+Binaural Beats

     This week Philip G. and I made our presentation on binaural beats.  The presentation can be found at the end of this post.  Essentially, binaural beats are two channels of slightly different frequencies, each played in one ear of a set of headphones.  Our brains perceive a pulsing of sound due to the perceived alternating of constructive and destructive interference.  One thing which I forgot to mention during the presentation is that the speed of the pulsing is equal to the difference of the two tones being listened to.  So if one ear hears 100 Hz and the other hears 105 Hz, the pulsing is at a rate of 5 Hz, or 5 pulses per second.  The hope of binaural beats is that this pulsing or beating will cause the brains waves to be drawn toward that frequency.  While I would like to see more studies on how exactly electrical signals in the brains are affected, I think there is enough evidence to be cautiously optimistic that there are positive effects.  At the very least, I think it is helpful to sometimes have a steady sound to help keep focused, so long as it is not played too loudly.  In The Shallows, Nicholas Carr lists four categories that all technologies can be placed into: those that extend our physical strengths  those that extend our range or sensitivity of our sense, those that enable us to reshape nature, and those that "extend or support our mental powers - to find and classify information, to formulate and articulate ideas, to share know-how and knowledge, to take measurements and perform calculations, to expand the capacity of our memory" (44).  Binaural beats, whether placebo effect or true science, is a technology that can extend and support our mental powers.