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Testing if 60 minutes of silence drives you crazy

Veritasium

21M subscribers • 15 videos on Rounds

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  • Recommended by 2 people, in Hacker News, across 2 different months.

For anyone, no background needed. Education, not medical advice.

32M views12 years ago2 recommendations

Brain and nervesMental healthNeuroscienceStress

Derek Muller spends over an hour in an ultra-quiet anechoic chamber to test the myth that absolute silence causes insanity.

*Watch with headphones on! Is 45 minutes really the longest anyone can stay in a perfectly silent, pitch-black room? Support Veritasium on Patreon bit.ly/VePatreon Check out Audible: bit.ly/AudibleVe Want to watch the whole hour of silence? youtu.be/jr1UMFC9DV0 Many stories have circulated claiming the longest anyone has stayed in an ultra-quiet anechoic chamber is 45 minutes, the reason being any longer would drive you insane. To me this sounded like unsubstantiated rubbish, like the claim the Great Wall is the only manmade structure visible from space. So I put my own psyche on the line, subjecting myself to over an hour of the most intense quiet on Earth. No, this was not THE quietest room on Earth (-9dB) but it is one of the quietest, and the truth is once you put a person inside, they are by far the loudest thing in there so the sound rating of the room is irrelevant. I was not surprised to find that I could stay in there for as long as I liked and feel perfectly fine. What was surprising is that my heartbeat was audible. You can hear it on the sound recording. Now I wasn't consciously aware of the sound of my heart while in the room, but I was more aware of the feeling of it beating. Huge thank you to everyone at BYU: Duane Merrell, Spencer Perry, Cameron Vongsawad, Jazz Myers, Ann Clawson, and Robert Willes.

Why it's here

2 people recommend this

What people say. Recommended as an interesting test debunking the myth that spending 45 minutes in an anechoic chamber will drive you crazy.

white-flamein Hacker News • Recommends

On “A New Yorker's Quest for the Perfect Amount of Noise”

There's a nice Veritasium video of an anechoic chamber here, with different people's reactions to it: link to this video I've been in sensory deprivation tanks, but never in an anechoic chamber (yet). However, I'm sure I'd love it. Many people live their life fleeing themselves, fleeing the thoughts in their head, and fleeing the realities they don't want to face. However, if you're emotionally healthy and are purposeful in establishing your identity and life direction, silence is simply golden. Not just auditory, but visual, social, and conceptual. Because of this, I don't think that there can be any singular preferable amount of noise for everybody. If there's some average, plenty of people will stil…
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Baeocystinin Hacker News • Recommends

On “Black Blacker Than Vantablack”

It's really not that bad. Some people find it unsettling, but many find it kind of relaxing. Derek from Veritasium has a good video on it for the interested. link to this video
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rchin Hacker News • Mentions

On “This Is Your Brain on Silence”

Here's a video response^ by a guy who wanted to test this assertion. He spent about an hour in one at BYU, and seemed comfortable enough throughout. Interesting points: at around the 16 minute mark, he verbally estimates his time at 8 minutes; after the 45 min is up he asks for the lights to be turned on, and gets no response from the people outside the chamber. He calmly finds the door by using his cell phone as a light. ^ link to this video
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plumain Hacker News • Mentions

On “The rise of fake engine noise”

Sure, but absolutes are rarely used in their literal meaning. "Silence" doesn't refer to the absence of any noise, it refers to a very low level of noise. The absence of any noise at all is very difficult to achieve (although you can come close: link to this video ). The same goes for other absolutes like "black" (e.g. link is arguably "blacker" than other "black" materials). You're technically correct (the best kind of correct), but your point is moot. Very few words that describe absolutes can be used "correctly" in practice. The logical conclusion is that these words (despite their dictionary definition) don't refer to actual absolutes but rather extremes: silence is not the absence of noise, it's…
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tylerjwilk00in Hacker News • Mentions

On “There's a Persistent Hum in Windsor, Ontario, and No One Knows Why”

The 45 minutes is apparently a myth. You can view an interesting video on ultra-quiet anechoic chambers in this veritasium video 1. 1 link to this video
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gus_massain Hacker News • Mentions

On “The Quietest Room in the World”

Veritasium did a video about this room (inside this room) and he says that this part is an exaggeration. link to this video
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