When we think about colors, we normally connect them with light – things you can see, like
white clouds, pink flowers, and brown cows.
But color can also be used to describe some special sounds: white, pink, and brown noise.
They’re very specific types of the kind of noise you’d probably think of as static,
designed to sound a certain way based on the physiology of human hearing.
And because of human evolution, they can also be useful when you’re trying to concentrate.
Have a listen to this: [PLAY WHITE].
This is white noise.
Both light and sound are made of waves.
The frequency of the waves – how quickly they vibrate – are important in how we perceive
them.
You might know that white /light/ is made up of light of all the colors of the rainbow
– all frequencies we can /see/.
White /noise/ gets its name because it contains sounds from all across the frequencies we
can /hear/.
That’s a big range – from around 20 to 20,000 Hertz, or wave vibrations per second.
These frequencies are played in fast, random succession, and your brain combines these
random, fast-changing frequencies into a fuzzy hiss of static.
Now, you may have noticed that white noise sounds kind of high-pitched.
Which seems weird: if white noise is made up of sounds with totally random frequencies,
you’d think it would sound sort of ... middle-pitched.
The reason white noise sounds high-pitched has to do with your biology – the way your
ears and brain detect and process sound.
What you hear as /pitch/ isn’t quite the same as the objective frequencies produced
and detected by machines.
Your hearing system -- and music -- is based on octaves.
When you play a string of notes, each one octave apart -- like a row of Cs [PLAY Cs]
-- it might sound like the are evenly spaced, in terms of how high they are.
But that’s not actually the case.
Instead, each octave represents a /doubling/ in frequency, meaning there are /twice/ as
many possible frequencies for our random sampler to choose from.
So in a random set of frequencies, statistically, more of the sounds will seem higher-pitched
to the human ear.
And there’s another reason white noise sounds high-pitched: human anatomy makes us more
attuned to sounds in the high-ish region of 3 to 4 kilohertz.
Our brains amplify sounds in this higher-pitched region, making the higher frequency sounds
in white noise seem louder than they really are.
So if you find white noise [PLAY WHITE] a bit too tinny, you might prefer other color
sounds.
Like pink noise: [PLAY PINK].
Pink noise takes human hearing into account, and balances out the frequencies so that all
octaves are represented evenly.
In pink noise, the frequencies played are still random, but the /volume/ of the higher
frequencies is dampened.
The higher the frequency, the more the volume is lowered, which compensates for how often
the higher sounds are played.
To your ears, the different pitches come through equally strong and the result is a deeper,
more balanced listening experience.
/Brown noise/ takes this idea a step further, sapping even more volume from the higher frequencies.
This creates a more bassy rumble, like this [PLAY BROWN], which
sounds a bit like a large waterfall or distant traffic.
Now, if you just glanced worriedly down at your pants, you’ve probably heard about
the infamous “brown note”.
Supposedly, there’s a particular tone that’s too low for humans to hear, but apparently
vibrates through your body, including your bowels -- causing involuntary motions down
there!
Do not worry though, you and your rear-end can rest assured: this myth has been well
and truly busted.
You’re safe to enjoy brown noise without any additional brown.
There are other noise colors, too, with frequencies that are adjusted in different ways.
But white, pink, and brown are the three main ones.
You might find the sounds of white, pink, and brown noise relaxing, and if you do, you’re
not alone.
Many people play these sounds to help them work or sleep, but why?
Again, the answer lies in human biology.
Your brain is especially attuned to detect changes in your surroundings if there’s
a low level of background information.
Like, it’s easy to tell the difference between two and three people talking at once, compared
to ninety-nine versus a hundred people chatting away.
Still just one extra person, but your brain has a harder time detecting that.
When it’s silent, almost any sound can alert your brain, and you can’t help but pay attention.
After all, it might signal danger – a throwback to our evolutionary ancestors’ worries about
predators or other threats.
An unfortunate side-effect of that is that a dripping tap or a snoring partner in a quiet
room can lead to some pretty frazzled nerves!
But white, pink, and brown noise -- playing across all frequencies -- are like muffling
blankets of sound.
They mask other sounds by making them less significant compared to the background.
So the solution to annoying noises can sometimes be more noise – sounds that come in many
colors!
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