We don't have compassion for fellow human beings. I don't think we will ever have compassion for animals who are sensitive to noise.
Example: Diwali is a horrible time to be a stray animal in India. Heck, even my pets hate the festival. But humans will always be self obsessed and say it's for celebration. Sure.
Per Blaise Pascal, no they cannot: “All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.”
We need to keep growing, building, making, taking. Some people seem to really love the bustle and creative destruction. I'm in my 40s, and I've always hated it. When I was a child, I wondered if when I grew up, I would fit naturally into the world the way that so many others seemed to. The answer was no. I don't know why people need to be the way they are. I don't feel comfortable in so many normal situations. The things that bother the animals bother me too, but for most people this is unthinkable in the same way that other modes of thought are unthinkable. (eg, when someone who thinks mostly in words learns that some people think only in pictures)
What about the impact of EMF pollution? The book "the invisible rainbow' goes into that, though I don't expect this type of position to be well received in HN. I find it very healthy that this type of "invisible" pollution gets at least some discussion, however. We have to start somewhere.
Whenever there's a beaching of whales I wonder if a submarine has sailed past blasting sonar so loud the whales have to jump out of the ocean to their death.
The amount of suffering people go through because of noise is pretty insane (some more than others). The most common situation I see in Europe is living in poorly insulated apartments with neighbors who act like they're in a pub 24/7.
I noticed this directly a few weeks ago. I was camping with a friend pretty deep in the woods, but at a campground. About a half a mile away there was an RV running a generator, which was annoying as hell, but not the end of the world. Then in the middle of the night, while we were stargazing the generator turned off, and we could noticeably hear the wildlife adapt to the change. Some got quieter, but mostly it was wildlife returning to the area. As if the sound from the generator was a forcefield keeping everything away, or at least hidden.
That last part is what really opened my eyes about the noise polution from datacenters
I'm autistic and have misophonia and hyperacusis, not to mention auditory processing issues which mean I'm more likely to lock on to a noise rather than what I actually would like to listen to.
There's so much noise around - it really does tie in to the "social model of disability" in that a lot of my issues would disappear if environments weren't so hostile - that includes noise, smells, and lights.
Not mentioned in the article is that whales were once able to communicate globally, but the low frequency noise generated by maritime traffic killed the "Whale Internet."
I've never seen an article mention researchers so many times, without mentioning any actual research. They really made their point, by publishing an article that is nothing but noise.
Not being able to read the argument, I'll just note that dogs are horrible sound polluters. Possibly only when they have bad human owners, but I'm pretty sure they're biologically evolved to mark territory by sound pollution, and should learn to shut up, too.
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[ 3.5 ms ] story [ 50.9 ms ] threadExample: Diwali is a horrible time to be a stray animal in India. Heck, even my pets hate the festival. But humans will always be self obsessed and say it's for celebration. Sure.
We need to keep growing, building, making, taking. Some people seem to really love the bustle and creative destruction. I'm in my 40s, and I've always hated it. When I was a child, I wondered if when I grew up, I would fit naturally into the world the way that so many others seemed to. The answer was no. I don't know why people need to be the way they are. I don't feel comfortable in so many normal situations. The things that bother the animals bother me too, but for most people this is unthinkable in the same way that other modes of thought are unthinkable. (eg, when someone who thinks mostly in words learns that some people think only in pictures)
It's not a question of "can we learn to shut up?", it's "will humans ever care enough to even want to learn?".
But here we're concerned for the aural experience of some birds.
That last part is what really opened my eyes about the noise polution from datacenters
There's so much noise around - it really does tie in to the "social model of disability" in that a lot of my issues would disappear if environments weren't so hostile - that includes noise, smells, and lights.
Not being able to read the argument, I'll just note that dogs are horrible sound polluters. Possibly only when they have bad human owners, but I'm pretty sure they're biologically evolved to mark territory by sound pollution, and should learn to shut up, too.