Hector Martin

In pop science getting things wrong: "Sperm whales are the loudest animal on Earth at 236 dB! That's enough to kill you!" Well, no. Sound pressure is measured differently in water and in air. Subtract ~61 dB for the equivalent SPL in air, 175 dB (same acoustic energy). And...

... if you're listening from outside the water, that's another ~30 dB loss from the impedance mismatch. Now you're at 145 dB. Still ear-damage level, right? Except sperm whales communicate in clicks which last 100 microseconds. Party balloons can produce > 160 dB impulses.

So you should be more worried about hearing damage from popping party balloons than from being outside the water next to a sperm whale. Also, howler monkeys blast out ~140 dB in air, *continuously*, which is a hell of a lot more impressive (especially per size), and dangerous.

Remember kids, it is not okay to read a research paper and go "number big, bigger number impressive, must write article" if you don't actually understand the subject matter.

Any recommendations for reading about how volume works?

From a scientific perspective, or from an audio engineering perspective? For the former I would say just Google it, but for the latter I might have some specific things to recommend if you want to go into details about mixing and such.

I usually find out does help to have a cursory overview of the scientific basis to really understand the audio engineering aspects. Most resources seem lacking there to me and usually just go straight into abstract. But nevertheless, hit me with that audio engineering theory!