3 ms·

Nothing in the article and nobody in the comments takes issue with the fact that it's logarithmic. It's everything else that's the problem. (It's a ratio where

• rusk 1y ago
  But the base value is well defined, qualitatively (“a quiet room”), which is fine for what we are talking about which is “experienced loudness”. Once you go past log(3) it really doesn’t matter what the noise was at log(0).
  • sanderjd 1y ago
    I'm sorry, but did you read the article? This is not the complaint. If decibels were used only to measure sound relative to "experienced loudness" there would be no complaint. The complaint is that it is used in many other ways, often without distinguishing what the base unit is.
    • rusk 1y ago
      The issue is that it’s not “well defined” that it’s somehow subjective. But the whole point with a logarithmic scale is the small values don’t matter.
      • sanderjd 1y ago
        This isn't what the article is about!