Health Editor’s Note: Okay, if any of you have tinnitus, buzzing in the ears, etc. you will know what I mean. I really do wonder if you will still be able to hear those sounds that never leave you…until you are able to fall asleep….Carol
Earth’s Quietest Place Will Drive You Crazy in 45 Minutes
by Rose Eveleth Smithsonian.com
Everybody seems to be looking for a little peace and quiet these days. But even such a reasonable idea can go too far. The quietest place on earth, an anechoic chamber at Orfield Laboratories in Minnesota, is so quiet that the longest anybody has been able to bear it is 45 minutes.
Inside the room it’s silent. So silent that the background noise measured is actually negative decibels, -9.4 dBA. Steven Orfield, the lab’s founder, told Hearing Aid Know: “We challenge people to sit in the chamber in the dark – one person stayed in there for 45 minutes. When it’s quiet, ears will adapt. The quieter the room, the more things you hear. You’ll hear your heart beating, sometimes you can hear your lungs, hear your stomach gurgling loudly. In the anechoic chamber, you become the sound.”
But the room isn’t just for torturing people. Companies test their products in it to find out just how loud they are. And NASA has sent astronauts to help them adapt to the silence of space. For you and me, however, the room is a deeply disorienting place. Not only do people hear their heartbeat, they have trouble orienting themselves and even standing. “How you orient yourself is through sounds you hear when you walk. In the anechnoic chamber, you don’t have any cues,” Orfield told the Daily Mail. “You take away the perceptual cues that allow you to balance and manoeuvre. If you’re in there for half an hour, you have to be in a chair.”
Carol graduated from Riverside White Cross School of Nursing in Columbus, Ohio and received her diploma as a registered nurse. She attended Bowling Green State University where she received a Bachelor of Arts Degree in History and Literature. She attended the University of Toledo, College of Nursing, and received a Master’s of Nursing Science Degree as an Educator.
She has traveled extensively, is a photographer, and writes on medical issues. Carol has three children RJ, Katherine, and Stephen – one daughter-in-law; Katie – two granddaughters; Isabella Marianna and Zoe Olivia – and one grandson, Alexander Paul. She also shares her life with her husband Gordon Duff, many cats, and two rescues.
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I have got tinnitus too but being a strictly nonMilitary guy i got mine from playing the music way too loud ,,,,,, i;m surprised to see so many others in the same boat as myself …… , Carol you’re a breath of fresh air here , thank you for your activities …….
Mine was jet engines. Strangely enough, my field later was ultrasonic accoustics so I was able to carefully analyze the “sound”, actually multiple single tones playing together in the ultrasonic region.
Feel more sorry for the guys that stood there and were handed sunglasses…
So yeah, interesting article but, yes I do have tinnitus….on the rifle range, I was like…hey Captain…I don’t have ear protection and I have to quall….. Captain Wackencracker says ” don’t worry Marine….it’s all good…you’ll be fine without it” because they didn’t get a shipment in of ear sponge things….and here I am 40 years later…..
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