# Sound and music, or art and science

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sound-and-music-or-art-and-science/472818>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [November 15, 2008, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sound-and-music-or-art-and-science/472818 "2008-11-15T05:00:22Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\
**Post date:** [November 15, 2008, 5:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sound-and-music-or-art-and-science/472818/1 "2008-11-15T05:00:22Z")

</div>

Sound and music are, in a sense, the same. Ben Burt who did the sound effects for \*Star Wars \*is equally as important as John Williams who did the orchestra. It take the genius of George Lucas to put it all together.

My point is this: a symphony on its own would be considered music, while a audio event - anything heard by the human ear - would potentially be considered noise – but it would be considered sound in the context of music. Again, the example of Star Wars. Or take any modern rock band like Prodigy, Nine Inch Nails, ect.  
It’s interesting that, on its own, it would be percieved as noise, but combined with music might not even be noticed!

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\
**Post date:** [November 15, 2008, 5:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sound-and-music-or-art-and-science/472818/2 "2008-11-15T05:03:49Z")

</div>

Er, what?

(Are there people who don’t consider noises to be sounds? And where’s the science?)

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Chessic\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7c8e57/32.png) [@Chessic\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chessic_Sense)\
**Post date:** [November 15, 2008, 5:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sound-and-music-or-art-and-science/472818/3 "2008-11-15T05:24:40Z")

</div>

What the HELL are you saying? The best I can get is that if you take a noise and put it with some music, it stops being noise and becomes sound…which makes no sense because you said sound and music are the same thing and noise is anything heard by the human ear. Music and sound are heard by the human ear. So therefore, M=S=N.

Is that it?

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Kozmik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/8dc957/32.png) [@Kozmik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kozmik)\
**Post date:** [November 15, 2008, 5:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sound-and-music-or-art-and-science/472818/4 "2008-11-15T05:50:23Z")

</div>

> [@Indistinguishable](#):
>
> Er, what?
> 
> (Are there people who don’t consider noises to be sounds? And where’s the science?)

I’ve already mentioned the science, ie. the excellent work of Ben Burt, John Wiliams.

And the art? The producers.

Apparently, the producers don’t consider the **sound effects** to be the same as the **the score** as evidenced on many DVDs with an Music-Only Audio Track. Maybe a director (any Dopers?) would have a different opinion on that.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![phil417](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/6bbea6/32.png) [@phil417](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phil417)\
**Post date:** [November 15, 2008, 8:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sound-and-music-or-art-and-science/472818/5 "2008-11-15T08:51:06Z")

</div>

Are you saying there would be no Bach or Beethoven if we didn’t have auditory canals? Please explain.

Love, Phil