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From: Bob Masta on 27 Sep 2006 10:11
On Tue, 26 Sep 2006 23:06:00 -0500, "Mike Rieves" <mriev(a)hotspam.com>
wrote:

>

>>
> I remember seeing this thing on the TV program "I've Got a Secret" in the
>late fifties or early sixties. (I saw a rerun of that show on the Game
>networt a couple of years ago). I remember there were arguments in the press
>at the time as to where it was really transmitting via RF or merely audio
>transmitted by bone conduction. As best I remember, there were well-known
>experts on both sides of the argument.
> Also, Lucille Ball claimed to have heard a picked up a radio broadcast on
>a filling while passing by a station after a visit from her dentist.
>

That Lucille Ball story has also been pretty roundly criticized, and
there isn't a shred of documentation in support of it. (She was
supposed to have intercepted code from a Japanese spy transmitter,
leading to the arrest of the spy. But no records of that arrest have
ever been found.)

I believe all the "dental radio" stories are in the "urban legend"
category. At least, I have never been able to validate one.
It's always something we've just "heard about" (so to speak!).

There are several reasons why dental radio is unlikely, not the
least of which is that the supposed "diode" from the fillings is
without an antenna, in an enclosure made of a pretty good
conductor (saltwater, basically). So the best you could possibly
hope for would be a few microvolts *in your tooth*. Now, even
assuming this signal could get the nerve beneath it to fire,
and even considering that some of those nerves may leak
signals into the auditory nerve, you'd still be left with the
single-channel problem: The best you could *possibly* hope
for would be a string of buzzes.

On the other hand, it is much more plausible that these cases
(if any real ones exist) are auditory hallucinations, possibly
stimulated by real acoustic noise from TMJ (tempro-mandibular
joint) problems, or slightly occluded blood vessels. Or even
stimulated by tinnitus, which may or may not be acoustic but
in some people can be a broadband effect unlike the more
usual "riinging in the ears". Broadband noise can definitely
produce "radio station" illusions under the proper conditions,
and I hope to write a paper decribing this in detail in the near
future.

Best regards,


by




Bob Masta
dqatechATdaqartaDOTcom

D A Q A R T A
Data AcQuisition And Real-Time Analysis
www.daqarta.com
Home of DaqGen, the FREEWARE signal generator
From: Mike Rieves on 27 Sep 2006 14:10

"Bob Masta" <NoSpam(a)daqarta.com> wrote in message
news:451a82e6.5657506(a)news.sysmatrix.net...
> On Tue, 26 Sep 2006 23:06:00 -0500, "Mike Rieves" <mriev(a)hotspam.com>
> wrote:
>
>>
>
>>>
>> I remember seeing this thing on the TV program "I've Got a Secret" in
>> the
>>late fifties or early sixties. (I saw a rerun of that show on the Game
>>networt a couple of years ago). I remember there were arguments in the
>>press
>>at the time as to where it was really transmitting via RF or merely audio
>>transmitted by bone conduction. As best I remember, there were well-known
>>experts on both sides of the argument.
>> Also, Lucille Ball claimed to have heard a picked up a radio broadcast
>> on
>>a filling while passing by a station after a visit from her dentist.
>>
>
> That Lucille Ball story has also been pretty roundly criticized, and
> there isn't a shred of documentation in support of it. (She was
> supposed to have intercepted code from a Japanese spy transmitter,
> leading to the arrest of the spy. But no records of that arrest have
> ever been found.)

It's remotely possible that the arrest was kept confidential for security
reasons, however I agree that the story is highly unlikely to have been
true. The TV show "Mythbusters" took this one on in episode 4, the result:
myth busted!

> I believe all the "dental radio" stories are in the "urban legend"
> category. At least, I have never been able to validate one.
> It's always something we've just "heard about" (so to speak!).

I agree.

> There are several reasons why dental radio is unlikely, not the
> least of which is that the supposed "diode" from the fillings is
> without an antenna, in an enclosure made of a pretty good
> conductor (saltwater, basically). So the best you could possibly
> hope for would be a few microvolts *in your tooth*. Now, even
> assuming this signal could get the nerve beneath it to fire,
> and even considering that some of those nerves may leak
> signals into the auditory nerve, you'd still be left with the
> single-channel problem: The best you could *possibly* hope
> for would be a string of buzzes.
>
> On the other hand, it is much more plausible that these cases
> (if any real ones exist) are auditory hallucinations, possibly
> stimulated by real acoustic noise from TMJ (tempro-mandibular
> joint) problems, or slightly occluded blood vessels. Or even
> stimulated by tinnitus, which may or may not be acoustic but
> in some people can be a broadband effect unlike the more
> usual "riinging in the ears". Broadband noise can definitely
> produce "radio station" illusions under the proper conditions,
> and I hope to write a paper decribing this in detail in the near
> future.

I agree here too. The Neurophone however, is a totally different animal.
I notice that at www.neurophone.com they are talking about ultrasonic
transmission, rather than RF transmission, which I think may be plausible,
though I'm far from an expert on the subject.


From: Nomen Nescio on 27 Sep 2006 16:50
In article <88zSg.25487$eW5.18936(a)bignews5.bellsouth.net>
"Mike Rieves" <mriev(a)hotspam.com> wrote:

> snip.....snip

> I'm far from an expert on the subject.

You're far from an expert on any subject. BTW, how's your course on dBs going. Also, when do you expect to finish your treatise on Doppler distortion?

From: Rich Grise on 27 Sep 2006 17:05
On Mon, 25 Sep 2006 22:06:45 -0700, Radium wrote:

> I have read about the neurophone which claims to produce auditory
> perception through nerve stimulation. Something to do with electric
> signals of certain frequencies being sensed as sound by the brain.

It should be trivially simple to test this - just get some deaf
volunteers, and try it!

Good Luck!
Rich

From: Radium on 27 Sep 2006 17:46

Rich Grise wrote:
> On Mon, 25 Sep 2006 22:06:45 -0700, Radium wrote:
>
> > I have read about the neurophone which claims to produce auditory
> > perception through nerve stimulation. Something to do with electric
> > signals of certain frequencies being sensed as sound by the brain.
>
> It should be trivially simple to test this - just get some deaf
> volunteers, and try it!
>
> Good Luck!
> Rich

Exactly! What makes me skeptical about Neurophone is it is not used on
deaf volunteers. Makes me think that the Neurophone is too good to be
true. Yet I still find it so interesting.

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