00:24:48,259 --> 00:24:50,980
roll. Look at the incredible chest -thumping

545
00:24:50,980 --> 00:24:55,019
volume of the 1960s rock concert. Schaefer points

546
00:24:55,019 --> 00:24:57,819
out that teenagers were willingly getting Boilermaker's

547
00:24:57,819 --> 00:25:00,140
disease, which is the literal clinical term for

548
00:25:00,140 --> 00:25:02,599
industrial hearing loss, from going to see bands

549
00:25:02,599 --> 00:25:05,329
like The Who or Jimi Hendrix. They were weaponizing

550
00:25:05,329 --> 00:25:07,990
the noise. Exactly. They were weaponizing that

551
00:25:07,990 --> 00:25:10,829
massive amplified sound to create an alternative

552
00:25:10,829 --> 00:25:13,730
lifestyle. They were essentially using the acoustic

553
00:25:13,730 --> 00:25:16,470
power of the machine to fight the cultural machine.

554
00:25:16,910 --> 00:25:19,210
But regardless of whether the noise is coming

555
00:25:19,210 --> 00:25:22,670
from a factory or a Marshall amplifier, look

556
00:25:22,670 --> 00:25:25,210
at the broad societal reaction to this overwhelming

557
00:25:25,210 --> 00:25:28,640
wall of sound. As the environment becomes increasingly

558
00:25:28,640 --> 00:25:32,440
lo -fi, it pushes humanity into a defensive posture.

559
00:25:32,680 --> 00:25:35,480
A retreat. And Schaefer describes this modern

560
00:25:35,480 --> 00:25:38,900
phenomenon as the return to the submarine home.

561
00:25:39,160 --> 00:25:41,559
It's an incredibly evocative phrase. I mean,

562
00:25:41,559 --> 00:25:44,819
if the outside world is an unrelenting, uncurated

563
00:25:44,819 --> 00:25:47,700
lo -fi sludge of traffic, jackhammers, sirens,

564
00:25:47,799 --> 00:25:50,420
and overlapping flatlines, what is the natural

565
00:25:50,420 --> 00:25:53,500
human response? We hide. We retreat. We seal

566
00:25:53,500 --> 00:25:55,859
the double -paned windows. We install climate

567
00:25:55,859 --> 00:25:58,059
control so we never have to open those windows.

568
00:25:58,240 --> 00:26:00,980
And on an individual level, we put on noise -canceling

569
00:26:00,980 --> 00:26:03,279
headphones. You use technology to block out technology.

570
00:26:03,720 --> 00:26:05,680
Schaefer observes that headphones direct us to

571
00:26:05,680 --> 00:26:08,900
a strange new integrity with ourselves. We create

572
00:26:08,900 --> 00:26:11,279
our own private, meticulously controlled interior

573
00:26:11,279 --> 00:26:13,740
soundscape specifically because we have entirely

574
00:26:13,740 --> 00:26:16,480
surrendered the shared public soundscape. If

575
00:26:16,480 --> 00:26:19,059
we're just hiding in our headphones, we've essentially

576
00:26:19,059 --> 00:26:21,759
ceded the street to the machines. Yeah. But...

577
00:26:22,029 --> 00:26:24,089
If we decide we want to take it back, if we want

578
00:26:24,089 --> 00:26:26,430
to actually study and fix the outside world,

579
00:26:26,650 --> 00:26:29,750
how do we even start? You can't just take a photograph

580
00:26:29,750 --> 00:26:32,769
of sound. Right. Which brings us to the methodological

581
00:26:32,769 --> 00:26:35,990
core of Schaeffer's work, analysis and mapping

582
00:26:35,990 --> 00:26:38,410
the invisible. This is where Schaeffer's work

583
00:26:38,410 --> 00:26:41,309
shifts from historical philosophy to hard science,

584
00:26:41,509 --> 00:26:44,359
entering the field of sonography. And he immediately

585
00:26:44,359 --> 00:26:47,259
acknowledges a massive logistical challenge here.

586
00:26:47,460 --> 00:26:50,119
Huge challenge. If a city planner wants to study

587
00:26:50,119 --> 00:26:52,059
a physical landscape, they can just charter a

588
00:26:52,059 --> 00:26:54,799
plane and take an aerial photograph. In one frame,

589
00:26:54,900 --> 00:26:56,480
they have the whole picture. They can see the

590
00:26:56,480 --> 00:26:58,420
rivers, the mountains, the city grid, the straw.

591
00:26:58,920 --> 00:27:01,359
But you cannot take an aerial photograph of a

592
00:27:01,359 --> 00:27:03,640
soundscape. Because a microphone does not function

593
00:27:03,640 --> 00:27:06,279
like a camera lens. Exactly. A microphone only

594
00:27:06,279 --> 00:27:08,660
samples specific acoustic details at a specific

595
00:27:08,660 --> 00:27:11,160
point in space. It gives you a highly localized

596
00:27:11,160 --> 00:27:14,150
close -up. So the methodological problem becomes,

597
00:27:14,190 --> 00:27:17,049
how do we get a bird's eye view of all the complex

598
00:27:17,049 --> 00:27:19,970
overlapping sounds in a sprawling city? It requires

599
00:27:19,970 --> 00:27:23,009
some serious creativity. And Schaefer and his

600
00:27:23,009 --> 00:27:25,450
team at the World Soundscape Project developed

601
00:27:25,450 --> 00:27:29,250
a few really ingenious ways to visualize this

602
00:27:29,250 --> 00:27:32,009
invisible data. One of the primary tools they

603
00:27:32,009 --> 00:27:35,299
developed is the Isabel contour map. Isabel maps.

604
00:27:35,500 --> 00:27:37,640
Let's explain those. So to picture this, think

605
00:27:37,640 --> 00:27:39,799
of a meteorological weather map that shows high

606
00:27:39,799 --> 00:27:42,019
and low pressure systems using swirling lines.

607
00:27:42,400 --> 00:27:44,859
Like on the evening news. Right. An Isabel map

608
00:27:44,859 --> 00:27:47,759
applies that exact visual language to acoustics.

609
00:27:47,880 --> 00:27:51,059
But the process of making one is incredibly labor

610
00:27:51,059 --> 00:27:54,039
intensive. It requires taking thousands upon

611
00:27:54,039 --> 00:27:56,660
thousands of individual decibel readings across

612
00:27:56,660 --> 00:27:59,359
a city grid over a long period of time. Just

613
00:27:59,359 --> 00:28:01,660
standing on corners with a decibel meter. Exactly.

614
00:28:02,339 --> 00:28:05,079
Then researchers plot those data points and draw

615
00:28:05,079 --> 00:28:07,680
contour lines connecting areas of equal sound

616
00:28:07,680 --> 00:28:10,299
level intensity. When you finally look at this

617
00:28:10,299 --> 00:28:12,700
completed map, the invisible becomes visible.

618
00:28:13,019 --> 00:28:15,759
You can immediately identify the valleys of quiet

619
00:28:15,759 --> 00:28:18,759
sanctuaries and the mountains of dangerous high

620
00:28:18,759 --> 00:28:20,980
decibel noise corridors running through a city.

621
00:28:21,099 --> 00:28:23,440
It's a vital tool for urban planning. Yeah. And

622
00:28:23,440 --> 00:28:25,599
alongside the Isabel maps, they also utilize

623
00:28:25,599 --> 00:28:27,799
what they call events maps. How do those differ?

624
00:28:28,059 --> 00:28:30,789
Well... While an Isabel map measures raw volume,

625
00:28:31,009 --> 00:28:33,529
an events map tracks the spatial distribution

626
00:28:33,529 --> 00:28:36,569
and temporal recurrence of specific sounds. So,

627
00:28:36,609 --> 00:28:38,970
say, tracking every single instance of a church

628
00:28:38,970 --> 00:28:40,829
bell ringing or an airplane passing overhead

629
00:28:40,829 --> 00:28:44,049
across a specific geographical area. Oh, tracking

630
00:28:44,049 --> 00:28:47,490
the rhythms. Exactly. But perhaps the most exhaustive

631
00:28:47,490 --> 00:28:49,890
and fascinating methodology Schaefer employed

632
00:28:49,890 --> 00:28:53,500
was his cataloging index. He wasn't content to

633
00:28:53,500 --> 00:28:55,720
just measure modern sounds with a decibel meter.

634
00:28:55,859 --> 00:28:59,259
He categorized them by distance, intensity, setting,

635
00:28:59,420 --> 00:29:02,319
and even deep historical shifts. Because audio

636
00:29:02,319 --> 00:29:04,039
recording technology is only about a century

637
00:29:04,039 --> 00:29:06,440
old. Right. So he had to find a way to measure

638
00:29:06,440 --> 00:29:09,319
the soundscapes of the past without audio recordings.

639
00:29:09,500 --> 00:29:12,039
And how he did that is brilliant. He created

640
00:29:12,039 --> 00:29:14,559
this massive searchable database of literary

641
00:29:14,559 --> 00:29:17,220
quotes about sound. Books as audio recorders.

642
00:29:17,359 --> 00:29:20,470
Yes. He treated novelists and poets as the audio

643
00:29:20,470 --> 00:29:22,789
recording devices of their eras, using their

644
00:29:22,789 --> 00:29:24,930
descriptions to track how our sonic environment

645
00:29:24,930 --> 00:29:27,710
has mutated over centuries. The data points he

646
00:29:27,710 --> 00:29:30,089
extracts from this literary analysis are incredibly

647
00:29:30,089 --> 00:29:32,529
revealing. They are staggering. For example,

648
00:29:32,650 --> 00:29:35,869
he conducted a statistical analysis of 19th century

649
00:29:35,869 --> 00:29:39,289
British literature and found that 48 % of all

650
00:29:39,289 --> 00:29:42,210
sound descriptions in those texts referred to

651
00:29:42,210 --> 00:29:46,269
natural sounds. Birds, wind, water, animals.

652
00:29:46,410 --> 00:29:48,799
Almost half. Almost half. But when he analyzed

653
00:29:48,799 --> 00:29:50,980
20th century British literature, that number

654
00:29:50,980 --> 00:29:55,119
had plummeted to just 28%. Wow. The sounds of

655
00:29:55,119 --> 00:29:57,440
nature were literally being written out of the

656
00:29:57,440 --> 00:30:00,079
European consciousness. Not because writers suddenly

657
00:30:00,079 --> 00:30:02,380
disliked nature, but because those natural sounds

658
00:30:02,380 --> 00:30:04,819
had been physically drowned out by the lo -fi

659
00:30:04,819 --> 00:30:07,279
reality of modern Europe. That is a staggering

660
00:30:07,279 --> 00:30:09,990
statistical drop. Interestingly, he notes that

661
00:30:09,990 --> 00:30:12,230
North American literature stayed relatively steady

662
00:30:12,230 --> 00:30:15,150
at around 50 % natural sounds across both centuries,

663
00:30:15,369 --> 00:30:17,430
which he attributes to the sheer scale of the

664
00:30:17,430 --> 00:30:20,369
continent and our continued access to vast, relatively

665
00:30:20,369 --> 00:30:22,990
untouched natural spaces. We just had more room

666
00:30:22,990 --> 00:30:25,650
to escape the noise. Right. But my absolute favorite

667
00:30:25,650 --> 00:30:28,069
historical nugget from his literary catalog is

668
00:30:28,069 --> 00:30:31,109
this comparison. You go all the way back to 70

669
00:30:31,109 --> 00:30:34,250
BC, and you find writers like Virgil and Cicero

670
00:30:34,250 --> 00:30:36,509
bitterly, specifically complaining about the

671
00:30:36,509 --> 00:30:38,960
sound of the handsaw. The handsaw. The handsaw.

672
00:30:39,019 --> 00:30:41,240
It was relatively new technology at the time,

673
00:30:41,259 --> 00:30:43,660
and they absolutely hated the grating noise it

674
00:30:43,660 --> 00:30:46,039
made. They documented their annoyance. But then

675
00:30:46,039 --> 00:30:48,480
you fast forward to the Industrial Revolution.

676
00:30:48,980 --> 00:30:51,759
Hundreds of years go by with massive factories

677
00:30:51,759 --> 00:30:54,640
screaming, grinding, and belching smoke across

678
00:30:54,640 --> 00:30:57,559
England, and almost nobody complains about the

679
00:30:57,559 --> 00:31:00,160
noise in literature until writers like Charles

680
00:31:00,160 --> 00:31:02,880
Dickens and Emile Zola come along much, much

681
00:31:02,880 --> 00:31:06,200
later. It perfectly illustrates how deep societal

682
00:31:06,200 --> 00:31:09,519
values dictate human perception. How so? Well,

683
00:31:09,599 --> 00:31:11,900
the Romans hated the handsaw because it interrupted

684
00:31:11,900 --> 00:31:14,240
their established acoustic world. It was a nuisance.

685
00:31:14,440 --> 00:31:17,000
But 19th century society had accepted that noise

686
00:31:17,000 --> 00:31:19,359
equated to economic progress, the sacred noise

687
00:31:19,359 --> 00:31:21,420
we talked about earlier. Right. Therefore, the

688
00:31:21,420 --> 00:31:23,200
factory noise wasn't perceived as a nuisance

689
00:31:23,200 --> 00:31:25,259
to be complained about. It was the sound of success.

690
00:31:25,859 --> 00:31:28,819
This stark contrast is exactly why Schaeffer

691
00:31:28,819 --> 00:31:32,000
insists we cannot just study sounds in a sterile

692
00:31:32,000 --> 00:31:34,670
laboratory setting. like traditional acousticians

693
00:31:34,670 --> 00:31:37,890
do. Exactly. Traditional acousticians love to

694
00:31:37,890 --> 00:31:40,769
study what they call sound objects, a sound recorded,

695
00:31:40,990 --> 00:31:44,269
isolated in a soundproof room, and analyzed purely

696
00:31:44,269 --> 00:31:47,130
for its mechanical and physical properties. But

697
00:31:47,130 --> 00:31:49,619
Schaefer argues this is a total dead end. He

698
00:31:49,619 --> 00:31:52,000
says we must study sound events. Sound events,

699
00:31:52,140 --> 00:31:54,960
meaning it has context. A sound event implies

700
00:31:54,960 --> 00:31:57,960
a human context. You can't just measure the frequency

701
00:31:57,960 --> 00:32:00,319
of a church bell in a vacuum and claim you understand

702
00:32:00,319 --> 00:32:03,279
it. You have to study that church bell as a cultural

703
00:32:03,279 --> 00:32:06,019
event occurring within a specific community carrying

704
00:32:06,019 --> 00:32:08,759
all its psychological, historical, and symbolic

705
00:32:08,759 --> 00:32:11,720
weight. Because the psychology of sound isn't

706
00:32:11,720 --> 00:32:14,759
just about decibels. It is deeply, inextricably

707
00:32:14,759 --> 00:32:17,599
tied to our memories, our emotions, and our humanity.

708
00:32:18,289 --> 00:32:20,170
Which brings us to a really beautiful section

709
00:32:20,170 --> 00:32:22,170
of the book dealing with symbolism and what I

710
00:32:22,170 --> 00:32:25,029
like to call the museum of lost sounds. Oh, the

711
00:32:25,029 --> 00:32:27,630
nostalgia section. Yeah. Schaefer relies heavily

712
00:32:27,630 --> 00:32:30,190
on the psychoanalyst Carl Jung's idea that sounds

713
00:32:30,190 --> 00:32:32,210
aren't just physical vibrations striking the

714
00:32:32,210 --> 00:32:34,789
eardrum. They act as archetypes. Meaning they

715
00:32:34,789 --> 00:32:37,950
carry unconscious weight. They carry rich, deep,

716
00:32:38,009 --> 00:32:41,230
unconscious connotations that we all share. And

717
00:32:41,230 --> 00:32:42,869
because the modern industrial world replaces

718
00:32:42,869 --> 00:32:45,990
old technologies with new technologies so violently

719
00:32:45,990 --> 00:32:49,240
and rapidly. It creates a profound sense of auditory

720
00:32:49,240 --> 00:32:53,240
nostalgia. We all harbor a deep, often unarticulated

721
00:32:53,240 --> 00:32:56,359
nostalgia for disappearing sounds. As the acoustic

722
00:32:56,359 --> 00:32:58,819
environment changes around us, we suddenly realize

723
00:32:58,819 --> 00:33:01,359
how much of our personal history, our sense of

724
00:33:01,359 --> 00:33:03,880
childhood and home, is bound up in the specific

725
00:33:03,880 --> 00:33:06,599
sounds of our past. Let's make this tangible.

726
00:33:07,220 --> 00:33:10,059
I want you listening to try this right now. Build

727
00:33:10,059 --> 00:33:12,539
your own mental list. What are the everyday sounds

728
00:33:12,539 --> 00:33:15,819
from your life that are just gone? Ooh, that's

729
00:33:15,819 --> 00:33:18,759
a good prompt. For me, it's the screeching, robotic,

730
00:33:19,140 --> 00:33:21,980
utterly chaotic handshake of a dial -up internet

731
00:33:21,980 --> 00:33:25,259
modem connecting. Oh, yes, erbing bong. Exactly.

732
00:33:25,420 --> 00:33:27,819
At the time, it was annoying, but now, hearing

733
00:33:27,819 --> 00:33:30,180
that sound immediately transports me back to

734
00:33:30,180 --> 00:33:32,460
being a teenager late at night. Or the specific

735
00:33:32,460 --> 00:33:35,180
heavy metallic clacking of a manual typewriter

736
00:33:35,180 --> 00:33:37,740
carriage returning. For me, it's the thwack of

737
00:33:37,740 --> 00:33:40,880
a newspaper hitting a front door. Yes. Or the

738
00:33:40,880 --> 00:33:43,680
clanking, hissing hum of the radiator in my childhood

739
00:33:43,680 --> 00:33:47,000
bedroom on a freezing winter night. Schaefer

740
00:33:47,000 --> 00:33:49,440
wrote this book in the 1970s, so his list is

741
00:33:49,440 --> 00:33:51,880
obviously older. He mourns the disappearance

742
00:33:51,880 --> 00:33:54,200
of the clatter of horse -drawn milk bottles in

743
00:33:54,200 --> 00:33:57,200
the early morning and the majestic booming blasts

744
00:33:57,200 --> 00:34:00,220
of steam whistles from the trains. It's a universal

745
00:34:00,220 --> 00:34:03,059
human experience to anger memory to sound. And

746
00:34:03,059 --> 00:34:05,859
Schaefer highlights a beautiful, poignant literary

747
00:34:05,859 --> 00:34:08,280
example of this to prove his point. The Camus

748
00:34:08,280 --> 00:34:11,119
novel. Yes. He looks at Albert Camus' famous

749
00:34:11,119 --> 00:34:14,590
novel, L 'étranger. or the stranger. The main

750
00:34:14,590 --> 00:34:17,789
character, Mersault, is famously detached, unemotional,

751
00:34:17,949 --> 00:34:20,110
almost completely alienated from the world. The

752
00:34:20,110 --> 00:34:22,570
total nihilist. Right. But when he is finally

753
00:34:22,570 --> 00:34:25,250
trapped in a prison cell, facing his own mortality,

754
00:34:25,550 --> 00:34:28,250
he has a singular moment of profound nostalgia.

755
00:34:28,610 --> 00:34:30,570
And what does he recall? It's not a visual memory.

756
00:34:31,039 --> 00:34:33,760
He sits in the darkness of a cell and he vividly,

757
00:34:33,760 --> 00:34:36,000
desperately remembers the characteristic sounds

758
00:34:36,000 --> 00:34:38,059
of the town he loved. Oh, it's so heartbreaking.

759
00:34:38,280 --> 00:34:40,440
He remembers the calls of the newspaper boys,

760
00:34:40,639 --> 00:34:43,480
the specific cries of the sandwich vendors, the

761
00:34:43,480 --> 00:34:46,199
exact screech of the trams turning a steep corner,

762
00:34:46,360 --> 00:34:49,079
and the heightened trumpet of the local ice cream

763
00:34:49,079 --> 00:34:52,539
vendor. A small, shrill sound cutting across

764
00:34:52,539 --> 00:34:55,000
the flow of words. It's such a stunning description

765
00:34:55,000 --> 00:34:57,400
of a sound mark anchoring a human soul. It really

766
00:34:57,400 --> 00:35:00,289
is. But, you know, all this nostalgia raises

767
00:35:00,289 --> 00:35:03,769
a very practical, almost cynical question. If

768
00:35:03,769 --> 00:35:06,750
the modern world is this noisy, stressful mess

769
00:35:06,750 --> 00:35:10,449
of flat lines and lo -fi sludge, and we all just

770
00:35:10,449 --> 00:35:12,730
miss the beautiful, discreet, meaningful sounds

771
00:35:12,730 --> 00:35:15,269
of the past, why don't we just pass stricter

772
00:35:15,269 --> 00:35:17,670
laws to ban the noise? Just outlaw it. Yeah.

773
00:35:17,809 --> 00:35:21,010
Why is Schaefer so stubbornly, repeatedly against

774
00:35:21,010 --> 00:35:23,409
standard municipal noise abatement strategies?

775
00:35:23,969 --> 00:35:26,269
It seems like the obvious solution. It seems

776
00:35:26,269 --> 00:35:28,449
obvious, but Schaefer argues that noise abatement

777
00:35:28,449 --> 00:35:31,369
is a fundamentally negative and ultimately futile

778
00:35:31,369 --> 00:35:33,809
pursuit. It is essentially an acoustic game of

779
00:35:33,809 --> 00:35:35,929
whack -a -mole that a society cannot win. How

780
00:35:35,929 --> 00:35:38,610
so? Well, you can pass a city bylaw to quiet

781
00:35:38,610 --> 00:35:40,670
down a specific type of machine, but within a

782
00:35:40,670 --> 00:35:43,590
year, a new, unregulated, louder machine will

783
00:35:43,590 --> 00:35:46,269
just take its place. Furthermore, abatement assumes

784
00:35:46,269 --> 00:35:49,349
the soundscape is merely a nuisance to be minimized,

785
00:35:49,389 --> 00:35:53,420
rather than an environment to be curated. Schaefer

786
00:35:53,420 --> 00:35:55,739
argues that this defensive posture is totally

787
00:35:55,739 --> 00:35:58,760
inadequate for preserving human sanity. So what's

788
00:35:58,760 --> 00:36:01,320
the alternative? The solution is not the negative

789
00:36:01,320 --> 00:36:03,460
restriction of noise abatement. The solution

790
00:36:03,460 --> 00:36:06,519
is the positive, proactive field of acoustic

791
00:36:06,519 --> 00:36:09,480
ecology, which naturally leads to the practice

792
00:36:09,480 --> 00:36:12,119
of acoustic design. Okay, let's break that down.

793
00:36:12,420 --> 00:36:15,199
Acoustic ecology is studying the intricate relationship

794
00:36:15,199 --> 00:36:18,920
between sounds and living organisms. It's looking

795
00:36:18,920 --> 00:36:21,590
at the sonic environment not as a backdrop, but

796
00:36:21,590 --> 00:36:23,829
it has a biological habitat. Exactly, like an

797
00:36:23,829 --> 00:36:26,150
ecosystem. And this ecological approach leads

798
00:36:26,150 --> 00:36:28,469
to my absolute favorite concept in the entire

799
00:36:28,469 --> 00:36:31,550
book, the biological module. Oh, this is fascinating.

800
00:36:31,929 --> 00:36:34,469
To understand this, Schaefer points out how physical

801
00:36:34,469 --> 00:36:37,110
architects work. Architects use the human body

802
00:36:37,110 --> 00:36:40,070
as a module or a baseline metric for all their

803
00:36:40,070 --> 00:36:42,849
designs. A doorframe is designed to fit the average

804
00:36:42,849 --> 00:36:45,349
height of a human being. A staircase is pitched

805
00:36:45,349 --> 00:36:47,150
to accommodate the natural stride of a human

806
00:36:47,150 --> 00:36:49,980
leg. The physical environment is scaled specifically

807
00:36:49,980 --> 00:36:53,119
to human biology. Makes perfect sense. So Schaefer

808
00:36:53,119 --> 00:36:55,920
asks the brilliant question, what is the acoustic

809
00:36:55,920 --> 00:36:59,469
equivalent? What is the acoustic module? The

810
00:36:59,469 --> 00:37:02,010
acoustic module he determines is the pairing

811
00:37:02,010 --> 00:37:05,150
of the human ear and the human voice. And when

812
00:37:05,150 --> 00:37:07,190
you look closely at human biology through this

813
00:37:07,190 --> 00:37:10,010
lens, you see that evolutionary nature was a

814
00:37:10,010 --> 00:37:12,250
first -rate acoustical engineer. The numbers

815
00:37:12,250 --> 00:37:14,750
back this up so perfectly. They do. Let's look

816
00:37:14,750 --> 00:37:17,289
at the numbers. The human voice, shouting at

817
00:37:17,289 --> 00:37:19,849
its absolute maximum volume at a short distance,

818
00:37:20,090 --> 00:37:23,849
maxes out at roughly 80 decibels. Consequently,

819
00:37:24,010 --> 00:37:26,489
the human ear doesn't start taking physical biological

820
00:37:26,489 --> 00:37:29,829
damage until it is subjected to sustained noise

821
00:37:29,829 --> 00:37:33,750
over 90 decibels. Wait, really? Yes. We are perfectly

822
00:37:33,750 --> 00:37:36,530
biologically evolved for our own sounds. Our

823
00:37:36,530 --> 00:37:39,050
primary communication tool is physically incapable

824
00:37:39,050 --> 00:37:41,690
of naturally damaging our primary reception tool.

825
00:37:41,869 --> 00:37:43,929
It is a closed, perfectly balanced biological

826
00:37:43,929 --> 00:37:47,099
loop. It's elegant. But then... Along comes the

827
00:37:47,099 --> 00:37:48,780
Industrial Revolution, and we started building

828
00:37:48,780 --> 00:37:51,400
machines that fundamentally, violently violate

829
00:37:51,400 --> 00:37:53,659
this biological module. We built right past the

830
00:37:53,659 --> 00:37:56,079
human scale. We build heavy machinery, jet engines,

831
00:37:56,219 --> 00:37:59,960
and sirens that operate in 110, 120 decibels.

832
00:38:00,059 --> 00:38:03,000
They completely shatter the human scale. They

833
00:38:03,000 --> 00:38:05,239
aren't designed for us. We are expected to endure

834
00:38:05,239 --> 00:38:08,619
them. And Schaefer shares this incredibly illustrative

835
00:38:08,619 --> 00:38:11,639
anecdote about construction in Vancouver to prove

836
00:38:11,639 --> 00:38:14,539
just how backward our municipal priorities have

837
00:38:14,539 --> 00:38:17,059
gotten regarding this biological module. Yes,

838
00:38:17,139 --> 00:38:19,500
this perfectly encapsulates his frustration with

839
00:38:19,500 --> 00:38:22,739
standard noise bylaws. So his students from the

840
00:38:22,739 --> 00:38:25,059
World Soundscape Project were out on the streets

841
00:38:25,059 --> 00:38:28,019
of downtown Vancouver actively measuring ambient

842
00:38:28,019 --> 00:38:30,780
construction noise. Taking data. Right. They

843
00:38:30,780 --> 00:38:32,820
were documenting heavy construction equipment,

844
00:38:33,079 --> 00:38:36,659
jackhammers, massive diesel engines. That was

845
00:38:36,659 --> 00:38:39,579
blaring continuously at well over 90 decibels.

846
00:38:39,599 --> 00:38:42,389
It was objectively, physically damaging. the

847
00:38:42,389 --> 00:38:44,610
biological module of the human ear. Illegal levels

848
00:38:44,610 --> 00:38:47,429
of noise, you would think. You would think. But

849
00:38:47,429 --> 00:38:49,630
while they were standing there taking these measurements,

850
00:38:49,929 --> 00:38:52,530
a group of Hare Krishna members happened to walk

851
00:38:52,530 --> 00:38:54,969
down the street singing, chanting, and playing

852
00:38:54,969 --> 00:38:57,570
small hand instruments. Within minutes, the local

853
00:38:57,570 --> 00:38:59,789
police arrived and arrested the singers, citing

854
00:38:59,789 --> 00:39:01,989
them under the city's noise abatement by law.

855
00:39:02,210 --> 00:39:04,989
But the punchline, the incredibly dark punchline,

856
00:39:05,090 --> 00:39:07,710
is that the massive, ear -shattering construction

857
00:39:07,710 --> 00:39:12,030
equipment was expressly Legally excluded from

858
00:39:12,030 --> 00:39:15,429
that very same noise by law. Exactly. Schaefer

859
00:39:15,429 --> 00:39:17,750
observes the scene and notes the profound irony.

860
00:39:18,260 --> 00:39:21,039
The human voice expressing joy, community, and

861
00:39:21,039 --> 00:39:23,340
spirituality within the safe limits of the biological

862
00:39:23,340 --> 00:39:26,280
module was actively criminalized because it was

863
00:39:26,280 --> 00:39:28,340
subjectively considered a nuisance by someone

864
00:39:28,340 --> 00:39:30,340
in a nearby office. While the machine destroying

865
00:39:30,340 --> 00:39:32,840
their hearing was protected. Yes. The mechanical

866
00:39:32,840 --> 00:39:35,219
jabberware, the heavy machinery that was operating

867
00:39:35,219 --> 00:39:37,900
at a volume that literally physically destroys

868
00:39:37,900 --> 00:39:40,940
the acoustic module, was legally protected and

869
00:39:40,940 --> 00:39:43,480
exempted in the name of economic progress. His

870
00:39:43,480 --> 00:39:45,840
thesis here is that we have built an urban society

871
00:39:45,840 --> 00:39:48,679
that implicitly permits mechanical devastation

872
00:39:48,679 --> 00:39:50,780
of the senses while actively suppressing human

873
00:39:50,780 --> 00:39:53,980
expression. That is infuriating, but so telling.

874
00:39:54,260 --> 00:39:57,460
It's a vivid indictment of how we prioritize

875
00:39:57,460 --> 00:40:01,099
industry over biology. Completely. So if we want

876
00:40:01,099 --> 00:40:03,940
to reclaim our acoustic humanity, if we want

877
00:40:03,940 --> 00:40:06,619
to stop arresting the singers and start actually

878
00:40:06,619 --> 00:40:08,940
fixing the environment, we had to transition

879
00:40:08,940 --> 00:40:11,619
from being passive listeners to active acoustic

880
00:40:11,619 --> 00:40:14,099
designers. I think the most shocking thing about

881
00:40:14,099 --> 00:40:16,659
Schaefer's proposed curriculum for acoustic design

882
00:40:16,659 --> 00:40:19,699
is that the very first step requires absolutely

883
00:40:19,699 --> 00:40:22,780
zero technology. No microphones. You don't need

884
00:40:22,780 --> 00:40:25,059
a decibel meter, you don't need drafting paper,

885
00:40:25,219 --> 00:40:27,300
and you don't need a law degree. That's right.

886
00:40:27,579 --> 00:40:30,380
The first fundamental task of the acoustic designer

887
00:40:30,380 --> 00:40:33,139
isn't to build a better microphone or draft a

888
00:40:33,139 --> 00:40:35,719
new, stricter noise ordinance. The very first

889
00:40:35,719 --> 00:40:38,579
task is a deeply personal exercise he calls ear

890
00:40:38,579 --> 00:40:41,099
cleaning. Ear cleaning. Before we can design,

891
00:40:41,260 --> 00:40:43,809
we have to learn how to truly listen again. We

892
00:40:43,809 --> 00:40:45,889
have to strip away the narcotic numbness of the

893
00:40:45,889 --> 00:40:48,449
lo -fi world. He suggests this incredibly challenging,

894
00:40:48,590 --> 00:40:51,909
almost monastic exercise, declaring a complete,

895
00:40:52,030 --> 00:40:54,429
uncompromising moratorium on your own speech

896
00:40:54,429 --> 00:40:57,789
for a full 24 hours. Just try to imagine doing

897
00:40:57,789 --> 00:40:59,969
that. Think about how difficult that actually

898
00:40:59,969 --> 00:41:02,730
is in modern life. You stop making sound. You

899
00:41:02,730 --> 00:41:06,570
become a pure receiver. For one whole day, your

900
00:41:06,570 --> 00:41:08,989
only job is to eavesdrop on the world around

901
00:41:08,989 --> 00:41:12,369
you. You soak it in. You actively practice clairaudience.

902
00:41:13,159 --> 00:41:16,119
It is a radical act of sensory reset. And when

903
00:41:16,119 --> 00:41:18,480
you finally clean your ears and truly listen

904
00:41:18,480 --> 00:41:21,400
without the urge to project your own noise, you

905
00:41:21,400 --> 00:41:23,820
start to perceive the hidden intricate rhythms

906
00:41:23,820 --> 00:41:26,059
of the world. The underlying patterns. Right.

907
00:41:26,369 --> 00:41:28,829
And this perception is essential for design because

908
00:41:28,829 --> 00:41:31,250
it provides the blueprint for how a healthy soundscape

909
00:41:31,250 --> 00:41:34,030
actually functions. Schaefer illustrates this

910
00:41:34,030 --> 00:41:36,949
by detailing an exhaustive 24 -hour audio recording

911
00:41:36,949 --> 00:41:39,889
his team made at a rural pond in Canada during

912
00:41:39,889 --> 00:41:41,989
the summer solstice. Oh, this specific part of

913
00:41:41,989 --> 00:41:44,369
the book was absolutely magical. When you sit

914
00:41:44,369 --> 00:41:46,590
down and meticulously analyze that recording,

915
00:41:46,829 --> 00:41:49,030
what emerges isn't just random nature noise.

916
00:41:49,150 --> 00:41:53,110
It is an incredible, masterful biological orchestration.

917
00:41:53,309 --> 00:41:55,170
He breaks down the data from the pond recording.

918
00:41:55,659 --> 00:41:57,579
and points out that there were two main groups

919
00:41:57,579 --> 00:41:59,960
of high -pitched performers trying to be heard

920
00:41:59,960 --> 00:42:02,960
in that specific environment, the local birds

921
00:42:02,960 --> 00:42:06,019
and a massive population of chirping frogs. Now,

922
00:42:06,079 --> 00:42:08,579
because they share a very similar acoustic frequency,

923
00:42:08,760 --> 00:42:11,739
if they all sang at the exact same time, they

924
00:42:11,739 --> 00:42:13,519
would mask each other's signals. It would just

925
00:42:13,519 --> 00:42:16,199
be a wall of high -pitched static. The pond would

926
00:42:16,199 --> 00:42:18,440
instantly devolve into a congested lo -fi environment.

927
00:42:18,880 --> 00:42:21,539
But nature inherently practices acoustic design.

928
00:42:22,630 --> 00:42:25,739
The recording reveals that at 3 .40 a .m., The

929
00:42:25,739 --> 00:42:28,159
very exact moment the first dawn bird begins

930
00:42:28,159 --> 00:42:31,659
to sing, the thousands of chirping frogs completely

931
00:42:31,659 --> 00:42:34,780
instantaneously go silent. They yield the floor.

932
00:42:34,900 --> 00:42:36,840
They literally clock out. They yield the floor.

933
00:42:36,920 --> 00:42:39,480
The birds take the acoustic stage for the entirety

934
00:42:39,480 --> 00:42:43,139
of the daylight hours. Then... At dusk, as the

935
00:42:43,139 --> 00:42:46,179
very last bird trails off into silence, the frogs

936
00:42:46,179 --> 00:42:48,079
immediately return and take over the night shift.

937
00:42:48,239 --> 00:42:50,699
It is a perfect self -regulating biological give

938
00:42:50,699 --> 00:42:53,019
and take. They share the limited acoustic space

939
00:42:53,019 --> 00:42:56,780
seamlessly based on biological cycles. And Schaefer

940
00:42:56,780 --> 00:42:59,420
asks us to contrast that profound, respectful,

941
00:42:59,480 --> 00:43:02,539
natural rhythm with the continuous, unyielding

942
00:43:02,539 --> 00:43:04,880
sludge of modern city traffic. Traffic doesn't

943
00:43:04,880 --> 00:43:08,130
clock out. No, the highway drone completely ignores

944
00:43:08,130 --> 00:43:10,989
day, night, season, or biological need. It just

945
00:43:10,989 --> 00:43:15,030
roars unconditionally. Once you understand that

946
00:43:15,030 --> 00:43:17,570
stark contrast through the practice of ear cleaning,

947
00:43:17,769 --> 00:43:20,269
you can finally begin to apply what Schaefer

948
00:43:20,269 --> 00:43:23,010
outlines as the four core principles of acoustic

949
00:43:23,010 --> 00:43:25,949
design. The tools to fix the world. Exactly.

950
00:43:25,949 --> 00:43:27,630
These are the tools. Let's run through those

951
00:43:27,630 --> 00:43:29,429
four principles in detail because this is the

952
00:43:29,429 --> 00:43:32,750
ultimate payoff of his entire philosophy. Principle

953
00:43:32,750 --> 00:43:35,030
number one. Respect for the ear and the voice.

954
00:43:35,110 --> 00:43:37,309
The biological module again. Right. This goes

955
00:43:37,309 --> 00:43:39,610
right back to the module. If an acoustic environment

956
00:43:39,610 --> 00:43:43,010
causes a threshold shift in your hearing, meaning

957
00:43:43,010 --> 00:43:45,349
it temporarily or permanently degrades your ability

958
00:43:45,349 --> 00:43:48,630
to hear, or if it physically forces you to shout

959
00:43:48,630 --> 00:43:50,570
just to be heard by someone standing next to

960
00:43:50,570 --> 00:43:52,969
you, that environment is biologically harmful.

961
00:43:53,289 --> 00:43:55,590
It's toxic. It has failed the most basic test

962
00:43:55,590 --> 00:43:58,510
of habitability and must be fundamentally redesigned.

963
00:43:58,730 --> 00:44:01,449
Moving to principle number two, an awareness

964
00:44:01,449 --> 00:44:05,070
of sound symbolism. As designers, or even just

965
00:44:05,070 --> 00:44:07,469
as citizens, we must recognize that sounds are

966
00:44:07,469 --> 00:44:09,829
never just physical vibrations occurring in a

967
00:44:09,829 --> 00:44:13,510
vacuum. They are deeply emotional and psychological

968
00:44:13,510 --> 00:44:16,809
symbols for the community that hears them. We

969
00:44:16,809 --> 00:44:19,230
have to ask ourselves, what does a specific sound

970
00:44:19,230 --> 00:44:22,869
communicate about our values? A church bell communicates

971
00:44:22,869 --> 00:44:24,809
something entirely different than an air raid

972
00:44:24,809 --> 00:44:27,190
siren, even if they operate at the exact same

973
00:44:27,190 --> 00:44:30,269
decibel level. We have to design with emotional

974
00:44:30,269 --> 00:44:33,800
resonance in mind. not just volume control. Principle

975
00:44:33,800 --> 00:44:36,260
number three, a knowledge of natural rhythms.

976
00:44:36,539 --> 00:44:39,380
This is the lesson of the pond. Just like the

977
00:44:39,380 --> 00:44:41,420
birds and the frogs yielding to each other, we

978
00:44:41,420 --> 00:44:43,960
need to design cities and communities that have

979
00:44:43,960 --> 00:44:46,940
distinct periods of acoustic activity and, crucially,

980
00:44:47,099 --> 00:44:49,739
periods of profound acoustic rest. We need downtime.

981
00:44:50,059 --> 00:44:52,659
The 24 -hour continuous hum of the flatline is

982
00:44:52,659 --> 00:44:55,119
the absolute enemy of natural rhythm. We need

983
00:44:55,119 --> 00:44:57,340
environments that breathe. And finally, principle

984
00:44:57,340 --> 00:45:00,300
number four, an understanding of balancing mechanisms.

985
00:45:00,989 --> 00:45:03,489
Schaefer borrows quite heavily from Eastern philosophy

986
00:45:03,489 --> 00:45:06,289
to articulate this point, particularly the Taoist

987
00:45:06,289 --> 00:45:09,889
concept of yin and yang. Right. He talks about

988
00:45:09,889 --> 00:45:12,289
balancing acoustic gravity versus lightness,

989
00:45:12,469 --> 00:45:16,210
expanding sounds versus gathering sounds. Western

990
00:45:16,210 --> 00:45:19,070
music and Western industrial soundscapes historically

991
00:45:19,070 --> 00:45:22,570
run toward aggressive, extreme hyperactivity.

992
00:45:22,750 --> 00:45:25,869
We are obsessed with the climax, the crescendo,

993
00:45:25,929 --> 00:45:28,650
the loudest possible output. Bigger, louder,

994
00:45:28,690 --> 00:45:31,670
faster. Schaefer argues we need to actively relearn

995
00:45:31,670 --> 00:45:34,289
how to balance our sonic environments by incorporating

996
00:45:34,289 --> 00:45:37,800
quietness, delicacy, and negative space. And

997
00:45:37,800 --> 00:45:39,900
a major part of achieving that cultural balance

998
00:45:39,900 --> 00:45:42,940
is the active, intentional preservation of those

999
00:45:42,940 --> 00:45:44,699
sound marks we talked about at the very beginning

1000
00:45:44,699 --> 00:45:46,400
of this deep dive. The clocks on the mantle.

1001
00:45:46,579 --> 00:45:49,320
Exactly. Just like we have historical societies

1002
00:45:49,320 --> 00:45:51,579
that fight to save old Victorian buildings from

1003
00:45:51,579 --> 00:45:53,679
the wrecking ball, Schaefer argues we need acoustic

1004
00:45:53,679 --> 00:45:55,699
societies fighting to save historically significant

1005
00:45:55,699 --> 00:45:58,920
sounds. He gives great localized examples from

1006
00:45:58,920 --> 00:46:02,280
his own city. The 1816 naval cannon in Vancouver

1007
00:46:02,280 --> 00:46:05,059
that fires every single night at 9 p .m. Oh,

1008
00:46:05,079 --> 00:46:07,769
I've heard that. It's iconic. Or the massive,

1009
00:46:07,829 --> 00:46:10,489
booming diaphone foghorn at the Point Atkinson

1010
00:46:10,489 --> 00:46:13,429
Lighthouse. These aren't just noises. They are

1011
00:46:13,429 --> 00:46:15,750
temporal anchors that define a community's identity.

1012
00:46:16,230 --> 00:46:19,010
He even compares the history of fire alarms to

1013
00:46:19,010 --> 00:46:21,269
show what we've lost. Oh, this comparison is

1014
00:46:21,269 --> 00:46:23,849
so good. In Mozart's day, if there was a fire

1015
00:46:23,849 --> 00:46:26,329
in Vienna, a watchman stationed on top of St.

1016
00:46:26,389 --> 00:46:28,869
Stephen's Cathedral would spot the smoke and

1017
00:46:28,869 --> 00:46:31,010
literally just shout down to the city through

1018
00:46:31,010 --> 00:46:34,110
a megaphone. A human voice. A highly human, desperate

1019
00:46:34,110 --> 00:46:37,329
warning. Compare that to the deafening, terrifying

1020
00:46:37,329 --> 00:46:39,730
mechanical ratchets used during the Blitz in

1021
00:46:39,730 --> 00:46:43,170
World War II London. Or the anxiety -inducing,

1022
00:46:43,170 --> 00:46:46,570
wailing electronic sirens we use today. We have

1023
00:46:46,570 --> 00:46:48,710
to consciously decide which of these sounds we

1024
00:46:48,710 --> 00:46:50,869
actually want to keep in our lives and which

1025
00:46:50,869 --> 00:46:52,989
ones we want to proactively design out of existence.

1026
00:46:53,550 --> 00:46:56,179
Because... If we do not actively choose, if we

1027
00:46:56,179 --> 00:46:58,599
remain passive consumers of our acoustic environment,

1028
00:46:59,019 --> 00:47:01,460
the machine will simply choose for us. And the

1029
00:47:01,460 --> 00:47:03,760
machine will always choose louder, faster, and

1030
00:47:03,760 --> 00:47:05,940
flatter. So after exploring all of these concepts,

1031
00:47:06,159 --> 00:47:08,440
what does this all ultimately mean for us today?

1032
00:47:08,920 --> 00:47:11,480
Let's synthesize this incredible journey Schaefer

1033
00:47:11,480 --> 00:47:13,579
has taken us on. We covered a lot of ground.

1034
00:47:13,820 --> 00:47:16,219
We did. We started by realizing a fundamental

1035
00:47:16,219 --> 00:47:19,980
biological truth. We don't have ear lids. Our

1036
00:47:19,980 --> 00:47:23,000
ears are always open, always vulnerable, continuously

1037
00:47:23,000 --> 00:47:25,800
touching the world at a distance. Right. We traced

1038
00:47:25,800 --> 00:47:28,500
how the Industrial Revolution co -opted the sacred

1039
00:47:28,500 --> 00:47:31,460
noise of the divine, using the sheer volume of

1040
00:47:31,460 --> 00:47:34,039
machinery to establish dominance, and in the

1041
00:47:34,039 --> 00:47:36,880
process, flattened our beautiful, rhythmic, hi

1042
00:47:36,880 --> 00:47:40,980
-fi natural world into a lo -fi sludge of continuous

1043
00:47:40,980 --> 00:47:43,840
super -biological drones. The flatline. We watched

1044
00:47:43,840 --> 00:47:46,559
modern society retreat in exhaustion into the

1045
00:47:46,559 --> 00:47:48,800
submarine home. blocking out the public square

1046
00:47:48,800 --> 00:47:51,760
with headphones. But crucially, Schaefer doesn't

1047
00:47:51,760 --> 00:47:54,059
leave us in a state of despair. He equips us

1048
00:47:54,059 --> 00:47:56,360
with the methodology to fight back. He teaches

1049
00:47:56,360 --> 00:47:59,059
us to map the invisible through sonography, to

1050
00:47:59,059 --> 00:48:01,940
clean our ears through intentional silence, to

1051
00:48:01,940 --> 00:48:04,420
respect the biological module of our own bodies,

1052
00:48:04,519 --> 00:48:07,539
and to start treating the entire world as a musical

1053
00:48:07,539 --> 00:48:10,360
composition that we have the power and the responsibility

1054
00:48:10,360 --> 00:48:13,480
to arrange. It is a profound, empowering call

1055
00:48:13,480 --> 00:48:15,760
to take responsibility for our shared environment.

1056
00:48:16,289 --> 00:48:18,230
And executing that responsibility requires a

1057
00:48:18,230 --> 00:48:21,130
massive cultural shift in how we value quietness.

1058
00:48:21,250 --> 00:48:24,510
We tend to view silence as a void, an emptiness

1059
00:48:24,510 --> 00:48:27,610
waiting to be filled with content. But to close

1060
00:48:27,610 --> 00:48:29,829
this out, I think we should reflect on a quote

1061
00:48:29,829 --> 00:48:32,050
Schaefer shares toward the end of his text from

1062
00:48:32,050 --> 00:48:35,110
the Indian mystic Kirpal Singh. Okay. Singh said,

1063
00:48:35,269 --> 00:48:37,650
when there is no sound, hearing is most alert.

1064
00:48:38,139 --> 00:48:41,059
The great poet Rainer Maria Rilke echoed this

1065
00:48:41,059 --> 00:48:44,099
exact sentiment, describing silence as the uninterrupted

1066
00:48:44,099 --> 00:48:46,579
news that grows out of silence. We spend our

1067
00:48:46,579 --> 00:48:49,219
entire modern lives surrounded by a thick fog

1068
00:48:49,219 --> 00:48:51,840
of acoustic clutter, operating under the false

1069
00:48:51,840 --> 00:48:54,059
assumption that more noise equals more information,

1070
00:48:54,239 --> 00:48:58,000
more connection, more life. But the truth, Schaefer

1071
00:48:58,000 --> 00:49:00,860
reveals, is the exact opposite. When there is

1072
00:49:00,860 --> 00:49:03,719
no sound, hearing is most alert. I want to turn

1073
00:49:03,719 --> 00:49:06,039
that idea directly back to you listening. Think

1074
00:49:06,039 --> 00:49:07,719
back to the very beginning of this deep dive

1075
00:49:07,719 --> 00:49:10,300
when I asked you to listen to the hum, the drone,

1076
00:49:10,480 --> 00:49:12,800
the invisible wallpaper of the room around you.

1077
00:49:12,920 --> 00:49:14,460
Now, having gone through this journey, I want

1078
00:49:14,460 --> 00:49:16,960
to ask you a much harder question. When was the

1079
00:49:16,960 --> 00:49:20,059
last time you experienced true, absolute silence?

1080
00:49:20,699 --> 00:49:23,099
I don't just mean a brief lucky pause in the

1081
00:49:23,099 --> 00:49:25,159
street traffic or putting your phone on mute

1082
00:49:25,159 --> 00:49:27,300
for a meeting or putting on noise -canceling

1083
00:49:27,300 --> 00:49:30,329
headphones to artificially block the world. I

1084
00:49:30,329 --> 00:49:32,530
mean a physical space where your hearing became

1085
00:49:32,530 --> 00:49:34,829
perfectly naturally alert simply because there

1086
00:49:34,829 --> 00:49:37,329
was absolutely nothing mechanical fighting for

1087
00:49:37,329 --> 00:49:40,380
its attention. In a modern world that is so deeply

1088
00:49:40,380 --> 00:49:42,880
structurally addicted to the narcotic of noise,

1089
00:49:43,059 --> 00:49:45,219
perhaps the most rebellious, the most fundamentally

1090
00:49:45,219 --> 00:49:47,639
humanizing thing you can do today is to seek

1091
00:49:47,639 --> 00:49:50,159
out a single moment of absolute quiet and finally

1092
00:49:50,159 --> 00:49:51,420
listen to what it has to say.