Questions tagged [audio]
For questions asking about the creation of or propagation of sound. Questions about how creatures or beings vocalize should use the [vocalizations] tag. Questions about music should use the [music] tag.
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If someone were to teleport from sea level. How loud would the collapse of the resulting human-sized atmospheric void be?
Would it be loud enough to hear and is there any risk of dangerously loud sound waves being generated if the object being teleported is large enough?
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Would this underground city be noticed by seismologists?
The setting is current day Los Angeles... except for the goblin city that exists beneath it. Its chambers range from about 500-2000ft underground and has a population of several thousand. A lot of ...
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Music Dragonfly via Perforations in Wings
Info
I'm designing a prehistoric-dragonfly that has little holes or perforations in its wings. When the wind flows through them, they make music (the viability of flying with these wings will be ...
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Planet-wide vocalizations: is there a natural limit preventing it?
Premise
I recently recalled when the Chelyabinsk meteor crashed overhead in 2013. The pressure wave was immense. The infrasounds, as recorded by nuclear missile detectors, appeared to traverse the ...
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Underwater acoustic muffling/dampening and sonar evasion. Is a stealth torpedo possible?
So I have various factions with submarines and surface ships battling it out for control over various underwater resources.
One of the rarer and more lethal weapons is a "stealth torpedo". It ...
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How close to the Sun would you have to be to hear it?
Taken from this fascinating answer:
The Sun is immensely loud. The surface generates thousands to tens of
thousands of watts of sound power for every square meter. That's
something like 10x to ...
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Are there animal teeth that make alien sounds?
There's this old trope where an alien being has a name that "can't be pronounced by the human tongue", but no one (afaik) has ever done the work to make that scientifically possible. Now, I'...
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Pre-electrical fast long-distance communication using Acoustic Mirrors
It takes a lot of work, but it can be done. The Mongol Yam, a horse-based mail system, is probably the best example that has been done before. But after visiting the local science museum recently, I ...
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Dissipating sonic booms
Alastair Reynolds is a contemporary sci-fi writer whose works often demonstrate a strong grip on science as it presently stands. Recently, I picked up his book On The Steel Breeze for a quick re-read ...
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How do I determine the physical size of a quartz crystal of a given shape and vibrational mode needed to approximate a specific resonant frequency?
So, one of my D&D characters has a cut/relief-carved quartz crystal amulet (medallion shaped) that's both an arcane focus (crystal) and a holy symbol (amulet), and I thought it would be a good ...
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How can our boss play his theme song in (almost) any environment?
So. our boss is kinda... nuts. His current pet project is to create a device that can play his theme song whenever his location is revealed to someone within a 50 meter radius. Naturally, he ...
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Is it possible for an airplane on the sky to play a sound so loud it could be heard 50km away?
I have a story where one side of a war takes advantage of psychological warfare, where a plane on an altitude of 60k ft or 15.2km has massive speakers to play horrifying, disturbing sounds recorded ...
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Biologically what kind of feet would make the least amount of noise?
I'm designing creatures on my made up planet where animals evolved exceptional hearing and I'm wondering what kind of feet they might evolve to produce the least amount of sound when walking to avoid ...
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Can EM waves naturally create sonic waves?
Q:Can EM waves naturally create sonic waves?
For example, could a natural antenna (e.g. a seam of conductive metal or the right kind of rock)receive em radiation and through thermal/mechanical or ...
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Would dragons be able to purr?
My dragons have a... "difficult" personality.
They're very catlike. Sure, they're more like KrimsonRogue's cat (somewhere around chaotic good). But, if I want to make my dragons smug, blue-...
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Speaker-Powered Directed Blast Weapon
So, in order to defeat a bulletproof enemy that has genetically engineered osteodermic plates like a rhino all over his body that can stop very powerful rounds, the protagonist put her brains to work ...
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How to hide this underground city from seismologists, oil prospectors, and ground surveying projects?
In my previous question Would this underground city be noticed by seismologists?, it was established that a Goblin city in one of my settings would probably not go unnoticed do to the meddling of ...
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Can a sound of 125dbs from a watch be used to cause pain for self defense?
I was planning on creating a watch capable of producing around 125 dbs of sound for self defense: it would irritate/incapacitate an attacker and possibly give the victim an opportunity to leave the ...
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How can an optical signal be converted into a mechanical/acoustic signal without using electricity?
There are several ways to directly convert acoustic/mechanic signals into optic signals (e.g. opening/closing a shutter, or the acousto-optic effect). Is there any way to do the reverse, without using ...
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How much energy it would be required to propel a projectile with sound? Would it be lethal to its user?
Context: in a scenario where batteries suddenly became extremely energy dense due to some events between the main characters, I was thinking about which electromagnetic weapons I could use, such as ...
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How should an echolocation device give feedback to the (blind) user?
So, the idea started when I came across human echolocation, it turns out everyone that has hearing uses passive echolocation intuitively even without knowing it, but more interesting is people that ...
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"AC" compressed air?
So, compressed air power is a Thing. Compressed air tools are reasonably common, and compressed air has even been delivered commercially as an industrial utility at times.
But all existing compressed-...
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Sound From a Super Nova
Let's say there exists an alternate reality from ours that is identical in every aspect save for one. There exists a substance in space that allows for the transmission of sound. Let's call this ...
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How would building an acoustic amplifier into a large scale rockface work?
I'd like for this to be how a small species communicates with a giant species. I was assuming a series of tunnels would carry the sound like a pipe organ.
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How long would a gramophone record made of vinyl remain comprehensible when played?
A gramophone record made of vinyl is stored under cool conditions in a sealed envelope. How long would it remain comprehensible when played after it was manufactured (assuming that the record was ...
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How quiet can a static, non-propulsive pulsejet be?
The wizards of Magitechia have discovered that the deflagration or detonation of certain chemical compounds have beneficial supernatural effects, that are useful for powering magical apparatuses. ...
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Could sound be recorded by door panels and later replayed?
In my novel, a character makes the claim that sound can be recorded by the panels in a door. The door panel vibrates with sound, according to him, and those vibrations are recorded analogically, very ...
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What frequency range would be ideal for audible communication on a planet with a thick atmosphere? [closed]
If you lived on a planet with a very thick atmosphere, and you communicated verbally, what frequency range would be best? What would you eventually evolve to?
Would their voices need to be high ...
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Use of Sound in a Radio and Electric Communication Enabled Species
Alright, so I was bouncing ideas off the wall about how the society of a species (maybe genetically modified humans?) with biological radio communication and electric field communication would look ...
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How could a ballistic mask provide full protection without compromising the wearer's singing voice?
So, I'm having trouble with one of my character designs.
Guardian angels are former humans who died in such dumb ways that Heaven simply couldn't let them in, not before they proved they can prevent ...
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On Siren Head's sonic attacks
At this point, roughly 98% of D&D SRD monsters are on the good side in my setting, I mean, they're too cool. So, I decided to throw something less cool, scary, intimidating and evil that's ...
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How Could an Alien or Superhero Increase and Decrease Their Hearing at Will?
Would it be possible for an extraterrestrial humanoid or superhero to increase and decrease their hearing at will, and if so, how? I'm thinking specifically of an alien who can somehow adjust their ...
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