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Everything Is Getting Louder

theatlantic.com

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Re: Everything Is Getting Louder

#31

Post by techsupporter »

acranox wrote: post #28
ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this an American thing? In Europe I never ever hear cars beep when locked/unlocked, just the mechanical sound of the central locking and flashing the hazard lights once when unlocked, double when locked successful and tripple when lock failed(door not closed properly). Having your car make a loud sound for lock/unlock just creates more noise in the neighborhood.

Maybe. But it’s also slightly more nuanced. Honda for example works like this. One press of the remote, locks all the doors. The second press will beep the horn if all the doors are successfully locked. If you left one of the doors open, the horn won’t beep on the second press. So it’s a away of getting confirmation that all doors are closed and locked. It seems useful, but when my neighbor comes home in the middle o…

What gets me are the number of people who will put their keys in their pocket and just beat the ever loving hell out of the "lock" button as they walk away. So it's all "beep," "beep beep," "beep beep beep beep beep beep beep beep" until they finally get out of range.

I'm sure those are the same people who, if or when they are pedestrians, stand at the corner and repeatedly slam the crosswalk request button.

Re: Everything Is Getting Louder

#32

Post by Waterluvian »

My wife and I bought our first house this summer. We moved from a city of 300k to the suburbs of a city of 40k about 45 mins away.

We thought through a ton of things when buying but the one thing that caught us by surprise was the change in noise level. It's quiet here. The only ambience is a train that runs through the middle of the city like 10-20 times a day but we are far enough away that this this wonderfully peaceful low rumble for a minute. I fall asleep to it.

The inside is also an interesting lesson on noise. The main floor is a big open concept with 10 foot ceilings. Sound echoes like mad and we were forced, counter intuitively, to speak more quietly if we wanted to hear each other across the room. I think it's slowly training us to be quieter people and I love it for no immediate practical reason.

Re: Everything Is Getting Louder

#33

Post by abjKT26nO8 »

htk wrote: post #20
abjKT26nO8 wrote: post #6

For me the trigger is TVs. I've been renting a flat in a poorer area for over a year now. The walls are a lot thinner than in other places. There are a lot of people today (mostly 50+ year-olds) who cannot fall to sleep without the TV on. My neighbor is one of them. And the thing with TVs is that the most irritating sound frequency they emit is the one that is barely audible when you're in the same room, but when you…

I use Howard Leight’s Max every night during sleep to keep my sanity.

As blunte pointed out[1], earplugs make the situation worse.

[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21237273

Re: Everything Is Getting Louder

#34

Post by abjKT26nO8 »

airstrike wrote: post #24
abjKT26nO8 wrote: post #6

For me the trigger is TVs. I've been renting a flat in a poorer area for over a year now. The walls are a lot thinner than in other places. There are a lot of people today (mostly 50+ year-olds) who cannot fall to sleep without the TV on. My neighbor is one of them. And the thing with TVs is that the most irritating sound frequency they emit is the one that is barely audible when you're in the same room, but when you…

Earplugs and a white noise app!

As blunte pointed out[1], earplugs make the situation worse.

[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21237273

Re: Everything Is Getting Louder

#35

Post by KoftaBob »

oriettaxx wrote: post #16

the worst are * bells from catholic churches (when they play early Sunday morning they just invite you to blaspheme) * muezzin shouting from the mosque (aggravated from the fact that they talk Arabic, were in many countries, e.g. Turkey, nobody talks arabic, so nobody understand!) and the worst of the worst is that in both cases sound comes from tapes (no live at all, and very bad taped). Any national new legislation…

Where the hell do you live where those two are a common thing? In the US, the vast majority of places have noise pollution laws where neither would be allowed.

Re: Everything Is Getting Louder

#36

Post by heymijo »

Waterluvian wrote: post #32

My wife and I bought our first house this summer. We moved from a city of 300k to the suburbs of a city of 40k about 45 mins away. We thought through a ton of things when buying but the one thing that caught us by surprise was the change in noise level. It's quiet here. The only ambience is a train that runs through the middle of the city like 10-20 times a day but we are far enough away that this this wonderfully pe…

Do you have neighbors and/or are you in an area with lawns that need maintenance?

Suburbs in the midwest are inundated with noise: lawnmowers, leaf blowers, trimmers, and cars.

Re: Everything Is Getting Louder

#37

Post by riku_iki »

blunte wrote: post #26

Many people either cannot hear very low frequency sound, and they cannot understand what it’s like for those of us who can. The sounds don’t necessarily get louder at night - there are just fewer competing sounds to mask them. Earplugs and other sound barriers make it worse by filtering out higher frequency sounds, making the remaining VLF sounds seem louder. VLFs also penetrate earth, stone, concrete, etc. And becau…

Do you have any citations to support this claim?..

Re: Everything Is Getting Louder

#38

Post by Waterluvian »

heymijo wrote: post #36
Waterluvian wrote: post #32

My wife and I bought our first house this summer. We moved from a city of 300k to the suburbs of a city of 40k about 45 mins away. We thought through a ton of things when buying but the one thing that caught us by surprise was the change in noise level. It's quiet here. The only ambience is a train that runs through the middle of the city like 10-20 times a day but we are far enough away that this this wonderfully pe…

Do you have neighbors and/or are you in an area with lawns that need maintenance? Suburbs in the midwest are inundated with noise: lawnmowers, leaf blowers, trimmers, and cars.

Our neighborhood is built into a protected maple forest. Beautiful 100foot maple trees. The side effect is that most back yards don't have grass. Mine is artificial. And front yards grow a shade grass that people cut irregularly.

Leaf blowers just aren't a thing anywhere I've lived.

Another random tidbit I thought about corded electric mower is not quiet but far quieter than my neighbours' mowers. They aren't bad!

Re: Everything Is Getting Louder

#39

Post by myroon5 »

The number of appliances that intentionally make noise and cannot be configured to stop making noise irks me.

I never want microwaves, dishwashers, laundry machines, etc. to make any noise. Even worse is how many of them continue making noise until you unload them. I'd like to one day be able to run a load of laundry or dishes overnight without being constantly woken up.

Re: Everything Is Getting Louder

#40

Post by naravara »

abjKT26nO8 wrote: post #6

For me the trigger is TVs. I've been renting a flat in a poorer area for over a year now. The walls are a lot thinner than in other places. There are a lot of people today (mostly 50+ year-olds) who cannot fall to sleep without the TV on. My neighbor is one of them. And the thing with TVs is that the most irritating sound frequency they emit is the one that is barely audible when you're in the same room, but when you…

When I was in a similar situation I ended up paying for a few hundred dollars worth of acoustic foam for the walls. It didn’t stop everything, especially stopping noise from upstairs neighbors, but it was still a huge help.

It’s unsightly though. The kinds that are actually nice to look at as wall decoration are super expensive.

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