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Re: perception of circling horn



At 11:10 AM 4/20/00 -0500, Paul O. Johnson wrote:
I thought we localized sound only through the
slight differences in time of arrival and intensity at the two pinnae. Do we
know the weighting our brains place on phase differences?

I fear I don't understand the question.

To the limited extent that I understand it, I think of the
sound-localization system as being sensitive to time differences,
although other cues are used. Echolocation by snapping your fingers works
surprisingly well, although it takes a while to learn the skill.

I'm usually too sloppy to draw the distinction between "phase" and "time".
They are related to each other by a Fourier transform (with a factor of
omega thrown in to mess things up). But in this case the difference is
arguably important.

I've seen research that shows that as part of the sound-localization
system, owl brains have special circuits for explicit time-domain
processing, distinct from the frequency-domain processing that leads to the
sense of pitch.... I assume typical mammals have these circuits too, though
somewhat less developed.

If that doesn't answer the question, please restate the question.....