WEBVTT - Can Sound Be Used As A Weapon? 0:00:04.480 --> 0:00:12.399 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Hey Therein 0:00:12.560 --> 0:00:16.320 Welcome to tech Stuff, I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm 0:00:16.320 --> 0:00:19.480 an executive producer with iHeart Podcasts and how the tech 0:00:19.520 --> 0:00:22.880 are you? So? On Monday's episode of tech Stuff, I 0:00:23.000 --> 0:00:28.360 covered the topic of active noise canceling headphones or active 0:00:28.360 --> 0:00:31.840 noise reduction headphones, and I mentioned in that episode the 0:00:31.880 --> 0:00:35.600 development of a system designed to cause discomfort in young 0:00:35.680 --> 0:00:38.640 people through the use of sound played at a pitch 0:00:38.720 --> 0:00:42.960 that most adults can't hear, because as we age, we 0:00:43.040 --> 0:00:46.879 start to lose the upper range of our hearing. This 0:00:47.000 --> 0:00:50.040 device is called the mosquito. And while I was a 0:00:50.080 --> 0:00:54.200 little flippant in the noise canceling episode, the truth is 0:00:54.440 --> 0:00:59.080 that acoustic weaponry is a thing. It might potentially cause 0:00:59.120 --> 0:01:02.120 significant heart depending on how it is used. And one 0:01:02.160 --> 0:01:05.640 of the scariest things about acoustic weaponry is that we 0:01:05.680 --> 0:01:10.800 don't actually really know how dangerous or not dangerous it is. 0:01:11.200 --> 0:01:13.559 So today I thought i'd talk a little bit about 0:01:13.600 --> 0:01:16.640 the history of using sound as a weapon, the technology 0:01:16.720 --> 0:01:20.039 created to harness sound in such a way, and the 0:01:20.240 --> 0:01:24.480 scholarship or lack thereof, surrounding the topic. Now On the 0:01:24.520 --> 0:01:29.400 one hand, sound has undoubtedly been weaponized in the past. 0:01:29.480 --> 0:01:32.560 You can't deny that sound has been used as a weapon. 0:01:32.920 --> 0:01:35.640 But on the other hand, there remain many questions as 0:01:35.680 --> 0:01:39.679 to the efficacy of acoustic weaponry. I guess it depends 0:01:39.760 --> 0:01:43.679 upon your intent. There's little doubt that someone could use 0:01:43.720 --> 0:01:47.039 sound to cause irritation or even pain in an effort 0:01:47.160 --> 0:01:51.600 to say, disperse a crowd. That's been used many times, 0:01:51.720 --> 0:01:53.960 especially over the last couple of decades here in the 0:01:54.040 --> 0:01:59.480 United States. There are stories about more sinister weapons, ones 0:01:59.520 --> 0:02:03.560 that you know, use sound to cause physical trauma up 0:02:03.600 --> 0:02:07.760 to and including lethal injury to targets. In fact, according 0:02:07.800 --> 0:02:10.600 to one scholarly article on the subject, one that I'll 0:02:10.639 --> 0:02:14.480 talk about a lot more in this episode, some stories 0:02:14.520 --> 0:02:18.880 allege that through sound and acoustic weapon could induce cavitation 0:02:19.480 --> 0:02:23.959 in tissue. That is, the sound could create bubbles within 0:02:24.320 --> 0:02:28.960 tissue like your organs, and then those bubbles could implode 0:02:29.120 --> 0:02:32.920 and that could cause significant damage. Nothing like the thought of, 0:02:33.000 --> 0:02:37.040 you know, liquefying organs. To really spice up your research now, 0:02:37.240 --> 0:02:39.760 I think it is very important to add that the 0:02:39.800 --> 0:02:44.360 scientific paper I just mentioned, it's titled Acoustic Weapons a 0:02:44.480 --> 0:02:48.680 prospective assessment. It was written by Jurgen Altman, and the 0:02:48.720 --> 0:02:53.560 author stresses that these are merely allegations. There's a distinct 0:02:53.800 --> 0:02:58.200 lack of evidence supporting these kinds of claims. Altman makes 0:02:58.240 --> 0:03:02.640 this very clear. Is a long and thorough article, and 0:03:02.720 --> 0:03:05.760 I highly recommend you read it. It was originally published 0:03:05.760 --> 0:03:10.040 in the scientific journal Science and Global Security, volume nine. 0:03:10.400 --> 0:03:12.800 It originally published in two thousand and one. It is 0:03:13.080 --> 0:03:15.120 free to read, so if you want to read the 0:03:15.160 --> 0:03:18.480 whole thing, you should. It's really a good read. I mean, 0:03:18.480 --> 0:03:22.680 it's actually written in a way that's very accessible. I think. Now, 0:03:22.760 --> 0:03:26.040 obviously it could be the case that since two thousand 0:03:26.080 --> 0:03:29.359 and one there have been more scientific focus directed at 0:03:29.480 --> 0:03:33.520 acoustic weaponry. But doing that is kind of tricky because, 0:03:33.520 --> 0:03:37.280 for one thing, how do you study potentially traumatic or 0:03:37.320 --> 0:03:41.839 even deadly effects of sound on human subjects, Because that's 0:03:41.880 --> 0:03:45.080 not exactly an ethical thing to do. If part of 0:03:45.120 --> 0:03:49.360 your question is will this hurt someone? If I play 0:03:49.800 --> 0:03:53.680 this frequency of sound at this volume putting someone in 0:03:53.720 --> 0:03:58.520 the path of that, that's really questionable, not questionable even 0:03:58.560 --> 0:04:01.600 I think that's just downright on ethic. Meanwhile, you have 0:04:01.680 --> 0:04:07.120 folks in the real world building real stuff that is 0:04:07.280 --> 0:04:12.360 weaponizing sound, So we don't fully understand what effect this 0:04:12.400 --> 0:04:16.920 could have on people. It may be largely benign apart 0:04:16.960 --> 0:04:21.440 from the obvious dangers of like hearing loss and stuff, 0:04:21.600 --> 0:04:25.240 but it might be worse. We just don't know. And meanwhile, 0:04:25.360 --> 0:04:30.320 we actually have companies making these things and various militaries 0:04:30.320 --> 0:04:34.760 and law enforcement agencies using them, so it's kind of scary. 0:04:35.279 --> 0:04:37.839 It's almost like the lack of evidence gives cover to 0:04:38.080 --> 0:04:41.080 those who are profiting off turning sound into a weapon 0:04:41.440 --> 0:04:46.560 because there's no proof showing that these weapons can be lethal, right, 0:04:47.000 --> 0:04:51.320 so they're non lethal weapons. They're not causing real harm, 0:04:51.800 --> 0:04:54.039 at least that could be the argument. So it should 0:04:54.040 --> 0:04:56.720 be totally fine for like a police force to use 0:04:56.760 --> 0:04:59.680 a directed acoustic weapon on a group of students who 0:04:59.720 --> 0:05:03.359 are testing something on a college campus because it's not lethal. 0:05:03.640 --> 0:05:08.760 And if you're thinking that sounds incredibly irresponsible and potentially criminal, 0:05:08.960 --> 0:05:12.160 then you're catching on quick. But let's talk about the 0:05:12.240 --> 0:05:16.920 history of acoustic weapons. Now. One place that a lot 0:05:16.960 --> 0:05:20.599 of articles about the history of acoustic weapons are sound 0:05:20.640 --> 0:05:23.919 as a weapon will pick as their starting point is 0:05:24.040 --> 0:05:28.000 the biblical account of the Battle of Jericho, which I 0:05:28.040 --> 0:05:31.960 think is a fun way to start, but not really helpful. 0:05:32.040 --> 0:05:34.440 But yeah. In the in the Bible, the story is 0:05:34.800 --> 0:05:39.320 Joshua leads the Israelites to conquer Canaan, and the city 0:05:39.360 --> 0:05:42.000 of Jericho's on their to do list, and the big 0:05:42.040 --> 0:05:44.960 guy upstairs tells Joshua that he and his army are 0:05:44.960 --> 0:05:47.359 to carry the Ark of the Covenant, as featured in 0:05:47.400 --> 0:05:50.920 the documentary Raiders of the Lost Arc, and they're going 0:05:51.000 --> 0:05:54.279 to have the procession led by seven priests who are 0:05:54.320 --> 0:05:57.600 blowing trumpets made of Ram's horn, and they're to do 0:05:57.680 --> 0:06:00.680 that for six days, going around the city one time 0:06:00.760 --> 0:06:03.560 each day. On the seventh day, they are to march 0:06:03.600 --> 0:06:07.160 around the city seven times, blowing the trumpets, and then 0:06:07.279 --> 0:06:11.400 afterward letting out a big old whoah, you know, shouting out, 0:06:11.720 --> 0:06:15.640 and at that point the city walls will come a tumblin' down, 0:06:15.880 --> 0:06:20.960 as Professor Harold Hill would say, now, not to burst 0:06:21.000 --> 0:06:25.039 any bubbles. But archaeological digs suggest that while there was 0:06:25.160 --> 0:06:30.279 a city in Jericho's spot before this particular period in history, 0:06:30.440 --> 0:06:33.800 and there was a city in Jericho's spot after this 0:06:33.839 --> 0:06:37.599 particular era of history, during the time when the story 0:06:37.680 --> 0:06:40.520 is actually supposed to have taken place, there were no 0:06:40.640 --> 0:06:43.880 people living in Jericho. So, in other words, the story's 0:06:44.000 --> 0:06:46.240 just a story, but it's a fun one to start with. 0:06:46.640 --> 0:06:50.880 So could sonic blasts actually knock down walls? Well, I 0:06:50.920 --> 0:06:54.320 would argue that, since this is a biblical story, it's 0:06:54.320 --> 0:06:58.080 not really like the pressure wave coming from these trumpets 0:06:58.440 --> 0:07:02.080 knocked the walls down. Rather, it's more like God saying, 0:07:02.320 --> 0:07:05.960 all right, y'all seem to follow my arbitrary orders I 0:07:06.000 --> 0:07:08.760 gave you, so now you get to kill everybody in town, 0:07:09.000 --> 0:07:12.160 which you know that's wild, But yeah, I would argue 0:07:12.200 --> 0:07:15.760 that the implication here is not that the trumpets knocked 0:07:15.760 --> 0:07:18.080 down the walls, but rather it was the big deity 0:07:18.120 --> 0:07:20.880 in charge who did the knock and down part. Still, 0:07:21.160 --> 0:07:25.400 you can imagine how sound could play a part in war. 0:07:26.000 --> 0:07:29.680 You could use sound in order to convey signals across distance. 0:07:29.960 --> 0:07:33.520 You could use sound in an attempt to intimidate the enemy. 0:07:33.840 --> 0:07:38.320 There's the infamous scene in Apocalypse Now in which a 0:07:38.400 --> 0:07:43.800 fleet of helicopters are blasting Wagner's Ride of the Valkyries 0:07:44.080 --> 0:07:49.240 as they fire down upon Viet Cong soldiers and Vietnamese 0:07:49.280 --> 0:07:53.320 civilians alike. So there's that now, Granted, that's fiction and 0:07:53.520 --> 0:07:56.440 people will tell you that didn't really happen, but that's 0:07:56.880 --> 0:08:00.920 a popular media depiction of using sound and warfare. Scottish 0:08:01.000 --> 0:08:04.480 bagpipes have been used for the purposes of kind of 0:08:04.560 --> 0:08:07.600 intimidating foes, as anyone who has heard them up close 0:08:07.680 --> 0:08:09.920 inevitably wants to find a way to get away from 0:08:09.960 --> 0:08:15.320 that point really quickly. I'm joking, kind of fun. Sign note, 0:08:15.520 --> 0:08:18.560 there's a bit of lore in bagpiping that the British 0:08:18.600 --> 0:08:22.600 actually outlawed the playing of bagpipes in Scotland around seventeen 0:08:22.680 --> 0:08:26.080 forty five as part of a larger disarming act, because 0:08:26.080 --> 0:08:29.840 bagpipes have been deemed an instrument of war literally in 0:08:29.880 --> 0:08:34.119 this case. But historian John Gibson, in his book Traditional 0:08:34.200 --> 0:08:38.800 Gaelic Bagpiping seventeen forty five to nineteen forty five, argues 0:08:38.920 --> 0:08:43.400 that the text of this disarmament Act does not actually 0:08:43.520 --> 0:08:47.240 name bagpipes as being prohibited, and that pipers who bring 0:08:47.400 --> 0:08:50.679 up this era of supposed persecution are probably just tired 0:08:50.679 --> 0:08:55.000 of people asking if they could kindly stop that awful racket. 0:08:55.360 --> 0:08:56.959 I'm having a lot of fun here, but I think 0:08:56.960 --> 0:08:58.760 it's only fair to say I actually kind of like 0:08:58.840 --> 0:09:03.600 bagpipe music. Anyway, Sounds played an important role in warfare, 0:09:03.960 --> 0:09:06.800 but that's not the same thing as using sound as 0:09:06.800 --> 0:09:10.720 an actual weapon. Now, according to Yurigen Altman's research, there's 0:09:10.800 --> 0:09:13.960 not much on record of militaries using sound as a 0:09:13.960 --> 0:09:16.920 weapon of war, though he did find suggestions that both 0:09:17.040 --> 0:09:20.600 Japan and the United Kingdom looked into the possibility of 0:09:20.679 --> 0:09:26.280 using acoustic weapons to lethal effect over some distance. Now. 0:09:26.280 --> 0:09:29.840 According to that research, both countries ultimately came to the 0:09:29.880 --> 0:09:33.800 conclusion that if it were in fact possible to create 0:09:33.880 --> 0:09:38.199 a sound so strong as to be lethal, it would 0:09:38.200 --> 0:09:41.520 require more power than would be practical. It would make 0:09:41.559 --> 0:09:43.960 way more sense to, you know, just use the conventional 0:09:44.000 --> 0:09:46.680 weapons we already have at our disposal. Why would you 0:09:46.760 --> 0:09:50.199 go and build this thing to get the same result 0:09:50.240 --> 0:09:53.280 you would get from weapons we already have. Which makes 0:09:53.320 --> 0:09:56.320 me think of Jurassic World. So big spoiler for the 0:09:56.360 --> 0:09:59.559 Jurassic World series, although I have a low opinion of 0:09:59.600 --> 0:10:02.280 those movies anyway, one of the plot points in that 0:10:02.320 --> 0:10:05.520 series is that the military wants to make use of dinosaurs, 0:10:05.600 --> 0:10:09.040 essentially using them to be like beasts of war and 0:10:09.160 --> 0:10:12.520 using lasers to point at enemies and then the dinosaurs 0:10:12.520 --> 0:10:15.080 attack the lasers because they've been trained to do that. 0:10:15.160 --> 0:10:18.040 But you know, we've got stuff like guns with laser 0:10:18.120 --> 0:10:21.400 sights or bombs and missiles with laser guidance. So it 0:10:21.440 --> 0:10:24.280 seems like it's an unnecessary and and practical use of 0:10:24.280 --> 0:10:27.640 our time and resources. Anyway, let's get back to sound. 0:10:28.080 --> 0:10:33.040 Altman's research included a nineteen sixty nine book titled Riot 0:10:33.120 --> 0:10:38.400 Control Material and Techniques by Our Applegate. Now. The book 0:10:38.480 --> 0:10:41.680 mentioned that many scientific articles had discussed the use of 0:10:41.720 --> 0:10:47.280 acoustic weapons in a non lethal capacity, specifically using low 0:10:47.320 --> 0:10:52.000 frequency sounds to counter, say a riot. Now, Altman points 0:10:52.040 --> 0:10:54.760 out that he was unable to find evidence of the 0:10:55.040 --> 0:10:59.240 mentioned scientific articles. He said, if these articles exist, I 0:10:59.320 --> 0:11:02.760 couldn't find them. The book alleges they exist, but I 0:11:03.240 --> 0:11:07.000 don't know where. According to Applegate, whomever it was that 0:11:07.280 --> 0:11:11.920 looked into using devices to create this low frequency sound 0:11:12.000 --> 0:11:16.040 to make this effect to do riot control ultimately determined 0:11:16.080 --> 0:11:18.680 it would be too expensive to be practical. Now, some 0:11:18.800 --> 0:11:21.320 of that makes sense, because I'm going to talk more 0:11:21.360 --> 0:11:25.560 about sound waves and frequencies and wavelengths and stuff later 0:11:25.600 --> 0:11:28.800 in this episode. But if you're talking about low frequencies 0:11:28.880 --> 0:11:32.240 like below, the threshold of typical human hearing, which at 0:11:32.280 --> 0:11:35.240 the low end is around twenty hurts. If you're talking 0:11:35.320 --> 0:11:39.640 about below that, well, the sound waves you're talking about 0:11:39.440 --> 0:11:43.880 are long. Those wavelengths are pretty long. You're talking about 0:11:43.960 --> 0:11:49.360 a low frequency and long wavelengths. High frequency have shorter wavelengths. 0:11:49.840 --> 0:11:53.240 With those long wavelengths, you also need a large loud 0:11:53.280 --> 0:11:56.920 speaker in order to actually produce those wavelengths. If you've 0:11:56.960 --> 0:12:01.040 ever seen the speakers on a stereo system, you know 0:12:01.080 --> 0:12:04.079 you've got different types, right, You've got your tweeters, you've 0:12:04.080 --> 0:12:08.280 got your subwiffers, that kind of thing. Well, the speakers 0:12:08.320 --> 0:12:12.840 responsible for the higher pitches are going to be smaller. 0:12:13.160 --> 0:12:17.640 The diaphragm needed to push air around to create those 0:12:17.760 --> 0:12:21.360 higher frequency sounds is smaller and needs to move very 0:12:21.440 --> 0:12:26.000 quickly in order to do that. The base speaker is 0:12:26.040 --> 0:12:28.600 going to be much larger, and it's going to move 0:12:28.720 --> 0:12:32.000 more slowly in order to push the air properly to 0:12:32.040 --> 0:12:34.680 create those low frequencies. So, if you want to create 0:12:34.840 --> 0:12:40.319 a really powerful, very low frequency generator, it's going to 0:12:40.360 --> 0:12:42.800 be huge and it's going to require a lot of 0:12:42.880 --> 0:12:46.920 power to move that massive diaphragm, especially if you want 0:12:46.960 --> 0:12:49.800 to do so at a really high amplitude, as in 0:12:49.840 --> 0:12:52.360 a really high volume, that just is going to require 0:12:52.480 --> 0:12:55.360 an enormous amount of energy, which is I think one 0:12:55.400 --> 0:12:59.199 of the reasons why even if militaries did look at 0:12:59.320 --> 0:13:02.560 infra sound as a potential weapon, they ultimately came to 0:13:02.600 --> 0:13:05.360 the conclusion that it was impractical because you would have 0:13:05.400 --> 0:13:08.400 to build things that are so large and so power 0:13:08.840 --> 0:13:12.160 or energy hungry that it just didn't make sense like 0:13:12.200 --> 0:13:15.600 you could achieve the same effect through other means without 0:13:15.679 --> 0:13:19.160 spending all that time and effort and energy to operate 0:13:19.240 --> 0:13:24.720 an impractical weapon. So sound did become important when it 0:13:24.760 --> 0:13:28.040 was playing a part in you know, like psychological operations 0:13:28.400 --> 0:13:31.360 aka SYOPS. I feel like I should get the stuff. 0:13:31.480 --> 0:13:33.640 They don't want you to know, guys on here to 0:13:33.679 --> 0:13:36.000 talk about syops because that's kind of right in their 0:13:36.040 --> 0:13:38.480 sweet spot. But this gets back to the concept of 0:13:38.559 --> 0:13:43.480 using sound in an effort to intimidate the enemy. So 0:13:43.840 --> 0:13:47.320 while Apocalypse Now was a fictional use of sound to 0:13:47.559 --> 0:13:50.880 get the sort of achievement, there are real world analogs 0:13:51.480 --> 0:13:55.440 that used sound or attempted to use sound in ways 0:13:55.480 --> 0:13:59.200 to get a very similar result. So, for example, during 0:13:59.240 --> 0:14:02.400 the Vietnam War, our US forces used recorded sounds in 0:14:02.440 --> 0:14:07.080 an attempt to demoralize Viet Cong soldiers. One such operation 0:14:07.559 --> 0:14:12.080 was called Wandering Soul, and this hinged on Vietnamese culture. 0:14:12.440 --> 0:14:15.199 So in Vietnam there was a widely held belief. This 0:14:15.320 --> 0:14:18.319 is widely held belief that if someone dies and they 0:14:18.360 --> 0:14:21.920 do not receive a proper burial, their spirit would be 0:14:22.000 --> 0:14:25.600 forced to wander the earth in pain for all eternity. 0:14:25.920 --> 0:14:30.520 So the US started blasting a spooky recording of South 0:14:30.680 --> 0:14:36.120 Vietnamese people impersonating deceased Viet Cong soldiers, the ghosts of 0:14:36.360 --> 0:14:40.400 Viet Cong soldiers who apparently were consigned to this fate. 0:14:40.720 --> 0:14:44.680 Some of the recordings included messages urging soldiers to return 0:14:44.720 --> 0:14:47.600 home to their families and to abandon the fight. Now, 0:14:47.640 --> 0:14:50.640 the effectiveness of this campaign is questionable, as it's pretty 0:14:50.640 --> 0:14:53.920 hard to conceal the fact that a helicopter is blasting 0:14:53.920 --> 0:14:56.960 out a recorded message as opposed to just believing there's 0:14:57.000 --> 0:15:00.800 an actual ghost jamboree going on outside. And nineteen seventy 0:15:01.040 --> 0:15:04.760 the US had stopped using this tactic in Vietnam, but 0:15:04.880 --> 0:15:08.720 it was an attempt to use sound to intimidate. I'll 0:15:08.760 --> 0:15:13.040 talk more about the exploration of acoustic weapons. But first, 0:15:13.120 --> 0:15:25.320 let's take a quick break to think our sponsors. All right, 0:15:25.360 --> 0:15:28.880 let's get back to Jurigen Altman's work. He did find 0:15:29.360 --> 0:15:34.400 some other instances of acoustic weapons in scholarly journals, though 0:15:34.480 --> 0:15:37.600 tracking down any hard evidence that any of these things 0:15:37.600 --> 0:15:41.040 were ever built and or used was a totally different story. 0:15:41.280 --> 0:15:44.760 But one such instance involved a supposed device created by 0:15:44.760 --> 0:15:47.760 the British Army in an effort to deal with protesters 0:15:47.800 --> 0:15:53.200 in Northern Ireland. The device, nicknamed the squawk Box, produced 0:15:53.560 --> 0:15:57.760 two high pitch frequencies within the range of typical human hearing, 0:15:57.800 --> 0:16:01.600 although if you're old enough you wouldn't pick up bottom inherently. 0:16:01.920 --> 0:16:04.560 One of the pitches was at sixteen killer hurts and 0:16:04.560 --> 0:16:08.480 the other was at sixteen point zero zero two killer hurtz. 0:16:08.840 --> 0:16:11.360 I probably wouldn't be able to hear these my hearing 0:16:11.440 --> 0:16:14.680 tops out somewhere in the fifteen to sixteen killer hurtz range, 0:16:14.800 --> 0:16:17.120 at least the last time I tested it. That's where 0:16:17.120 --> 0:16:21.280 it was, so I might not perceive this directly at all. However, 0:16:21.800 --> 0:16:26.000 at high amplitudes, at high volumes, these higher pitch frequencies 0:16:26.320 --> 0:16:29.240 can interact with one another and interfere with one another. 0:16:29.560 --> 0:16:32.960 When we talked about noise canceling headphones, I talked about 0:16:33.000 --> 0:16:37.240 how this works in that context, where you create a 0:16:37.680 --> 0:16:41.080 sound wave that's in opposite to the one that you're 0:16:41.120 --> 0:16:43.720 trying to block, and if you're doing that, the two 0:16:44.240 --> 0:16:47.160 waves cancel each other out and you get silence or 0:16:47.240 --> 0:16:50.400 near silence as a result. So the production of these 0:16:50.520 --> 0:16:55.480 two different frequencies would induce a third frequency to form 0:16:55.560 --> 0:16:59.760 within the ears of protesters, and the effect was supposedly 0:16:59.840 --> 0:17:03.400 so so intense that people couldn't withstand it. They had 0:17:03.440 --> 0:17:06.639 to get away from the sound. Altman points out that 0:17:06.680 --> 0:17:10.639 the UK has denied that such a device has ever existed, 0:17:10.960 --> 0:17:14.040 and he also mentions another source that concluded that while 0:17:14.040 --> 0:17:17.280 the British may have looked into actually making such a thing, 0:17:17.640 --> 0:17:20.320 it may never have been built. So it sounds like 0:17:20.400 --> 0:17:22.320 this is another one of those things where people said, 0:17:22.400 --> 0:17:24.919 you know, this should be able to work, but no 0:17:24.960 --> 0:17:28.800 one actually made the thing. But it does come into 0:17:28.880 --> 0:17:32.160 play when we get to audio spotlights a little later 0:17:32.240 --> 0:17:35.639 in this episode, so that's a fun little tidbit. Further, 0:17:35.840 --> 0:17:40.200 Altman writes about articles claiming that infrasound you know below 0:17:40.240 --> 0:17:43.000 the typical range of human hearing, so below that twenty 0:17:43.119 --> 0:17:46.000 Hurtz range, played at a high enough volume, like at 0:17:46.040 --> 0:17:50.200 around one hundred decibels, can disorient the listener. But Altman's 0:17:50.200 --> 0:17:52.800 research also came across scientists who said they could not 0:17:52.960 --> 0:17:56.439 confirm these findings, so whether that's actually true or not 0:17:56.600 --> 0:17:59.600 remains unknown. It's kind of funny because you know, this 0:17:59.680 --> 0:18:03.120 is an anecdote, so it's not really it's not evidence 0:18:03.160 --> 0:18:04.919 at all. But this is something that happened to me 0:18:05.160 --> 0:18:06.840 not too long ago. I was in a car with 0:18:06.920 --> 0:18:09.560 my partner and a jeep pulled up behind us, and 0:18:09.600 --> 0:18:12.119 the person in the jeep had their sound system blasting 0:18:12.240 --> 0:18:15.439 at an incredible volume, and the bass was cranked up, 0:18:15.560 --> 0:18:17.920 probably about as far as it could go, And even 0:18:17.960 --> 0:18:19.840 though we were sitting in a car with our windows 0:18:19.920 --> 0:18:22.840 rolled up, we could hear that bass pretty clearly, and 0:18:22.880 --> 0:18:27.000 it did create a rather unpleasant and disorienting sensation, though 0:18:27.080 --> 0:18:29.600 that might just be because I'm old and cranky and 0:18:29.640 --> 0:18:34.000 have nothing to do with any physiological reason. Altman specifically 0:18:34.040 --> 0:18:37.880 states that his research focused on acoustic weapons that are 0:18:37.880 --> 0:18:41.520 intended to do physical damage to a target, rather than 0:18:41.680 --> 0:18:45.240 just using sound as a way to annoy or distress 0:18:45.280 --> 0:18:48.160 someone by you know, like preventing them from getting rest, 0:18:48.240 --> 0:18:51.040 for example, which is legit. But I think we should 0:18:51.240 --> 0:18:56.240 take the use of sound as a deterrent or way 0:18:56.320 --> 0:18:59.639 of distressing someone into consideration, because while there is a 0:18:59.720 --> 0:19:03.200 lack of firm scholarship on the efficacy of sound as 0:19:03.240 --> 0:19:06.960 a weapon that causes direct physical harm or perhaps even death, 0:19:07.240 --> 0:19:09.960 we do have plenty of examples of folks using sound 0:19:10.040 --> 0:19:14.520 to make someone else's life more difficult. For example, Christmas 0:19:15.000 --> 0:19:18.520 nineteen eighty nine, five years after the song do they 0:19:18.560 --> 0:19:21.240 Know It's Christmas? Came out? Now, I think there's no 0:19:21.359 --> 0:19:24.720 denying that that particular song is torture all by itself, 0:19:24.760 --> 0:19:27.600 but it doesn't factor into the story now. In nineteen 0:19:27.680 --> 0:19:32.359 eighty nine, the US military used rock and or roll 0:19:32.600 --> 0:19:37.160 music to force Manuel Noriega to exit the Vatican embassy 0:19:37.160 --> 0:19:39.919 in Panama City, at least that was their intent. So 0:19:39.960 --> 0:19:42.960 the US won in Noriega on charges of drug trafficking 0:19:43.040 --> 0:19:46.399 and such, and Noriega had sought refuge in the embassy. 0:19:46.800 --> 0:19:50.560 So the US put some really powerful speakers on hum v's, 0:19:51.040 --> 0:19:54.520 drove the humv's around the embassy, and blasted the embassy 0:19:54.560 --> 0:19:57.760 with tunes like I thought the Law by the Clash, 0:19:57.840 --> 0:20:01.600 which is classic, or all I what is you by 0:20:01.640 --> 0:20:04.760 you too? And because the military really does have a 0:20:04.840 --> 0:20:09.160 six sense of humor Hanama by Van Halen. But mostly 0:20:09.160 --> 0:20:11.280 they played a lot of songs by guns n' Roses 0:20:11.359 --> 0:20:15.679 and the Doors. This musical assault lasted three days, but 0:20:15.760 --> 0:20:18.719 then the Pope called the President and said, hey, can 0:20:18.800 --> 0:20:21.960 y'all knock it off please? That's our embassy. And the 0:20:22.119 --> 0:20:26.520 US complied, and Noriega ultimately surrendered himself just a few 0:20:26.560 --> 0:20:29.200 days later. I don't know, maybe he missed the music. 0:20:29.440 --> 0:20:33.439 In nineteen ninety three, law enforcement agents employed the let's 0:20:33.480 --> 0:20:38.919 blast them with sound technique on David Koresh's compound in Waco, Texas. 0:20:39.080 --> 0:20:42.959 This is the infamous Branch Davidian holdout. Now. Among the 0:20:43.000 --> 0:20:47.280 sonic bombs that they dropped were various songs as well 0:20:47.320 --> 0:20:52.280 as the sound of jet planes and disturbingly, one report said, 0:20:52.440 --> 0:20:57.400 the screams of rabbits as they were being slaughtered. Yikes. 0:20:57.680 --> 0:21:00.399 Now the military has used loud music to rock the 0:21:00.440 --> 0:21:04.119 sleep and morale of prisoners of war as well, in 0:21:04.240 --> 0:21:07.640 order to soften them up for interrogation or break down 0:21:07.680 --> 0:21:10.919 their resistance by preventing them from getting enough rest, so 0:21:11.080 --> 0:21:15.360 mentally they wouldn't be able to withstand interrogation techniques. Now, 0:21:15.359 --> 0:21:18.840 I find all of this ethically troubling, to say the least, 0:21:19.200 --> 0:21:23.080 particularly in light of research that has suggested repeatedly that 0:21:23.200 --> 0:21:27.160 torture is not effective. At least, it's not effective if 0:21:27.160 --> 0:21:29.800 your goal is to get at some sort of truth, 0:21:30.119 --> 0:21:33.400 no matter how popular media might suggest otherwise. I'm looking 0:21:33.440 --> 0:21:36.399 at you, Jack Bauer, But I mean, I guess you 0:21:36.400 --> 0:21:39.159 could argue it is effective if your only goal is 0:21:39.200 --> 0:21:42.639 to make the tortured person feel miserable and powerless. Yeah, 0:21:42.800 --> 0:21:46.080 it works to that extent, but that seems you know, repugnant. 0:21:46.560 --> 0:21:50.000 You know, again, not really the same as using a 0:21:50.480 --> 0:21:54.880 weapon of war. So what about l rads l RAD 0:21:55.560 --> 0:21:59.639 That initialism stands for long range acoustic device, and in 0:21:59.680 --> 0:22:03.520 turn these actually evolved from an earlier device, the AHD 0:22:03.880 --> 0:22:08.600 or acoustic hailing device. All right, this involves a pretty 0:22:08.640 --> 0:22:12.960 tragic story. So back in two thousand, US forces aboard 0:22:13.040 --> 0:22:17.600 a Navy destroyer named the USS Coal were attacked when 0:22:17.720 --> 0:22:21.919 terrorists aboard a small boat approached the vessel and then 0:22:22.119 --> 0:22:25.720 bombed the destroyer. The attack killed more than a dozen 0:22:25.840 --> 0:22:29.640 US service members as a result. As the boat was approaching, 0:22:30.000 --> 0:22:33.720 the USS Coal attempted to hail the vessel to determine 0:22:33.720 --> 0:22:36.800 the crew's intent, but they got no response. There was 0:22:36.880 --> 0:22:40.040 no radio contact with the boat, so hailing involved using 0:22:40.080 --> 0:22:42.679 loudspeakers to send out a message over the water. But 0:22:43.000 --> 0:22:47.360 sound doesn't travel forever. As I mentioned in Monday's episode, 0:22:47.560 --> 0:22:53.719 over distance, sound waves attenuate they diminish in strength, so 0:22:54.080 --> 0:22:56.520 it was reasonable to assume that the crew on the 0:22:56.560 --> 0:23:00.000 smaller boat just couldn't hear the messages. Once the boat 0:23:00.359 --> 0:23:03.960 was close enough that those aboard the USS Coal could 0:23:04.000 --> 0:23:07.600 be sure that they were being heard, it was already 0:23:07.640 --> 0:23:12.119 too late, and the attack immediately followed. One consequence of 0:23:12.160 --> 0:23:16.200 this attack was that engineers began to develop technology designed 0:23:16.240 --> 0:23:19.160 to focus sound waves and to blast them out at 0:23:19.240 --> 0:23:23.840 high enough amplitude or volume so that intelligible sound could 0:23:23.840 --> 0:23:28.919 travel much, much further in a directed fashion. This was 0:23:28.960 --> 0:23:32.400 the acoustic hailing device, and it would allow naval forces 0:23:32.440 --> 0:23:36.200 to send an audible message, not just audible, but intelligible, 0:23:36.280 --> 0:23:39.399 as in you can understand what someone is saying, in 0:23:39.520 --> 0:23:43.680 order to warn approaching craft that they need to make 0:23:43.720 --> 0:23:47.240 their intent clear and follow orders or else potentially face 0:23:47.400 --> 0:23:50.840 defensive measures from the Navy. Essentially, the Navy would be 0:23:50.840 --> 0:23:54.120 able to say stop where you are, or we will 0:23:54.119 --> 0:23:57.959 shoot you now. To accomplish this, the device needed to 0:23:58.000 --> 0:24:01.440 be able to one blast out sound with enough energy 0:24:01.800 --> 0:24:06.600 enough amplitude to travel a far distance, and two focus 0:24:06.640 --> 0:24:11.040 that energy toward the target. And turns out you can 0:24:11.440 --> 0:24:14.560 do this with sound. So let's talk about sound beams 0:24:14.720 --> 0:24:18.640 or audio spotlights, because this is really cool. All right. 0:24:18.680 --> 0:24:22.760 So I mentioned in the previous episode that sound travels 0:24:22.880 --> 0:24:26.720 in waves, in longitudinal waves. Actually we talked about that 0:24:26.760 --> 0:24:30.320 in the active Noise Canceling episode, but these waves are 0:24:30.680 --> 0:24:33.840 pretty darn long. So I'm talking about the wavelengths of 0:24:33.840 --> 0:24:36.400 sound that are within the typical range of human hearings, 0:24:36.400 --> 0:24:39.280 so between twenty hurts to twenty killer herts. If you 0:24:39.320 --> 0:24:43.199 compare those wavelengths to like light waves sound waves in 0:24:43.200 --> 0:24:47.560 the audible range, they are enormous. And that link means 0:24:47.600 --> 0:24:51.760 that sound waves can and do bend around physical objects. 0:24:51.920 --> 0:24:56.320 They diffract. So here's a way of imagining this. Let's 0:24:56.359 --> 0:24:59.160 say you're standing on one side of a free standing 0:24:59.320 --> 0:25:01.840 opaque wall. Let's say the wall is like eight feet tall. 0:25:02.160 --> 0:25:04.720 I'm on the other side of this opaque wall. We 0:25:04.760 --> 0:25:06.720 would still be able to talk to each other, right, 0:25:06.800 --> 0:25:08.520 You could speak and I could hear you, and I 0:25:08.560 --> 0:25:11.560