- You might crave it, but can you handle it? The longest anyone can bear Earth’s quietest place, an anechoic chamber at Orfield Laboratories in Minneapolis, is just 45 minutes. The chamber holds the Guinness World Record for world’s quietest place.
- In social animals, silence can be a sign of danger. Some scientists suggest this is why people feel comforted by humming, talking to themselves or having the radio on when alone.
- A silent note in a song is called a rest. Ironically, Simon and Garfunkel’s 1966 hit, The Sound of Silence, features none.
- After viewing the The Silence of the Lambs thriller, Martha Stewart broke up with actor Sir Anthony Hopkins, who played Hannibal “the Cannibal” Lecter.
- Monks in some Buddhist traditions may opt to take vows of silence. Talking during sleep isn’t ground for dismissal.
- Acoustic ecologists estimate that there are fewer than a dozen outdoor spaces in the United States where you can spend 20 minutes during the day without hearing noise from human activity.
- Natural silence is hard to find. Breath is barely audible to the human ear at 10 decibels, rustling leaves are 20 decibels and birds chirp at about 45 decibels. The loudest thunderclaps can reach up to 120 decibels.
This article first appeared in the Summer 2013 issue of Canoeroots Magazine.
