Well sure most lexicon discussions can turn into hair-splitting, but I would like to make a special case for the word ‘silence’ as a term with more than an average amount of emotional weight and semantic specificity.
Its use is often quite subjective while myopically considered obvious by the user, because it is intrinsically confusing. It can be very politically loaded when referring to reticence or censorship. In physics it’s a problem of absolutes, and in psychology a phenomenological conundrum.
Then there’s zen, sufism, and mystic shit like that. Rabbit holes and silent all the way down.
To the naked ear, silence is always relative to a previous soundscape, since even at the quietest moments you will still hear your heartbeat, breath, digestion. It’s neurophysiology and psychology and philosophy and more when talking about silence to the naked ear, all using different definitions of the word.
Well sure most lexicon discussions can turn into hair-splitting, but I would like to make a special case for the word ‘silence’ as a term with more than an average amount of emotional weight and semantic specificity.
Its use is often quite subjective while myopically considered obvious by the user, because it is intrinsically confusing. It can be very politically loaded when referring to reticence or censorship. In physics it’s a problem of absolutes, and in psychology a phenomenological conundrum.
Then there’s zen, sufism, and mystic shit like that. Rabbit holes and silent all the way down.
To the naked ear, silence is always relative to a previous soundscape, since even at the quietest moments you will still hear your heartbeat, breath, digestion. It’s neurophysiology and psychology and philosophy and more when talking about silence to the naked ear, all using different definitions of the word.