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In this blogposting…

* The Most Relaxing Sound in the World
* Reality is an Illusion
Go forth….

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THE MOST RELAXING SOUND IN THE WORLD
Incredibly, the university of Manchester employs ‘sound therapists’ whose job is to determine the various effects that sounds have on our state of mind.  Even more incredibly, they claim to have earned their salary by coming up with the most relaxing sound in the world.

You might think that the sound in question would be a kind of slow-beat combination of birdsong, flowing water and a light Spring breeze with, perhaps, a distant hint of Northumbrian pipes.  But if that is what you think, you’re quite spectacularly wrong.

The sound therapists got together with a local band called Marconi Union and drafted several ‘tunes’, eventually creating a ‘song’ called Weightless.

They then played the song to 40 women (it says here) and found it to be more effective at helping them relax than songs by Enya, Mozart and Coldplay - to name but three.

They reckon it works by ‘using specific rhythms, tones, frequencies and intervals to relax the listener’.  (Whether it has the same effect on men is a moot point which, perhaps, this blogposting could throw some light on.)

A continuous rhythm of 60 beats-per-minute ‘causes the brainwaves and heart rate to synchronise with the rhythm: a process known as entrainment.  Low underlying bass tones relax the listener and a low whooshing sound with a trance-like quality takes the listener into an even deeper state of calm’.

At any rate, that’s what they claim.  But we sceptical truckshunters don’t have to take their word for it.  We can listen to it ourselves and make our own minds up.

Click on the link below; if it doesn’t work, cut and paste it into the Search box of your internet browser.  When the web page opens, click on the arrow, top left - then sit back and listen.

There’s more information about this ‘discovery’ on the same page, too, as well as comments left by previous listeners who have done the same thing as you.

https://soundcloud.com/emerson-hurtatis/marconi-union-weightless

I’d be interested to know what you think and how 'entrained' you become...
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REALITY IS AN ILLUSION….
I’ve been sent these optical illusions by a nameless blogster, who should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves.  However, I’m a big fan of stuff like this so - Thanks, whoever you are!

The one at the top is the infamous, and frankly unbelievable, ‘Adelson Shadow’.

Although the square labelled ‘A’ appears to be darker than the square labelled ‘B’, they are actually exactly the same shade of grey.

If you don’t believe it, join the club.

Next comes the 'Blue/Green Illusion'; the ‘blue’ and ‘green’ backgrounds are actually the same colour.

I think.

The next one’s a bit of a test.  Try counting the black dots to see just how much of a test it is.

Next comes ‘Static Motion’.  The illusion of movement is ‘derived from interacting colour contrasts and shape positions within the image’.  Notice, too, that when you look at any individual point dead on, it stops moving.

The final illusion is perhaps my favourite.  The two pictures of the Leaning Tower of Pisa are exactly the same - despite appearances.  I’ve tried this illusion with matching photos of Grey’s Monument and, yes, once again the Monument on the right was definitely leaning away from the one on the left.

Er…..

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CONTACT ME
Post comments on this blog or email me:  truckshunters@googlemail.com