Where Does Sound Go?
By leiah_a1
@leiah_a1 (17)
Philippines
March 26, 2012 4:20am CST
They say that sound travels and that it travels fast. I'm just curious about if you cry, or say something, or laugh, the sound that you make travels and then just disappear? Does sound travel up to a certain point and then disintegrates? I know we have to take into account loudness but is that it? I'm no physics whiz but I just really like to know.
3 responses
@Torunn (8609)
• Norway
11 Jul 12
Sound is waves, particles vibrate so that the pressure varies with time and space and thus carries the sound waves propagate through different medias.
As the wave will use parts of its energy to make the next particle in line start to vibrate, each particle will vibrate a bit weaker than the one before it and in the end there's not enough energy left to make the particle vibrate.
@honest_efforts100 (1607)
• India
4 Jul 12
What a lovely question. It got me thinking a lot. I have never really thought about it. But I guess sound is swallowed up by other sounds in the atmosphere. Let us await more responses from the public and see where it will end up.
@owlwings (43915)
• Cambridge, England
26 Mar 12
Sound is energy transmitted by waves through the air or other mediums. As it travels outward from the source, the energy is gradually absorbed (and turned into heat) by the medium it is travelling through and so becomes weaker and weaker until our ears can no longer detect it at a distance.
