Subject: Re: The natural spectrogram From: beauchamp james w <jwbeauch(at)UX1.CSO.UIUC.EDU> Date: Fri, 30 Jan 2004 09:50:29 -0600Eckard Blumschein wrote (in part): >>>Isn't the usual spectrogram subject to the notorious trade-off beween >>>spectral and temporal resolution? >> >>Well sure, but we can let the human ear tell us where to be on that >trade-off. > >This might be not quite correct for several reasons. The smallest product >delta t times delta f of hearing is much better than according to the >uncertainty principle. >Aren't about 10 microseconds and 1 Hz realistic? The product is 10^-5 << 1. >Frequency resolution of the natural spectrogram is not at all restricted, >in principle. 10 usec and 1 Hz might be JND's for special cases, but I doubt very much that they could be discriminated simultaneously. Can you offer an acoustic example where they are? In fact, what is the smallest product that has been observed, and how does it vary with frequency, intensity, and other factors? Jim