Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!sundc!pitstop!sun!decwrl!labrea!agate!ig!uwmcsd1!bbn!rochester!ur-tut!ur-cvsvax!jea From: jea@ur-cvsvax.UUCP (Joanne Albano) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: Sonic Tomfoolery Message-ID: <719@ur-cvsvax.UUCP> Date: 26 Feb 88 14:19:40 GMT References: <8802251858.AA21577@cory.Berkeley.EDU> Organization: Center for Visual Science, Univ. of Rochester Lines: 20 In article <8802251858.AA21577@cory.Berkeley.EDU>, dillon@CORY.BERKELEY.EDU (Matt Dillon) writes: > >You're working too hard - the human ear has no mechanism for detection of > >phase. > > Huh, where did this come from? I've played around with sound > quite a bit, and if I generate two tones of slightly different frequencies, > I can hear the phase quite fine thank you. Quite right Matt! The confusion here is that the "ear" has no mechanisms whatsoever. It is the brain that is the hearing system. It turns out the the superior olive has some very specialized cells for detecting phase differences between the two ears! The Superior Olivary Nucleus is in the brainstem at the third or fourth processing point (synapse). -- =================================================================== Joanne Albano, Center for Visual Science (716) 275-6848 Room 256 Meliora Hall, Univ. of Rochester, Rochester NY 14627 UUCP: ur-cvsvax!jea@rochester.EDU ARPANET: UR-CVSVAX!JEA@ROCHESTER.ARPA