If a tree falls down in the woods and no one is around does it still make a sound????

Question

If a tree falls down in the woods and no one is around does it still make a sound????

Answer 1

If you left a tape Recorder,,switched on there ,,you would surely hear something,,,,

Answer 2

Yes, just no one would hear it.

Answer 3

Yes, it makes a sound because the falling tree creates sound waves upon impact.

The question then becomes "does it make a NOISE?"  One definition of the word noise is "any sound that is undesired or interferes with one's hearing of something."  In this case, no, the falling tree does NOT make a noise because a noise is created by the hearer.

Answer 4

YES! Especially if you live in the woods, and it falls on your house.

Answer 5

if no one saw it fall, did it fall, or just appear on the ground?

Answer 6

An old chestnut tree perhaps? In a classical deterministic physics universe the treefall would trigger a causal chain which would ultim8ly be knowable and could be traced back to the original cause (sound). In our quantum probabilistic universe you could only infer a certain likelihood of the event within given parameters.

Answer 7

Yes.

Answer 8

Very philosophical, a bit like the paradox of Schrodinger's cat but not quite as subtle.

I'm sure you are well aware of the answer.

Answer 9

Since sound is caused by variations in pressure waves, the sound is still there, but if no one is there to listen to it - or a device to  interpret the pressure waves into sound, then only the fairies will be able to hear it - and I know a few people who've been with the faries to confirm this.

Answer 10

The irate magpies that have immigrated to my back garden certainly thought it did. But if they weren't there, if it was a baron woodland, with only other trees, on an island, in outer space, with it's own atmosphere, then...

...no. But the shockwave would probably infiltrate the surrounding air.

I pretend I am a tree in a lonely forest when I really need to f**t in a crowded lift. Or at a family dinner.

Answer 11

Of course it does. Just because no one hears it the sound still exsists.

Answer 12

if the yahoo! answers user posts a question and nobody cares, was the question asked?

Answer 13

It makes sound "waves", which will travel until they hit an eardrum, whether that be an animal or human. At that point, it becomes a "sound".

Answer 14

Simply posing the question means there has to be an answer, right?  IMO it's an "artificial" question, because nobody would ever know about the tree falling in the first place.  Good question for ppl who like questioning for the sake of questioning ;-).

Edit - OK they might see the fallen tree later- but it's still an artificial question because "they might" and we're not talking about some specific tree either.

Answer 15

Yes.  The sound a falling tree makes does not depend on the proximity of observers.

It would be a strange universe indeed in which sounds grew louder the more people were nearby (though sounds made BY people often seem to).

Answer 16

I think sounds are waves so it would still give out waves, there's just no one around to pick the soundwaves up?!

Answer 17

Yes:, it still make a sound . By hitting the woods around it.

A sound is produce by the vibraretion of objects, things, or etc.