Is it possible for humans to hear sounds in space? The quick response is “No!” Still, misconceptions about noise in space exist. All thanks to the sounds in sci-fi movies and TV shows. How many times have we heard the Starship or the Millennium Falcon whoosh within space? It’s so fixed our thoughts about space that people are often amazed to find out that it doesn’t work that way. The laws of physics explain that it can’t happen, but usually enough producers don’t actually think about them. They’re working for effect.
It’s not just a difficulty with TV or movies. There are inaccurate ideas out there that planets make noises, for instance. What’s truly occurring is that special methods in their atmospheres are carrying out eruptions that can be picked up by delicate instruments. In order to know them, experts take the discharges and heterodyne them to build something we can hear so they can try to investigate what they are. But, the planets themselves aren’t making sounds.
The Physics of Sound
It is important to learn the physics of sound. Sound travels within the air as streams. When we chat, for example, the wave of our vocal cords reduces the air around them. The compressed air pushes the air around it, which conveys the sound waves. Ultimately, these sounds arrive at the ears of an audience, whose understanding interprets that action as sound. If the compressions are high frequency and moving quickly, the signal obtained by the ears is defined by the brain as a whistle or a shriek. If they’re below frequency and moving more slowly, the brain interprets it as a drum or a boom or a low voice.
Here’s the essential thing to remember without anything to reduce, sound waves can’t be transferred. There’s no evidence in the emptiness of space that transfers sound waves. There is a possibility that deep waves can pass through and reduce vapors of gas and dust, but we wouldn’t be able to learn that noise. It would be too low or too high for our ears to notice. Of course, if someone lived in space without any safeguard against the vacuum, hearing any sound waves would be the lightest of their difficulties.
What About Light?
Light can travel within the vacuum of space. This is why we can see different objects like planets, stars, and galaxies. But we can’t hear any noises they might produce
Haven’t Probes Picked Up Sounds from the Planets?
NASA, back in the 90s announced a five-volume set of space sounds. Unluckily, they were not likewise particular about how the sounds were produced exactly. It turns out the recordings weren’t true of sound originating from those planets. What was picked up were interplays of charged particles in the magnetospheres of the planets that had trapped radio waves and other electromagnetic interferences. Astronomers then took those measures and transformed them into sounds. It is like the way a radio catches the radio waves, which are long-wavelength light waves from radio stations and turns those signals into sound.
Apollo Astronauts Heard Sounds Near the Moon?
According to NASA records of the Apollo moon missions, many of the astronauts reported hearing music when orbiting the Moon. It sets out that what they heard was a completely foreseen radiofrequency obstacle between the lunar module and the command modules.
The various notable examples of this sound were noticed when the Apollo 15 astronauts were on the far side of the Moon. However, once the orbiting spacecraft was over the near side of the Moon, the warbling ended. Anyone who has ever operated radio or done HAM radio or other operations with radio wavelengths would understand the sounds at once. They were nothing unusual and they absolutely didn’t develop through the vacuum of space.
Why Do the Movies Have Spacecraft Making Sounds?
Considering we know that no one can actually hear noises in the vacuum of space, the most suitable answer for sound effects in TV and movies is, if producers didn’t make the rockets noise and the spacecraft go whoosh, the soundtrack would be boring. But it doesn’t mean there’s sound in space. All it indicates is that sounds are joined to give the scenes a little excitement.
