# Ringing in the ears \[edited title\]
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ringing-in-the-ears-edited-title/165394
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [March 31, 2003, 5:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ringing-in-the-ears-edited-title/165394 "2003-03-31T05:49:04Z")
**Posts on this page:** 8
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@DuhCow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DuhCow)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2003, 5:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ringing-in-the-ears-edited-title/165394/1 "2003-03-31T05:49:04Z")
what exactly IS that high pitched ringing in your ear?
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### Author:  [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2003, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ringing-in-the-ears-edited-title/165394/2 "2003-03-31T05:52:04Z")
This reminds me of when a friend said to me
“can’t you hear that car alarm?”.
“I can now, bastard”
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### Author:  [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2003, 5:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ringing-in-the-ears-edited-title/165394/3 "2003-03-31T05:56:34Z")
Could be tinitus.
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### Author:  [@Lobsang](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobsang)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2003, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ringing-in-the-ears-edited-title/165394/4 "2003-03-31T06:04:07Z")
Probably not what **DuhCow** meant but cool anyway - \> If you concentrate on ‘hearing’ the space you are in, you can sort of ‘hear’ the silence.
Almost buddhist or something.
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### Author:  [@Apex\_Rogers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Apex_Rogers)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2003, 6:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ringing-in-the-ears-edited-title/165394/5 "2003-03-31T06:06:23Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by DuhCow \*
> \*\*what exactly IS that high pitched ringing in your ear? \*\*
IIRC, when one suffers hearing damage (by loud music or other such noise, presumably), oftentimes the upper frequency is the first to go. In the inner ear, each sound recepting cell has a hair attuned to a certain frequency that translates the incoming noise (after it’s been passed throught the timpanic membrane of course) to the auditory nerve to be interpreted by the brain. If these hairs get damaged (again likely to be higher frequency), one will hear a temporary ringing indicating the cell has lost functionality and is reporting a false positive to the auditory nerve that whatever frequency it is associated with is being heard. Once the brain realizes that you’ve been hearing the same frequency for such a long time, it tends to shut off the cell, ignoring the incoming signal. High pitched ringing as a result of loud noises often results in permanent hearing loss. If you are talking about everyday, now and again high pitched ringing, you are refering of course to tinitus. I’m not sure of the specifics here, but something triggers the specific hair cell to sende false positive signals to the brain. In this case, the cell is not permantly damaged and can recover to hear its frequency again. This is information I vaguely remember from my bio class last year, so you should probably **google** it up to find definitive answer. Feel free to correct me, anyone.
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### Author:  [@bibliophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bibliophage)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2003, 6:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ringing-in-the-ears-edited-title/165394/6 "2003-03-31T06:38:48Z")
**Cecil Adams** on [What causes ringing in your ears?](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a5_094.html)
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### Author:  [@bibliophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bibliophage)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2003, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ringing-in-the-ears-edited-title/165394/7 "2003-03-31T06:46:51Z")
I have edited the thread title from **ears** to **Ringing in the ears**. In the future please try to choose more descriptive titles.
bibliophage
moderator GQ
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### Author:  [@meathead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/meathead)
#### Post date: [March 31, 2003, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/ringing-in-the-ears-edited-title/165394/8 "2003-03-31T15:05:20Z")
You might want to also investigate Meniere’s Disease. Tinnitus can sometimes be one of the first symptoms, and it gets progressively more annoying from there.