interesting fact

[pianistimo]

'men see twice as well as women, conversely women hear twice as well as men.'

[thalbergmad]

And the source of this amazing fact is...........................

[pianistimo]

'music: physician in times to come.' 

haven't you ever wondered why women hear things that you don't?

[thalbergmad]

Woman only hear what they want to.

They are experts at selective hearing.

Thal

[pianistimo]

you're talking about men, i think.  women hear everything.  inflection.  words used.  expressiveness.   

i think we listen so intently, that we don't even hear the words anymore.  there was always something mesmerizing to me about the spoken voice.  i start listening to the pitches and it really doesn't matter what the person is saying if they have a good speaking voice.

[thalbergmad]

women hear everything. 

Cobblers

[debussy symbolism]

Greetings.

You don't understand Susan. The saying that "women hear twice as well as men" only implies that women tend to hear the nuance and tone on conversation, rather than the pure concrete and denotative meaning of spoken words. It is true to some extent that women tend to listen to the sound of the voice and men to the meaning of the voice, but of course you cannot stereotype all men for example as being non-responsive to tone, as many men are responsive. One of the first things I listen to and notice is the tone of the speaker.

[pianistimo]

but, we immediately read between the lines.  for instance, i remember hearing a professor tell us to listen to the 'points of articulation' in a CD of haydn or some such composer - and i immediately transferred this to spoken language.  where people pause,  change of texture, etc.  what they consider important about what they are saying. 

for instance,  a man can say fire fire  or FIRE, fire.  or fire FIRE, or FIRE FIRE.
  or FIRE       FIRE.  or casually, 'there is no fire.'  even when a fire is raging.

now, oddly as it may seem - i prefer FIRE         FIRE  -  it means the man is taking time to make sure his words are correct.  perhaps the first fire was not entirely correct, but he reaffirms the same statement again after checking.

as i see it - great pauses in speech are alright.  in fact, you may think the person has gone to lunch mentally.  but, after a period of thought - they return on track but slightly off key.

for women, i think we take it forgranted that we will not be attempting to check or correct anything.  what comes out is the way it is.  honestly.  it was what was in our brain.  if it is incorrect - we then justify it.  then it will be correct.  after all - we are only making the speech pleasant to listen to.  if we pull one over, we have done our job. 

seriously, i think that some women like me have 'sensory overload' and if something is going on at the same time as we are listening or talking - it's very difficult to get the entire story.  for instance, if the phone rings and the five year old is tugging at my leg asking if she can play next door - i might say anything in response to the person on the phone just to keep the conversation flowing.  conversely, if the house is entirely quiet and there is a conversation going between me and my children - or a person or on the phone - then i can hear the static in the  phone line.

how do men eliminate the noise, the unnecessary information - to make room for specialized responses?  say a man is working in an environment where jack hammers are everywhere.  how do they stay focused?

[debussy symbolism]

but, we immediately read between the lines. 

I think all humans to some extent exercise that ability.

. for instance, i remember hearing a professor tell us to listen to the 'points of articulation' in a CD of haydn or some such composer - and i immediately transferred this to spoken language. where people pause, etc. what they consider important about what they are saying.

I think that points of articulation would not go with the tone of the speaker, and furthermore the words spoken. Certain embellishments such as trills and mordents simply don't exist in spoken language...at least that of Western origin...

for instance, a man can say fire fire or FIRE, fire. or fire FIRE, or FIRE FIRE.
 or FIRE FIRE. or casually, 'there is no fire.' even when a fire is raging.

Okay... I think if there is indeed a fire, most people will not spend time thinking over how they should accent each word. You should mostly hear "FIRE FIRE FIRE THERE IS A FIRE..."

now, oddly as it may seem - i prefer FIRE FIRE - it means the man is taking time to make sure his words are correct. perhaps the first fire was not entirely correct, but he reaffirms the same statement again after checking.

as i see it - great pauses in speech are alright. in fact, you may think the person has gone to lunch mentally. but, after a period of thought - they return on track but slightly off key. maybe even down a dynamic or two.

 

Oh I get it so you need to repeat "FIRE" at least two times to reasure your self and others that there indeed IS a fire.

for women, i think we take it forgranted that we will not be attempting to check or correct anything. what comes out is the way it is. honestly. it was what was in our brain. if it is incorrect - we then justify it. then it will be correct. after all - we are only making the speech pleasant to listen to. if we pull one over, we have done our job.

Well usually both men and women tend to think before they speak, and formulating words is a necessity if one would want to divulge them. However I do confess that I hear the expression "just talking out of my ass" alot more from men than from women.

[pianistimo]

condaleeza rice is an exception.  but, somebody trained her to listen to important parts of sentences and weed out the rest.

[debussy symbolism]

Well in order to be able to grasp the whole picture, one must work at the details first.

[pianistimo]

that's what i thought - but sometimes it becomes distracting.  how do you know when enough time is spent on a detail?  perhaps this is when women should check by looking and men should check by listening?

[debussy symbolism]

Well generally, you know that enough time was spent on detail when you are able to give a responce. If a man carries through a sentence, but doesn't finish, you aren't able to give a responce because you don't know all the facts. When he is finished talking however, and you hopefully remembered all of the words (at least the meaningful ones!) he uttered, and you successfully comprehended them, then you are able to give a responce.

[pianistimo]

you mentioned taking things literally.  this is where a woman has to stop a man in mid-sentence and get him to explain if what he just said is meant to be literal.  otherwise, it will be a source of potential distraction from the rest of what he says.  thereby, without stopping him - a sort of 'wawa-ing' effect takes over. 

and, visa -versa - if a man's visual acuity is the main source of information - literal takes on two different meanings.  the visual one and the one on paper.  do you think this means that men tend to see things as they literally are vs explainations?  do they ignore irrelevant information by doing so? 

now, if women learn to read somewhat earlier than men - it would indicate that their sight learning is highly developed as children - but becomes secondary to auditory.  now, men seem to do a crossover as well - at some later point - from abstaining from visual learning to using it to a high degree in middle school/highschool/college.  do you think men/women become somewhat the same because of this twist - and it is really a matter of how much a person challenges themselves to take in information through various senses.  or, do you think the initial statement is wrong and that men/women do not have any superior sense from each other?

now as i see it- women have smaller ear canals.  that could account for some kind of acuity that is not related to anything excepting the physical ability to hear better.  does a bigger ear canal allow for auditory decrepidation to happen earlier because of loud noises entering the ear all at once instead of a little bit at a time - filtered down?

[debussy symbolism]

you mentioned taking things literally. this is where a woman has to stop a man in mid-sentence and get him to explain if what he just said is meant to be literal. otherwise, it will be a source of potential distraction from the rest of what he says. thereby, without stopping him - a sort of 'wawa-ing' effect takes over.

Actually it is that men that tend to not be able to discern certain things such as sarcastic tone, insinuations etc, and so when a woman is speaking the man may interpret her saying wrong and consternation will arise. A major cause for divorce is the failure of couples at communicating with each other. Again this is just generalizing and doesn't account for individual cases.

 

I think that men as a group tend to rely on written things more than aural things.

Women's (a little girl's actually" brain develops in such a way in that the hemisphere that addresses linguistical and logical areas (the areas responsible for "abstract" thinking) tend to develop earlier than in boys, so that would explain why little girls tend to act more "mature" more structured than boys at the same age. It is impossible to say which sex has superior senses to the extent of my knowledge and it is impossible to place for example each female infant as more organized or "logical" than a male infact.

Smaller ear canals do not account for worser or better hearing; it is the structures inside the ear that account for hearing. The ear in itself doesn't account for whether a person is responsive to the tone of speech or such; it is the brain that does that.

[debussy symbolism]

Sorry about the quote incident in my previous post before this one.

[pianistimo]

'previous post before this one?'  you must have stayed up last night, too.  'previous post' would do.  having a 'quote incident' is the highlight of my day.  imagine that you must think me very bored.  well, as a matter of fact - it rained/snowed ice and hail last night and this morning -and now we are iced in.  sliding in and out of the house and the cars barely missing each other in the driveway. 

not knowing what to say now - i shall just start rambling.  after all, what does one do when one runs out of useful material.  i mean being quoted as saying nothing leads to a dwindling of nothingness to discuss.  i rest my case.  women and men probably have no better odds against the other.  take divorce for instance.  who really wins.  the woman takes the house - the man the furniture.  now, who can live in a house without furniture.  sometimes one takes the children and the other the pets.  now, how fair is that?  sooner or later there will be some kind of retribution.  perhaps silence.  with every now and then a high pitched squeal when the lawyer fees come in the mail or the alimony check is automatically deducted.  i'm just guessing from what i read in the tabloids. 

our arguments usually settle around inconsistencies.  women like men to be regularly dependable and missing an important routine of the day is tantamount to treason.  what woman suddenly wants to be responsible to take the garbage out AND shovel the driveway.  as it so happens - he decides today to take the almost teenager to the mall and then shop at costco (getting, albeit, necessary items).  the thing is - being gone is no excuse for delaying the inevitable in the hopes it will already be done when one returns. 

duly at least chopping ice from the front porch and alternating hands (piano hands, i might add) made me feel energized.  looking at the sidewalk did not.  especially after the homeowner's notice came in the mail.  'clean your sidewalks or we vill charge you $50 dolla fine and fees for sidewalk sweeper.'  nevermind it is pure ice and one must chop in like a glacier and hope to lift the sections.  let alone trying to stand up while doing this.