Re: biological evolution of pitch (Eckard Blumschein )

Subject: Re: biological evolution of pitch
From:    Eckard Blumschein  <Eckard.Blumschein(at)E-TECHNIK.UNI-MAGDEBURG.DE>
Date:    Mon, 24 Feb 2003 15:41:27 +0100

Dear Martin, you wrote:

>The pitch mechanism that is at work in our heads is much older than our
>species. Günter Ehret even found it in the mouse:
>
>http://w1.570.telia.com/~u57011259/Ehret.htm

Of course. When I wrote "some kind of inverse transform as do radar and
sonar", I meant the same what Ehret called "and then grouped together". I
am sure, Geoffrey Manley was also correct when he wrote "I was quite
amazed, for example, to note from our SOAE data that the octave distance
between interacting SOAE peaks (amplitude correlations) in lizards with
tiny papillae and humans are essentially identical." So the most basic
principles of hearing are older than mammal peculiarities. 


>One biological function of f0 pitch is in fact the support of sound
>localization. If two or more harmonics of a complex sound (vocalization) can
>be unified into one percept, pitch, they must come from one direction and
>from one sound source.

Wasn't the first function of intelligent hearing to map some coincidence
near to the motoric neurons? Insects have their ears near to their wings in
order to be able to rapidly dive down in case of danger. Well, male and
female midges possibly distinguish each other by frequency. However, this
could easily be done by simple resonators. It would not require the FCT -
inverse transform mechanism. 

I would like to stress that the FCT makes full sense only together with its
inverse. I imagine pitch a label to location, not vice versa.

Kind regards,
Eckard