My synaesthasia may be getting "worse..."

[Ryanderman]

Originally Posted by TDK

Hmmm. I get this slightly. Sounds to silent things. Its to the point that I'm not sure if I'm making it up though, because its for stuff like muted TVs and speakers. And sometimes gifs, yeah.

I get that with tv's and speakers too. A computer in the lab I'm in is doing it right now, and no one will believe me when I say it's making a really irritating high pitched whine. But I don't think that's what the article was talking about. It's not mixing up signals, but actually hearing a frequency that a lot of people can't hear. Feel special that you can hear such a high frequency.

I attach colors or textures to numbers or words, but it's not so much that I see the colors or feel the textures in relation to the number or words, but that certain numbers or words remind me of certain colors or textures. I think it's an interesting connection in the memory part of my brain, rather than mixed signals. I like the number 6 better than 7, because green is better than yellow. Things like that.

[Thylacine]

Originally Posted by guyy

I mean, I've had this for a while now, which is similarly weird (partly because there's no explanation for it I can think of, since my hearing is otherwise perfect). It's weirdly psychological, in that it gets not just louder but also more elaborate (various layers of sounds pulsing at different frequencies) if I concentrate on it, but it also varies by location, and just today I found a certain area at my school where it goes away completely. It's never been triggered by something like looking at animated .gifs, though.

I can't sleep at night without music playing or at the very least my fish tank filter being kind of noisy. It just gets worse and worse if there is no other noise to focus on.

[TDK]

Originally Posted by Ryanderman

I get that with tv's and speakers too. A computer in the lab I'm in is doing it right now, and no one will believe me when I say it's making a really irritating high pitched whine. But I don't think that's what the article was talking about. It's not mixing up signals, but actually hearing a frequency that a lot of people can't hear. Feel special that you can hear such a high frequency.

No, like, I hear the music playing or the people talking, but very distantly.

[Zilla]

Originally Posted by secretskull

For the record, I think that this sounds really awesome. I may even be envious. I think you should be happy with your new found super power.

How about this one?

the "ooeeeeeeeeeeee, eeeooooo" thing is the same for me, but I also hear a lower "hrrrrrrrrr" with the mouth being open. It's more boring because there's not a lot of motion.

Originally Posted by Meister

So, if someone were to play those sounds, do you see phil_ in a drill dozer or does it only work one way around? Been curious about that forever.

I don't think it's exactly possible to replicate the sound, but it's possible that if the sound were somehow manifest in the physical realm, I might be able to tell you what images would trigger it, but it's not the same kind of association. Sounds don't trigger shapes for me, they trigger colors. The most fun is the bridge in Styx's "Come Sail Away" because that's one of the only pieces that's psychodelic. A lot of music for me falls in the range between dark red (Distrubed's "Stricken") and light gray/white (The Beatles' Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da). Though there are a few blue songs (paradoxically enough, The Beatles' "Yellow Submarine"). Most of my favorite music is orange (most Van Halen, the Scorpions). Oh, wow, I guess there is a green song, now that I think about it, "Sabotage" by the Beastie Boys. Oh, rap usually ends up blue too...

Originally Posted by katiuska

What a crumbly yellow voice you have.

I knew of a girl who "lost" her synesthesia, which is particularly weird because it's not something that's supposed to happen. Also, is associating things with colors actually synesthetic? I do that, but I don't think it counts--I mean, 8 always reminded me of magenta a little, but I don't see 8s that are printed in black ink as anything but black.

Yeah, there's a clear difference between what is really there and what's implied or triggered. It's not that it actually messes with my perception, it's like an imaginary sense.

There are tests, according to the wikipedia page. The number one makes me a little frustrated because I have it for numbers, but 5 and 2 are similar in color and the association is not as strong for square-shaped numbers like on an LED. There's the Stroop test thing they can do for that.

Originally Posted by TDK

No, like, I hear the music playing or the people talking, but very distantly.

I've noticed that happens a lot, and it's not synaesthesia, it's the device not actually being compeletely mute. I figured this out because I'd close my eyes and still be able to hear it, or I would hear my computer make a noise that I wasn't expecting it to make even though the speakers' volume is turned all the way off (not set to 0 on the computer, just the volume dial set to minimum).

[Meister]

muted TVs and speakers

I videotaped a stand-up performance from TV once and the station screwed up - there was a minute or two without sound, then a break and those two minutes repeated with sound. I'd watch the tape frequently and one time I noticed I knew the mute part so well I could lip-read it, and I swear I heard the words very quietly. Kinda creepy.

blue, green and red songs

What about Blues?

And do you ever get really confused playing Guitar Hero?

[Zilla]

Blues depends on the song. The more jazzy ones are yellower. A lot of Eric Clapton is actually whiter than Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da. It takes a specific kind of blues song to be blue, a lot of them either go red, yellow, or white actually. Oh, now that I think about it, a lot of blues songs have "cleaner" colors than rock songs. The colors are more solid and vibrant than other genres, which have a lot of black/gray interference...

I don't get confused playing guitar hero for a lot of reasons. Probably the biggest reason is that I don't look at the colors, I look at the position. The other reason is that, for me, the entire song usually stays the same color because it usually has the same feel throughout. (There are a few that change, Stairway to Heaven has 3 colors, starting with a whispy white-yellow strand, the drums come in and make it a thicker, greener ribbon, and then the guitar solo brings it into a hot-yellow with black interference bit similar to the color of most AC/DC songs.) Last, I'm able to focus on the notechart for motor response instead of the color the song makes, much like people frequently tune out the background animations of the band playing. It's there, but it's not important.

Edit: Also, high-note guitar solos are almost always a streak of white amidst the other color of the song

[Fifthfiend]

Originally Posted by Zilla

"ween-ga-ween-ga-ween-ga" for the left part.

"waaooooww" for the right part.

Edit: missed the neon flashy bit, that's "bip boop BIP bip boop BIP"

Edited for closer onomatopoeic representation.

Nonsense, it sounds like a high-pitched whine mixed with the ring of a charging capacitor.

[TDK]

Originally Posted by Zilla

I've noticed that happens a lot, and it's not synaesthesia, it's the device not actually being compeletely mute. I figured this out because I'd close my eyes and still be able to hear it, or I would hear my computer make a noise that I wasn't expecting it to make even though the speakers' volume is turned all the way off (not set to 0 on the computer, just the volume dial set to minimum).

Yeah, I'd thought it was. Either that, synaesthesia, or my imagination.

[bluestarultor]

Originally Posted by Ryanderman

I get that with tv's and speakers too. A computer in the lab I'm in is doing it right now, and no one will believe me when I say it's making a really irritating high pitched whine. But I don't think that's what the article was talking about. It's not mixing up signals, but actually hearing a frequency that a lot of people can't hear. Feel special that you can hear such a high frequency.

God I hate when people can't hear stuff I can. :gonk: Yes, TV sets and such emit hypersonics. I could zip up a few tones made in Audacity to do an informal test, but I personally can hear at least up to the 18,000 Hz range on (I think it was) a square wave, which seems to be far above what Phantom7 can pick up. Either that, or you could get Audacity yourself. It's free. Just use Generate>Tone and pick the waveform and frequency you want. I'd use a sine wave just to be sure, but I don't think it would really matter. Then again, I'm no physicist.

[guyy]

Originally Posted by bluestarultor

God I hate when people can't hear stuff I can. :gonk: Yes, TV sets and such emit hypersonics. I could zip up a few tones made in Audacity to do an informal test, but I personally can hear at least up to the 18,000 Hz range on (I think it was) a square wave, which seems to be far above what Phantom7 can pick up.

I can actually hear up to about 19,000 if it's loud enough (not loud to the point of hearing obliteration, but loud to the point of being annoying if it's at a lower frequency), though anything that high just sounds like an increase in the background whine I hear all the time. CRTs make the same noise, but most people I know can't hear it. (LCD TVs don't make this noise, as far as I know. Something about the "scanning" process in CRTs [big box monitors] makes it, I think.)

...This kinda makes me worried about how safe CRT TVs are, because the Audacity-generated high frequency things are almost inaudible even at high volumes, but I can hear CRTs easily. That sound might be loud enough to be kinda...destructive. Maybe this is why TVs give me a headache even when I'm not watching them.