What is this thing called “Sound?”

Abstract

In our first two chapters we examined how we are affected by the sounds in our surroundings, and how we affect our surroundings with sound. The bridge in this transaction is the phenomena of sound itself; how it is created, how we receive it, and ultimately what happens to it once it impinges on our bodies and thus our minds.

“As our problem is to study the laws and sensations of hearing, our first business will be to examine how many kinds of sensations the ear can generate, and what differences in the external means of excitement or sound, correspond to these differences of sensation.” (Herman Helmholtz, “On the Sensations of Tone,” 1862)¹