Or at least “explain it like I am an 8th grader.” I am a middle school science teacher and am struggling with explaining these concepts in a simplified way that my students can understand. They have some prior knowledge about waves and how they travel. I appreciate any help you can provide!
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To put it in an acoustic context, analog is like a police or fire siren (weeooo, weeooo). The frequency of the sound is continuously rising and falling, and that has a meaning to us.
Digital would be more akin to a telegraph using morse code (dot, dot, dot, dash). It’s on or off. Durations may change, but it’s always all or nothing.
Sound is inherently analog in nature, as is all things that could be described as a “wave”. So, even if you may have digital equipment between the recording and playback of that sound, it always starts and ends analog. Digital must “sample” that wave and approximate it by slicing it up many times per second.
Analog is the signal meat uses. Digital is the signal that computers use.
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