Talk:Binaural beats/Archive 1

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Chart

Would it be ok to add a link to a site which describes the documented responses within our brains when in certain brain wave patterns. This site has an easy to understand chart and brief and simple explanations of how binaural beats work, how isochronic tones work and how brainwave entrainment is achieved. http://www.relaxmp3.co.uk/brainwave-entrainment/chart.htm many thanks Leelahcat 15:19, 8 July 2007 (UTC)

Other Uses section

The Other Uses section is a complete disaster. It makes sweeping claims with no citations whatsoever; it is virtually unintelligible in places (notably the sentence about theta waves in children); and it is blatantly non-NPOV. I question its relevance altogether. I don't even know where to start editing. A simple cleanup of the verbiage is not nearly enough. If there are no objections, I move to strike it from the article. --Nonstopdrivel 10:13, 8 May 2007 (UTC)

Agreed 217.205.110.55 14:51, 21 June 2007 (UTC)

Link to Commercial Site

Anyone have an objection to linking to [1], which has an MP3 demonstration of binaural beat frequencies? Grunnah 02:12, 9 January 2007 (UTC)


I'd like to encourage people to try out binaural beats, check out SBaGen for starters since it's free and just as good if not better than BWGen. Maybe more people will become interested and contribute, and use the binaural beats as well. I am hoping this will generate more interest, the potential is vast for this phenomenon.

I agree, it has a lot of potential. I'm currently photoreading about binaural beats while image streaming about lucid dreams and, wow!, it's a uniquely intense experience; after I finish this article and my book on neuro-linguistic programming, I am definitely adding binaural beats to my self-hypnosis tape.

how on eath do you use SBagen, I downloaded it, but I know nothing about terminal

Did ya try reading SBAGEN.txt?--Army1987 29 June 2005 10:18 (UTC)

BwGen is M U C H easyer to use

Are these sentences contrary??

"In nature, two sounds that are similar but slightly shifted in frequency will beat to produce two new frequencies which are the average and the difference of the original two sounds. For example, a 400 Hz tone and a 410 Hz tone will form a 405 Hz tone pulsating 5 times per second."

and "For example, if a 315 Hz sine wave is played into the right ear and a 325 Hz one into the left ear, the brain is supposed to be entrained towards the beat frequency (10 Hz, in the alpha range). Since alpha range is usually associated with relaxation, this is supposed to have a relaxing effect."

In the first, you get 405 Hz and in the second you get 10 Hz...

And what does "405 Hz tone pulsating 5 times per second" mean? 'One hertz simply means "one per second" '; en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hertz - therefore, this is 405 pulses per second pulsating 5 times per second? 405 per second 5 per second? --Zumbuluk 00:07, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

405 oscillations per second, whose amplitude oscillates 5 times per second. (Of 81 oscillations in 0.2 seconds, the first is quietest, the forty-first is loudest, the last is quietest, and then again.) See the image on Beat (acoustics). These are 114 oscillations per second (34 oscillations since the graph is 0.3 seconds), pulsating 6 times per second (a half, a whole, and another half in the 0.3 seconds). --Army1987 19:35, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

These sentences are not contrary...the "beat frequency" is the frequency of the pulsating, and is the difference in frequency between the two tones. So, for example, if you listen to a 400 Hz & 410 Hz tone, you will hear a sound that sounds like the same tone as a 405 Hz sound, but it will get louder and quieter at the rate of 5 times per second. I don't know what it means for your brain to be entrained, but if you play a 315 Hz & a 325 Hz sound, the beat frequency will be 10 Hz, and it will sound like a 320 Hz note modulated off and on at 10 times per second.

This is not correct- The difference between 400 and 410 is 10, not 5. Our ears do not "blend" tones the way our eyes blend color. Otherwise if you played two piano keys next to each other at the same time and volume, you would hear a single new note in between. You will hear a 400 Hz tone and a 410 Hz tone, as well as a "beading" 10 times a second as the waves cancel each other out and re-inforce each other. It will sound like 2 tones that are almost but not quite in tune with one another. Which is the reason I have never been able to stand listening to any "entraining" tones long enough to see if they have any affect. 202.14.81.49 03:49, 10 October 2007 (UTC)

"Controversial"?

Pjacobi wrote:

Binaural beats or binaural tones is a controversial technology...

However, binaural beats themselves are not controversial. It is a matter of fact that playing two different tones into the ears will give rise to a perceived beating whose rate is the difference between the two frequencies. The controversy is only about its uses.

Yup, it may have been not the wisest place to insert the controversial: But also the enhancement of the related EEG band is no clear cut case. --Pjacobi June 29, 2005 12:37 (UTC)
Is this a generally accepted scientific phenomenon? Not meaning to be cynical, but sounds a bit urban myth-like to me... Is that what the controversial refers to in the initial paragraph? -- postglock 15:46, 18 August 2005 (UTC)
It is an established phenomenon. The impression you get most likely stems from the fact that the article is rife with error and pseudoscience. The article text betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of the topic no doubt inferred from the disinformation obtainable on several websites (just look at the external links). This could be a strong article, but even the essential definition offered on the wiki is woefully inaccurate. — Ringbang 13:24, 19 August 2005 (UTC)
Well, what's wrong with the article? - furrykef (Talk at me) 13:54, 19 August 2005 (UTC)
Inferred it from what? I use binaural beats on myself in the use I describe, which you probably never tried to. (Of course, the ones I use aren't 15 dB quieter than the background noise.) Well, the effect may be placebo, but that is an unfalsifiable statement, since there is no way to make someone believe he's listenig to binaural beats when he really isn't to test wheter that would work.--Army1987 23:19, 22 August 2005 (UTC)
Hi, Army1987. You criticised the experiment that I referred to because, you said, it used inaudible beats. I'd like to correct you: only the first part of the experiment used inaudible beats. Later on, the experimenters tried using an audible binaural beat. They found no effect on EEG in either case. I admit that one study does not prove the case either way, but I think you were wrong to be so dismissive about it. Until someone does a better study, it's the only hard evidence we have. --Heron 20:14, 23 August 2005 (UTC)
Yeah. Audible beats. Mixed with jazz music...--Army1987 22:36, 23 August 2005 (UTC)
Yes, that does seem incongruous. Why did they have to spoil it? --Heron 20:07, 24 August 2005 (UTC)

About mixing with other sounds

Assuming I'm playing two sinewaves that are binaurally beating as normal, but I want to mix it with pink noise (or other sounds), does it matter whether or not the frequency of the noise is also offset in each speaker? If not, must the noise be mono or can it be stereo? - furrykef (Talk at me) 3 July 2005 21:02 (UTC)

A pink noise has no specific frequency, it covers the whole frequency spectrum. I don't know wheter two indipendently generated pink noises in the two speakers are ok (I wouldn't even know how to try). If you use the same pink noise in both speakers you're sure the only difference between the two tracks is that of the sinewaves. Bwgen (www.bwgen.com) has the option of using two noises which are the inverse of each other, this gives the impression that the noise is generated inside the head. They say that can be unpleasant, and they don't say what its effects are.--Army1987 21:04, 18 July 2005 (UTC)

Binaural Headphones

To hear the sounds below 20Hz do we need special kind of headphones?

No, any old pair of stereo headphones will do. They don't even need a good low-frequency response, since the low frequencies come from your head, not from the headphones. "Binaural headphones" are simply headphones that supply sound to both ears. --Heron 19:11, 16 January 2006 (UTC)
If you mean beating rates below 20Hz, Heron is right. If you mean carrier frequencies below 20 Hz (as some commercial advocates of bin. beats propose, even if I think they're uneffective), you should use large headphones covering the whole ears with a good bass response, since earbuds have a very poor bass response (that's why many portable CD players have a bass-boost function; with earbuds you can hardly hear 30Hz sounds). I know that some commercial advocates of bin. beats sell special headphones designed to play sounds down to 4 Hz, but IMO you can't hear any sine wave below 15 Hz no matter how loud it is, so they're no use. --Army1987 20:40, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

Alleged dangers

Software providers creating packages for audio processing such as Adobe Audition (formerly Syntrillium Cool Edit Pro) do have disclaimers in their help materials stating that the use of brainwave synchronization by means of binaural beats can cause seizures and even death and that they will not be held responsible for injuries or deaths that occur as a result of the use of binaural beats.

This can't be true?

The disclaimer may have existed, but I am having a hard time finding any credible evidence to back up the idea that binaural beats cause seizures. Perhaps this is bleed-over from the connection between flashing lights and seizures. Dilvie 13:08, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

82.22.123.41 07:48, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

What? The info that those programs have these disclaimer was cutted and pasted from brainwave synchronization article. I have never read such disclaimers myself, but I can't see any reason why someond would have lied about that. As for wheter the use of binaural beats can actually kill, it sounds quite unlikely to me, so we'd better say that help materials are stating that (rather than claiming or pointing out) as per Wikipedia:NPOV_tutorial#Bias_in_attribution:_Mind_your_nuances unless we know that it has ever killed anyone. --Army1987 14:12, 10 March 2006 (UTC)


I wouldnt say death is probable, but seizures seem reasonable. Seizures can be induced by pulsating light so i dont see why pulsating sound couldnt do the same. --Guitarlord71

All sound is "pulsating". That's the nature of sound. Binaural beats just pulsate more slowly. Unless somebody can find a documented case, let's avoid jumping to conclusions, and stick to the facts and established evidence. Dilvie 13:13, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

What?!?

Do sounds really heterodyne in nature to produce two tones that are the sum and difference of their 2 frequencies?

Not in a linear medium. Heterodyning only happens when the two tones are passed through a nonlinear channel, as is deliberately done in electronics to receive radio broadcasts. I suspect that some of our articles are wrong in that respect. Now excuse me while I go and weed out that rubbish about brainwaves from the heterodyning article. --Heron 10:11, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

Site alleges 'better than' binural beat effect

Found something kind of funny, a website sells a program that can apparently:

http://www.transparentcorp.com/special/headphone-less.php?

"Until now, the vast majority of brainwave entrainment has been through uncomfortable headphones or expensive goggles ... For example, trying to fall asleep with headphones on is very difficult for most people. In addition, many headphones sets are uncomfortable and can decrease the enjoyment a person derives from using brainwave entrainment products."

basically say you can achieve the same effect with mono speakers in the background while sleeping. uhm, im a little reluctant to believe that since...well i know nothing of this "new technology, not only do you not need to use headphones, but you don't even need stereo speakers."

Whether it's a hoax I won't say, but there should definitely be something concrete written in the wiki section.


81.236.28.84 15:24, 19 April 2006 (UTC)

Any periodic repeating stimulus is believed to be able entrain brainwaves, even metronome clicks, if listened to enough long. (Well, in the case of metronome, the frequency would be < 4 Hz, so unless you're used to meditating it won't be very effective because too much lower than your currend dominant frequency...) Maybe they wouldn't have the same effect as binaural beats because the latter are processed in another part of the brain. Anyway, the "while sleeping" part instinctively sounds much BS to me... --Army1987 19:25, 19 April 2006 (UTC)


Subjective effects?

Do binaural beats have a subjective effect? I've found plenty of websites that claim the answer is yes, but they all seem to be selling something. Can anyone link me to some credible research - or share their experiences?


"Yeah. Where's the research? Who did it in which study?" --me


I believe you may mean objective, rather than subjective, if you're referring to scientific validity of the claimed effects of binaural beats on an EEG. PowerThrills 01:22, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Weasel words

Kind of new to this Wikipedia lark but it seems to me the second section on the "hypothetical uses" contains a lot of weasel words and is lacking in references. Hence I added the tag. 81.158.131.47 12:07, 1 July 2006 (UTC)


OTOH, it seems bizarre to loudly advertise as non-neutral, i.e., "controversial", an article describing a 167 year old scientific observation that has never seriously been challenged. Binaural Beats are a laboratory repeatable and testable effect. The question is what the implications of Gerald Oster's 1973 discovery -- being able to "entrain your brain" -- might be, and it is in that area that there is controvery. Basically, within that branch of the subject is a religous "crusade of words" between scientific fundamentalists and new age loonies, with a secondary "snake-oil" profiteering angle added in. I'm certain there is a sane middle ground -- just as I am sure there are implications to being able to entrain brainwave activity -- but to find it, you do need to explain the controversy, not just label the entire subject "controversial." --150.216.181.54 13:08, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

It is very easy to verify the phenomenon of binaural beats. You just need to download Binbeat sample.ogg (244 KB), to listen it through earphones and hear the beating, and to check that you can hear no beating if you remove one earphone and keep the other. That statement doesn't even strictly require a citation, since it makes descriptive claims the accuracy of which is easily verifiable by any reasonable adult without specialist knowledge WP:NOR. The only disputed thing is that they can affect the brain functions. I moved the tag to show this, even if the wording of the articles do not imply that binaural beats themselves are desputed.

Brain Waves fact correction

The article stated that binaural beats seem to come from inside your head, and that's how you can tell them from a monaural sound. Actually, the reverse is true, because monaural sound lacks stereo spatialization clues, such as stereo time delays or frequency shift caused by the doppler effect. Because the binaural sound is stereo, it exhibits subjective stereo spread, causing the sound to be more enveloping. It doesn't appear to come from the center of your head at all. Rather, different source frequencies will exhibit different spatialization charactaristics as your brain attempts to decode the stereo spatialization clues and locate the source of the audio in 3D. Dilvie 13:37, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Scientific references

In "EEG and Subjective Correlates of Alpha-Frequency - Binaural-Beat Stimulation Combined with Alpha Biofeedback", Dale S. Foster, Memphis State University, May 1990 [2], the author states:

Hypothesis 1, that alpha-frequency binaural beats stimulation would increase alpha brain wave production, was not rejected. However, the increase in alpha production over baseline was due to numerous factors, one of which was the binaural- beat stimulation. The subjects also received brief relaxation response instructions and conditions conducive to relaxation were provided. It should be noted that group A, which received alpha- frequency binaural beats, did not differ significantly in treatment alpha production from Group D, which received artificially produced surf sounds. It cannot be concluded from this data that the increase in alpha for Group A was due to a frequency-following response.

Cannot say I am overly convinced of the effectiveness of this brain "stimulation" -but maybe other studies say something else. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.152.208.12 (talk) 09:51, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps another reference?

EEG WAVES AS DEFINED BY FREQUENCY - Sydney Louis, M.D., Brown University @

http://www.brown.edu/Departments/Clinical_Neurosciences/louis/eegfreq.html (sorry, I'm not sure how to hyperlink...)

I myself feel relaxation when listening to alpha waves, and similiar responses as claimed for theta and delta waves, but my experience means nothing since there is no science behind it. :( Erik212 08:33, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Sources of Confusion

From reading the discussion here, it sounds as though people are a bit confused on this topic. I'm no expert on this particular topic, but it seems clear to me that some don't see the separation between the well-documented phenomena of binaural beats, and the protoscience of binaural beats having a measurable effect on an EEG, and thus a person's state of mind. As I understand it, the phenomena occurs when a person listens to two tones of different, yet close, frequencies on stereo headphones. Each frequency is played exclusively on either the right or left channel. Two new frequencies are perceived by the listener, though those tones do not actually exist on the recording. The idea behind the protoscience surround binaural beats is that the listener's "brainwaves" (EEG) will synchronize with the frequency of the perceived binaural beats, which is referred to as entrainment.
Binaural beats = verified phenomena
Entrainment = Protoscience
It is important to note here that protoscience is not the same as psuedoscience.
--PowerThrills 01:45, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

It seems from the literature that entrainment is scientifically well established and indeed is the basis for EEG biofeedback, as well as Binaural beat technologies. So calling it 'protoscience' the definition of which is that the hypothesis is testable, is POV given that the hypothesis HAS been tested on numerous occassions (see article references). What other basis do you have for such a claim? Jagra (talk) 01:44, 25 November 2007 (UTC)