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Noise pollution hurts the heart

theatlantic.com

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Re: Noise pollution hurts the heart

#21

Post by nimbius »

amelius wrote: post #19
baron816 wrote: post #3

There are few things that make me angrier than when a Harley-Davidson style motorcycle (or a pack of them) drive past me while I’m walking down the street. I can’t believe cities haven’t prohibited them, especially at night. Those things are specifically designed to create noise pollution. They’re so fucking obnoxious, even just thinking about it while I’m writing this is working me up.

And the people riding them use earplugs :) https://www.alpinehearingprotection.com/earplugs/motosafe-pr...

Not for the pipes though. Most riders wear ear plugs for wind noise and traffic noise at highway speed.

Re: Noise pollution hurts the heart

#22

Post by centimeter »

ryanianian wrote: post #13

Damaging the heart sounds right. My neighbor has a unique obsession with his leaf-blower. It's like his daily 30-120 minutes of exercise at random times of the day. Even with all the noise-cancelling technology in the world, it ruins me for at least 2-3 hours and makes both video-conferencing and deep work basically impossible. Here's the thing: Nobody cares. The neighbor can say no to polite requests to figure out a…

> high-pitch "safety" beeping

This drives me insane. I know some shithead lawyer or safety “activist” somewhere is responsible for all the bullshit beeping I have to deal with in my life. A fire alarm going off for no reason. (I would accept the negligible marginal risk of burning to death than have to deal with legally mandated fire alarms.) My car beeping because I didn’t put the seatbelt over the luggage in the passenger seat. Even airplanes aren’t as annoying with the audible alerts as cars. The only time I get beeped at when I’m flying is if I’m stalling or something. At least in aircraft, designers have the understanding and latitude to treat noises as the pointless distractions they are.

Re: Noise pollution hurts the heart

#23

Post by pivo »

boredumb wrote: post #12
baron816 wrote: post #3

There are few things that make me angrier than when a Harley-Davidson style motorcycle (or a pack of them) drive past me while I’m walking down the street. I can’t believe cities haven’t prohibited them, especially at night. Those things are specifically designed to create noise pollution. They’re so fucking obnoxious, even just thinking about it while I’m writing this is working me up.

Harleys stock are actually under the legal noise limit (80 decibels i think?) and are generally that loud due to straight exhaust and a specific cam shaft they use to squeeze more performance out of them. My understanding is folks prefer them to be loud so that they can be better noticed by cars and get hit less often. Dirt bikes are around 100 decibels, perform like trash and shouldn't be on the freeway near cars in…

> folks prefer them to be loud so that they can be better noticed by cars and get hit less often

If you want to do something that’s too dangerous to do without infuriating everyone around you, maybe you just shouldn’t do it.

I don’t think those super loud exhausts are stock either. There are tons of bikers who replace the stock pipes with the loudest ones they can find. I don’t get it at all.

Re: Noise pollution hurts the heart

#24

Post by stevenpetryk »

Guest42 wrote: post #15
belly_joe wrote: post #2

I feel the sound -> stress connection palpably. Especially sudden loud noises like a horn honking cause me to feel upset for a long while after being startled. Seems like a convincing argument to me for car-free spaces, although honestly I just wish we had stronger social norms against unnecessarily using a car's horn.

Agreed. I also don’t like it when locking a car via remote causes the horn to go off and in order to make sure people hit it multiple times.

There's someone who does this every day outside my apartment at around 7:15. It is infuriating. 4-5 loud, inconsistently-spaced honks "just to be sure" when I'm sure their car locks silently on the first request. Most modern cars only beep if you lock them twice.

Re: Noise pollution hurts the heart

#25

Post by centimeter »

Dumblydorr wrote: post #4

The main problem seems to be stress; with loud noises comes stress, which is a chronic killer. There's also the correlation between loud noise and air pollution, loud noise and sleep disruption, vibrations, disruptions to daily habits, inconvenience of construction and transit, etc. Personal story, there were workers using an extremely loud diesel powered crane to redo the facade of our building. They without fail be…

I think it’s unfortunate that society has become pacified to a point that people generally will not use e.g. minor equipment sabotage to deal with nuisances like this that otherwise take excessive bureaucratic nonsense to combat.

Re: Noise pollution hurts the heart

#26

Post by airstrike »

belly_joe wrote: post #2

I feel the sound -> stress connection palpably. Especially sudden loud noises like a horn honking cause me to feel upset for a long while after being startled. Seems like a convincing argument to me for car-free spaces, although honestly I just wish we had stronger social norms against unnecessarily using a car's horn.

I have this wild pet idea that we should be have a meter connected to a car's horn and at the end of the year you have to pay a bill for the amount you used. Something like $0.10 / second. You'll still honk when you need to but think twice before using it to annoy other drivers.

Re: Noise pollution hurts the heart

#27

Post by macg333 »

I live near a busy road, close to an intersection with a stoplight, and have my desk at a window that faces said road. The constant slowing a revving of traffic around the light is very distracting and I run an air purifier on high throughout the day to stabilize the noise and drown out the shifting traffic noises. I have also shifted my desk so that it does not overlook the road and thus I don't have to watch individuals sitting at the light all day. These two adjustments have made a positive impact on my focus when I'm working.

While I am excited for EVs to become more mainstream, I'm afraid for roads such as mine where the speed limit is 40 and people often drive 50+ that the quiet engine won't make much of a difference given the speed and that the sound of tires on the road and wind rushing around the vehicle are still somewhat loud in their own right. It makes me want to move to a more rural environment where the loudest noise is the refrigerator.

Re: Noise pollution hurts the heart

#28

Post by nickt »

boredumb wrote: post #12
baron816 wrote: post #3

There are few things that make me angrier than when a Harley-Davidson style motorcycle (or a pack of them) drive past me while I’m walking down the street. I can’t believe cities haven’t prohibited them, especially at night. Those things are specifically designed to create noise pollution. They’re so fucking obnoxious, even just thinking about it while I’m writing this is working me up.

Harleys stock are actually under the legal noise limit (80 decibels i think?) and are generally that loud due to straight exhaust and a specific cam shaft they use to squeeze more performance out of them. My understanding is folks prefer them to be loud so that they can be better noticed by cars and get hit less often. Dirt bikes are around 100 decibels, perform like trash and shouldn't be on the freeway near cars in…

That “loud pipes save lives is rubbish” [1]. Even if it were true the ROI on some training and awareness would be far higher.

[1] https://www.quora.com/Do-loud-pipes-really-significantly-sav...

Re: Noise pollution hurts the heart

#29

Post by DigitallyFidget »

I'd like to see an actual legitimate source of research regarding this. I can understand how some people are sensitive to the disruption of noises and how that can induce stress to those individuals, but the connection between noise and heart damage seems indirectly related.

Re: Noise pollution hurts the heart

#30

Post by boredumb »

pivo wrote: post #23
boredumb wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Harleys stock are actually under the legal noise limit (80 decibels i think?) and are generally that loud due to straight exhaust and a specific cam shaft they use to squeeze more performance out of them. My understanding is folks prefer them to be loud so that they can be better noticed by cars and get hit less often. Dirt bikes are around 100 decibels, perform like trash and shouldn't be on the freeway near cars in…

> folks prefer them to be loud so that they can be better noticed by cars and get hit less often If you want to do something that’s too dangerous to do without infuriating everyone around you, maybe you just shouldn’t do it. I don’t think those super loud exhausts are stock either. There are tons of bikers who replace the stock pipes with the loudest ones they can find. I don’t get it at all.

I think you're right about the straight pipes being after market, but I believe the noise generally comes from the engine configuration firing at uneven intervals that make it unusually distinct.
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