how does the string in can telephone really work?
In: 3
Pretty much exactly like it looks. Sound is vibration. Usually, we hear it as vibrating air, but the air around a drum vibrates because the drum is vibrating from being hit, and the air around our heads is vibrating because our vocal cords vibrate it. Thus, sound actually begins as a vibrating object.
Its the same principle here. A voice causes the can to vibrate, which causes the string to vibrate, which causes the far can to vibrate, which causes the air to vibrate, which is what you’re hearing. A chain of vibrations, losing clarity with distance and multiple transitions through different mediums, but nonetheless still recognizable as the human speech it began as.
think of it like a guitar string, you pluck it, and it vibrates which creates pressure waves in the air that we can hear.
With a can and string, if you plucked the string, you’d hear it like a guitar.
alternatively, by talking into the can, the can vibrates, which “plucks” the string.
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