4 ms·

The sound of Earth’s magnetic field

56 points by cellover 4y ago

jamesdwilson 4y ago
How does it demonstrate the fluctuation from the last 100k years? (per article)
- nomel 4y ago
  > The rumbling of Earth’s magnetic field is accompanied by a representation of a geomagnetic storm that resulted from a solar flare on 3 November 2011 It’s art.
dylan604 4y ago
It's very reminiscent of underwater recordings where the flow is causing cables/chains/etc to move around on a ship wreck. Makes for interesting background noise. Will definitely be fun as a sound design for a movie.
sidcool 4y ago
ELI5. What does it mean for magnetic field to have sound?
- 1970-01-01 4y ago
  Read the 2nd sentence of the article, and you'll get it.
  - CoastalCoder 4y ago
    IMHO the 2nd sentence is still pretty vague and maybe misleading. IIUC, they took a model of earth's magnetic field over the past 100,000 years, fed it into (some magic box that the article doesn't explain), and turned it into a public art exhibit.
- queuebert 4y ago
  One simple answer is that electricity run through a loudspeaker makes sound. And physics tells us that changing magnetic fields cause electricity. You could run that electricity through a speaker and "hear" the Earth's changing magnetic field. You would necessarily have to speed it up because we don't have 20,000 years to listen.
pyinstallwoes 4y ago
Instantly going into my next techno track.
O__________O 4y ago
Direct link to audio clip: https://soundcloud.com/esa/the-scary-sound-of-earths-magnetic-field https://soundcloud.com/esa/the-scary-sound-of-earths-magneti...
ccbccccbbcccbb 4y ago
As someone who writes electronic music and is pretty familiar with synths, effects and DSP in general, I call bullshit on the title of the article. It should read: "A whole bunch of synths and/or samplers, stereo panned and processed with a whole stack of effects, using a sped-up recording of Earth's magnetic field as a trigger of said generators". This is not even remotely the sound of Earth's magnetic field.
- queuebert 4y ago
  Can you link to where you found their methods? I can't find anywhere where they said what they did. (Generously assuming you're not just sh*tting on them for no reason.)
  - ccbccccbbcccbb 4y ago
    I hear what they did. There are distinct generators placed in various places in the sound stage, with reverbs on them, with sound that is characteristic of granular synthesis. Even if you are not familiar with these methods, just think about it: even if soumeone would genuinely just bring the inaudible frequencies of a recording of magnetosphic waves into audible domain by speeding it up, without any processing, where would this lush stereo imaging come from? It would be plain and simply monophonic. Moreover, they don't quite make it secret that this is not the actual sound of the magnetosphere: >Musician and project supporter Klaus Nielsen, from the Technical University of Denmark, explains, “The team used data from ESA’s Swarm satellites, as well as other sources, and used these magnetic signals to manipulate and control a sonic representation of the core field.
    - ccbccccbbcccbb 4y ago
      Here is what genuine recording would sound like, for example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llXu9pSvF54 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llXu9pSvF54 I do realize though, that many people won't hear any difference.
      - 4y ago
m3kw9 4y ago
How is this different than saying here, this is the sound of light.
dhritzkiv 4y ago
Sounds like a lot of sound effects from David Lynch's Twin Peaks: The Return
aaron695 4y ago
aaroninsf 4y ago
As a sound artist who specialized in actual field recordings, and took their honest representation and provenance seriously, it is a recurring gripe of mine when media relations and pop sci writers assert that this sort of thing is the "the sound of." It is not remotely that. It is sonification, which is a fine and noble art in its own right, but it represents an often very arbitrary transformation of one set of signals, into some audio form consumable by humans. FTA for example: "The team used data from ESA’s Swarm satellites, as well as other sources, and used these magnetic signals to manipulate and control a sonic representation of the core field." Some correlation is there, no doubt—but it would be very helpful for people to be educated about what sonification is, and, what they are hearing in this particular effort, e.g. given a sense of scale and timescale and medium transformation...

56 points by cellover 4y ago

jamesdwilson 4y ago

How does it demonstrate the fluctuation from the last 100k years? (per article)

nomel 4y ago
> The rumbling of Earth’s magnetic field is accompanied by a representation of a geomagnetic storm that resulted from a solar flare on 3 November 2011 It’s art.

dylan604 4y ago

It's very reminiscent of underwater recordings where the flow is causing cables/chains/etc to move around on a ship wreck. Makes for interesting background noise. Will definitely be fun as a sound design for a movie.

sidcool 4y ago

ELI5. What does it mean for magnetic field to have sound?

1970-01-01 4y ago
Read the 2nd sentence of the article, and you'll get it.
- CoastalCoder 4y ago
  IMHO the 2nd sentence is still pretty vague and maybe misleading. IIUC, they took a model of earth's magnetic field over the past 100,000 years, fed it into (some magic box that the article doesn't explain), and turned it into a public art exhibit.
queuebert 4y ago
One simple answer is that electricity run through a loudspeaker makes sound. And physics tells us that changing magnetic fields cause electricity. You could run that electricity through a speaker and "hear" the Earth's changing magnetic field. You would necessarily have to speed it up because we don't have 20,000 years to listen.

pyinstallwoes 4y ago

Instantly going into my next techno track.

O__________O 4y ago

Direct link to audio clip: https://soundcloud.com/esa/the-scary-sound-of-earths-magnetic-field https://soundcloud.com/esa/the-scary-sound-of-earths-magneti...

ccbccccbbcccbb 4y ago

As someone who writes electronic music and is pretty familiar with synths, effects and DSP in general, I call bullshit on the title of the article. It should read: "A whole bunch of synths and/or samplers, stereo panned and processed with a whole stack of effects, using a sped-up recording of Earth's magnetic field as a trigger of said generators". This is not even remotely the sound of Earth's magnetic field.

queuebert 4y ago
Can you link to where you found their methods? I can't find anywhere where they said what they did. (Generously assuming you're not just sh*tting on them for no reason.)
- ccbccccbbcccbb 4y ago
  I hear what they did. There are distinct generators placed in various places in the sound stage, with reverbs on them, with sound that is characteristic of granular synthesis. Even if you are not familiar with these methods, just think about it: even if soumeone would genuinely just bring the inaudible frequencies of a recording of magnetosphic waves into audible domain by speeding it up, without any processing, where would this lush stereo imaging come from? It would be plain and simply monophonic. Moreover, they don't quite make it secret that this is not the actual sound of the magnetosphere: >Musician and project supporter Klaus Nielsen, from the Technical University of Denmark, explains, “The team used data from ESA’s Swarm satellites, as well as other sources, and used these magnetic signals to manipulate and control a sonic representation of the core field.
  - ccbccccbbcccbb 4y ago
    Here is what genuine recording would sound like, for example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llXu9pSvF54 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llXu9pSvF54 I do realize though, that many people won't hear any difference.
    - 4y ago

m3kw9 4y ago

How is this different than saying here, this is the sound of light.

dhritzkiv 4y ago

Sounds like a lot of sound effects from David Lynch's Twin Peaks: The Return

aaron695 4y ago

aaroninsf 4y ago

As a sound artist who specialized in actual field recordings, and took their honest representation and provenance seriously, it is a recurring gripe of mine when media relations and pop sci writers assert that this sort of thing is the "the sound of." It is not remotely that. It is sonification, which is a fine and noble art in its own right, but it represents an often very arbitrary transformation of one set of signals, into some audio form consumable by humans. FTA for example: "The team used data from ESA’s Swarm satellites, as well as other sources, and used these magnetic signals to manipulate and control a sonic representation of the core field." Some correlation is there, no doubt—but it would be very helpful for people to be educated about what sonification is, and, what they are hearing in this particular effort, e.g. given a sense of scale and timescale and medium transformation...