
The “432 Hz vs. 440 Hz” conspiracy theory - yinso
https://jakubmarian.com/the-432-hz-vs-440-hz-conspiracy-theory/
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dsego
Adam Neely has a great take on this: A = 432Hz
[https://youtu.be/EKTZ151yLnk](https://youtu.be/EKTZ151yLnk)

Another good one is Paul Davids: The Ultimate 432Hz VS 440Hz | CONSPIRACY +
Comparison [https://youtu.be/Rt3EAPDn-Ug](https://youtu.be/Rt3EAPDn-Ug)

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nkurz
> At the urging of singers, the French government made the tuning A = 435 Hz
> officially standard in France in 1859

Did they know that the time that they had chosen exactly 435 Hz? That is, were
they to directly count the number of waves per second using the technology
available at that time?

My quick searching says that devices such as "Scheibler's Tonometer" did exist
at the time. These allowed the user count the much slower "beats" between two
tuning forks, letting them extrapolate the frequency of a unknown tuning fork
from a known. But what did they use for a known?

Or was the French standard only actually defined as a particular tuning fork,
only determined to be 435 Hz at some late time, when better technology was
available?

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anoncake
> There are millions of people in the world who believe that Goebbels
> introduced the tuning to make people feel more anxious.

That's absurd.

It's more likely Goebbels did that to demonstrate that Germany was no longer
bound to Article 282 (22) of the Treaty of Versailles, which forced it to
accept the 435hz standard.

See: Jerry L. Weinstein, Musical Pitch and International Agreement. The
American Journal of International Law Vol. 46, No. 2 (Apr., 1952), pp.
341-343,
[https://www.jstor.org/stable/2194075](https://www.jstor.org/stable/2194075)

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dr_dshiv
The average human alpha wave, the most dominant brainwave, is 10hz.
Coincidental that 10 fit in a second, I guess.

[http://www.jneurosci.org/content/37/42/10173](http://www.jneurosci.org/content/37/42/10173)

Personally, I would prefer that seconds were slightly shorter (~.84 seconds),
because then we could have decimal time, where there are 100 seconds in a
minute, 100 minutes in an hour and 10 hours in a day. Mm, would be soo
satisfying. Useless, but satisfying.

~~~
qubex
Technically time _is_ decimal in the SInsystem because the unit is the second
_s_ and the usual decimal power names apply. It’s just that we have standard
names for various non decimal multiples.

Yes, as with anything that lies beyond the clause “ _well technically..._ ”
this actually kind of vindicates the opposing campus point, so yeah...

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karmakaze
It was funny how the numerology is bunk but then we use 440 rather than 439
because it's prime. It all makes sense of course unless you're in the believer
camp then it could seem arbitrary.

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Arbalest
heh yeah, numerology doesn't make much sense when applied to measurement units
generally. That hasn't stopped it being applied anyway. For someone already
prone to this sort of thinking, they're looking at the number, without
thinking about how the measurement base was derived.

Thankfully, this article isn't so much about debunking the exact myth, but
rather the notion that the standard has any particular historical
significance. It is interesting to think that it wasn't until recently we have
even been able to reasonably measure and standardise frequency.

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tmpfs
I found the article hyperbole and a better reference is scientific tuning [1]

[1]
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_pitch](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_pitch)

