Synesthesia is one of one of those weird neurological phenomena (so weird the spell checker doesn't even recognize it) where senses get mixed up. You can see letters as colored or see music as colors.
Melissa Saenz and Christof Koch of Caltech have discovered a new form : auditory synesthesia. In auditory syenesthesia, moving patterns can cause people to hear sounds as they report in the journal Current Biology.
What's even more interesting is that you can test yourself by using the pattern of moving dots. Just got there and start the movie and see if you hear anything.
I tried it several times and heard something occasionally. However, it was always different and not reproducible so I think I was probably hearing background sounds around the house just from concentrating and listening carefully.
Their estimate is that about 1% of the population experiences this phenomena so there is a statistically significant chance that someone here will. So post your experiences and observations!
Nothing for me.
ReplyDeleteNope, no sound for me.
ReplyDeleteno sound for me but the dots were challenging my eyes quite a bit...
ReplyDeleteDots are kinda neat, but no music. Was this test given under the influence of LSD?
ReplyDeleteFar out, man! If you loop that and stare at it long enough, you can hear John Lennon saying, "I'm dead" backwards.
ReplyDeleteI recently started looking into synesthesia after having a brief discussion about it in one of my classes. I had discussed some experiences with my teacher, who suggested I might have some form of synesthesia, but I hadn't been able to find any related articles until coming across these more recent articles regarding auditory synesthesia. I don't see colors when listening to music or see words as color, rather I hear sounds/music when I see color. A bit like playing that old Simon game where you have to repeat the pattern, but every time the colors light up, there is a sound associated with it that helps me remember the pattern. I used to play the game on mute because the sound that comes with the game always distracted me because it would clash with the sound in my head. As for the moving dots demo, I hear the same sound every time I play it but I'm not quite sure how to describe it. I suppose the first part was a bit like a car accelerating in the distance and the second part was a bit like someone breathing out air.
ReplyDeletei heard bubbling
ReplyDeleteMuch like Peekajinx, I could hear a kind of accelerating/crescendo sound as the dots moved away from the center of the screen and a deflating/decrescendo sound as they moved closer to the center--almost like a breathing pattern.
ReplyDeleteI've "heard" faint "sounds" in my head accompanying movement (especially patterns of movement) my entire life, but never really commented on it. At first, I just kind of assumed everyone perceived motion that way, and as I got older, was kind of embarrassed to talk about it, since it's clearly kind of weird. I'm glad I'm not the only one.
I hear a wooshing at first kinda like wind and then the second part i hear a sucking sort of sound
ReplyDeleteI can hear the bubbling...as if I have an internal drumset marking the rhythm of the dots moving. Pitch gets higher when the dots expand, and lower when they contract. I also hear a small "boom" sound when the dots stop moving.
ReplyDelete