4 ms·

The curious case of whistled languages and their lack of left-brain dominance

65 points by shawndumas 11y ago

lawpoop 11y ago
I heard this yesterday on NPR, and wondered if singing is processed similarly. It's another phenomenon that is half-music, half-language.
- jerelunruh 11y ago
  Singing does use a different part of the brain than speech and it would be interesting to know if it's similar to listening to whistling. Someone in my family used to stutter badly but their singing has always been flawless
  - Zancarius 11y ago
    Not surprising. That was the same case with John Paul Larkin whose stage name Scatman John[1] probably rings a few bells. Although his style of singing lent itself well to (ab)use of stuttering. Very curious how that works, though. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scatman_John https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scatman_John
davidw 11y ago
I wonder if they also studied this one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silbo_Gomero https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silbo_Gomero
- gpvos 11y ago
  Not in this study, but the actual article, linked at the bottom, does refer to an earlier study on the whistled language of La Gomera. Also, Wikipedia says that Silbo Gomero is "one of the best-studied whistling languages".
codezero 11y ago
It's really interesting how this type of communication works, you can read up about the details on Wikipedia [1]. Also, this page [2] has some cool examples of sine-wave speech that you can listen to in order to understand how people can understand whistled speech. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistled_language https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistled_language [2] http://www.mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk/people/matt.davis/sine-wave-speech/ http://www.mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk/people/matt.davis/sine-wave-spe...
- Gravityloss 11y ago
  Link 2, that's pure magic. I recommend to everyone, just listen the files in the order given.
  - esrauch 11y ago
    Interestingly in the first audio example of [2] I was able to understand the sentence before listening to the clear version. I've heard other examples of this phenomenon before (perhaps these exact examples on NPR?) and I recall definitely not making it out then, so maybe something was stuck in my brain the first time.
    - jcranmer 11y ago
      After listening only to the first one about four or five times, I made out "It was a funny day when the children were going to the park." Even after priming with the clear version, "sunny" still sounds like "funny," although the other text was much clearer.
  - rndn 11y ago
    Wow, I listened to this several months ago and I am still primed on the first sentence.
  - mcweaksauce 11y ago
    Sine-wave speech reminds me of R2D2 from Star Wars. Does anyone know if sine-wave speech was used as an inspiration? Maybe R2D2 actually says coherent sentences in the movies, but we aren't used to that form of speech interpretation
forkandwait 11y ago
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boatswain%27s_call https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boatswain%27s_call I wonder if the boatswain calls count as a whistled language?

65 points by shawndumas 11y ago

I heard this yesterday on NPR, and wondered if singing is processed similarly. It's another phenomenon that is half-music, half-language.

jerelunruh 11y ago
Singing does use a different part of the brain than speech and it would be interesting to know if it's similar to listening to whistling. Someone in my family used to stutter badly but their singing has always been flawless
- Zancarius 11y ago
  Not surprising. That was the same case with John Paul Larkin whose stage name Scatman John[1] probably rings a few bells. Although his style of singing lent itself well to (ab)use of stuttering. Very curious how that works, though. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scatman_John https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scatman_John

davidw 11y ago

I wonder if they also studied this one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silbo_Gomero https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silbo_Gomero

gpvos 11y ago
Not in this study, but the actual article, linked at the bottom, does refer to an earlier study on the whistled language of La Gomera. Also, Wikipedia says that Silbo Gomero is "one of the best-studied whistling languages".

codezero 11y ago

It's really interesting how this type of communication works, you can read up about the details on Wikipedia [1]. Also, this page [2] has some cool examples of sine-wave speech that you can listen to in order to understand how people can understand whistled speech. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistled_language https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whistled_language [2] http://www.mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk/people/matt.davis/sine-wave-speech/ http://www.mrc-cbu.cam.ac.uk/people/matt.davis/sine-wave-spe...

Gravityloss 11y ago
Link 2, that's pure magic. I recommend to everyone, just listen the files in the order given.
- esrauch 11y ago
  Interestingly in the first audio example of [2] I was able to understand the sentence before listening to the clear version. I've heard other examples of this phenomenon before (perhaps these exact examples on NPR?) and I recall definitely not making it out then, so maybe something was stuck in my brain the first time.
  - jcranmer 11y ago
    After listening only to the first one about four or five times, I made out "It was a funny day when the children were going to the park." Even after priming with the clear version, "sunny" still sounds like "funny," although the other text was much clearer.
- rndn 11y ago
  Wow, I listened to this several months ago and I am still primed on the first sentence.
- mcweaksauce 11y ago
  Sine-wave speech reminds me of R2D2 from Star Wars. Does anyone know if sine-wave speech was used as an inspiration? Maybe R2D2 actually says coherent sentences in the movies, but we aren't used to that form of speech interpretation

forkandwait 11y ago

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boatswain%27s_call https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boatswain%27s_call I wonder if the boatswain calls count as a whistled language?