Posted on 03/08/2007 9:40:58 AM PST by LibWhacker
Source of sound pulses? Frequency? Have they been measured? Can we make our own and interfere with them? So many questions!
O-O-O-O-M-M-M-M-H-H
Well that explains why loud Hip-Hop cars in traffic gets on my nerves............
All science is physics.
Makes one wonder if screaming when in pain might be a way the body tries to mitigate the pain by overriding the "sound waves" in the nerve paths.
Thanks. Very interesting!
"Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof."
Until then, this article is probably BS.
Maybe this will help to explain why the sound of Shrillery's voice makes me feel actual physical pain -- she must be able to activate my nerves and influence the sound that is transmitted through them!
Maybe something like this could prove useful against the enemy in battle? In addition to helping "us" understand anesthetics, it could help us figure out new ways to induce pain in the enemy at a distance.
bttt
Sounds like they haven't actually proved this. It occured to me that the lack of heat could also be explained if it turned out that nerves are actually superconductors.
I'm not a physicist and I didn't stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night, but isn't my explanation as feasible as theirs? (Just trying to stir the pot!)
It should be relatively simple to test nerves for minute pressure changes in response to stimuli, shouldn't it? This theory appears to be relatively simple to confirm, to my non-scientific mind.
What?
A SCIENTIST, huh? Doesn't he know that sound waves produce heat too as they travel through a substance?
This statement is, unfortunately, usually made to stop discussion of a proposition that the speaker disagrees with. That means the speaker believes he has some prior knowledge about the proposition that he regards as strong evidence and does not want to hear anything to the contrary. I concede that not all propositions start with maximum entropy priors. So in this case, the speaker believes he has some special knowledge about the prior probability of the truth of the proposition.
But even with such special knowledge the "extraordinary claims" language is deeply imprecise.
From a Bayesian perspective, which admits prior probabilities, even a very strong and spiked prior probability for the truth of a proposition like "nerve impulses are transmitted electrically," changes VERY quickly with contrary evidence, given even one new fact. So if, for example, there is no evidence of the heat that ought to be given off via electrical transmission, that is a very significant contrary fact and the posterior probability distribution after that fact changes the strong prior very significantly.
So "extraordinary proof" is almost a silly concept here. Of course, you want the contrary "fact" to be replicated. But once replicated, according to normal scientific standards (not double-dawg-dare extraordinary standards), that single fact changes the posterior probability profoundly.
The other evidence cited in the article, that is, the lipid solubility and it's correlation with the anesthetic properties of different molecules, is not a contrary fact--it's an alternate explanation for an observed phenomenon (nerve transmission). The existence of an alternate explanation would not change the posterior as much as a contrary fact. The existence of a viable, alternative explanation does, however shift the posterior probability.
So my point is, the "extraordinary claims" language is quite sloppy and really should play no role in scientific discussion. It's a rhetorical point to close-off inquiry, not a scientific point.
"Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof."
Do you believe in God, Heaven and/or an afterlife?
Just askin'... ;)
All physics is math.
"It's a rhetorical point to close-off inquiry, not a scientific point."
hmmmmm ...
reminds me of the global warming non-debate.
Me too.
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