The Sounds of Silence: Perspectives on Documenting Acoustic Landscapes at the Intersection of Remoteness, Conservation and Tourism

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This essay was a very ambitious attempt at bridging the gap between the quantitative analysis of conservation biology and the qualitative research behind conservation humanities.  The two projects that are detailed here (Finland, Pyrenees) are eloquently described and documented through the instruments, concepts, and the interviews of tourists in both areas. The approach is novel and applicable to other areas of ecological/biological research as the connection with the work at the U of Helsinki mentioned in the essay proves.  

I would like the authors to consider this observation:

There is a story in the making about silence or formulations/conceptualizations of silence that never quite gets told.  This would be my only critique of an otherwise extraordinary article.  If the humanities are going to have a stronger presence in this interdisciplinary dialogue, they can't come in second.  The presence of humanistic thinking needs to be a la par with that of the biological/ecological measurements and documentation of the soundscapes.  The article underscores how visitors of these remote areas quickly define silence as the absence of human or human-made sound, the acceptance of natural soundscapes (wind, rain, animals, etc.), but it would be helpful for readers to see how the authors can actually make the sociocultural and socioeconomic context in which these sounds occur more visible: tourism needs a capitalist infrastructure that unfortunately undoes exactly what it hopes to commodify: the promise of silence.  The humanities can only contribute to this interdisciplinary dialogue if it can frame and expose the underlying complications that the instruments only measure.  Otherwise, humanistic inquiry will come in second place and be another missed opportunity.   I would suggest that the authors think about these broader issues so that the humanistic element does not turn into "noise" in the writing. 

Congratulations on a great piece!

Author Response

Reviewer 1   Comments 1: There is a story in the making about silence or formulations/conceptualizations of silence that never quite gets told.  This would be my only critique of an otherwise extraordinary article.  If the humanities are going to have a stronger presence in this interdisciplinary dialogue, they can't come in second.  The presence of humanistic thinking needs to be a la par with that of the biological/ecological measurements and documentation of the soundscapes.  The article underscores how visitors of these remote areas quickly define silence as the absence of human or human-made sound, the acceptance of natural soundscapes (wind, rain, animals, etc.), but it would be helpful for readers to see how the authors can actually make the sociocultural and socioeconomic context in which these sounds occur more visible: tourism needs a capitalist infrastructure that unfortunately undoes exactly what it hopes to commodify: the promise of silence.  The humanities can only contribute to this interdisciplinary dialogue if it can frame and expose the underlying complications that the instruments only measure.  Otherwise, humanistic inquiry will come in second place and be another missed opportunity.   I would suggest that the authors think about these broader issues so that the humanistic element does not turn into "noise" in the writing.

Response 1: We wholeheartedly agree with this comment. In response to this comment we have added the following sentence to highlight future directions where collaboration with environmental historians and other humanities scholars could enrich our understanding of the field sites “To enrich our existing methods, we recognise that a broader humanities approach, including for example scholars from environmental history, could help us understand the tensions and contradictions that might emerge in the future, such as how the influx of tourists and tourist infrastructure might erode the silence and solitude that attracts tourists in the first place.” See lines 573-577.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

This is a fascinating article that brings together different disciplinary approaches and research methods (principally ecoacoustic research and transect based mobile ethnographic methods) to explore new approaches to understanding and conserving soundscapes and the environments that produce, and are produced by, them.

The article is well researched and clearly written and is suitable for publication in its current form. Below I have offered a few minor suggestions for revision.

In the attached PDF version of the article I have highlighted several words/sentences with typos that might be corrected.

 

GENERAL POINTS

The terms ‘site’ and ‘case study’ are both used to refer to the field sites. It would be simpler for the reader if only one were used.

 

There is a strong focus in the paper on the value of what people perceive to be natural (visually and/or acoustically). The motivation of the authors in understanding these perceptions seems to be aligned with conserving (and perhaps restoring) places that have a high ‘naturalness value’ for users. That is a worthwhile project, but I wonder if it is worth noting explicitly in the introduction that these kinds of perceptions of naturalness may not (always) be good indicators of some of the things we think of as characterising more ‘natural’ areas, i.e. high biodiversity (e.g. in places with high biodiversity of kinds that don’t make a lot of noise (that is pretty much everyone other than birds), or are hard to see). As such, what is being ‘conserved’ here seems to be a landscape of human amenity as much as anything else (one that much of the time aligns with other kinds of conservation goals, like biodiversity conservation, but can’t be assumed to always do so).

 

The idea of scaling the findings in this research places significant weight on the particular perceptions of naturalness of the people interviewed. Is there anything more than can be said about their representativeness of the population at large? Might different cultural groups perceive different sounds as natural? The idea that bird sounds are all perceived as indicators of naturalness by all people seems a bit too simple. Some birds (e.g. introduced ‘pest’ species or those with harsh calls) are viewed as undermining the naturalness and amenity of landscapes by particular humans.  

 

SPECIFIC POINTS
p. 1 “Firstly, whilst the work of conservation biologists has slowed rates of biodiversity loss” – Given that rates of loss continue to accelerate, it seems odd to say that the work of conservation has slowed them. Is the point that they’re slower than they might have been without that work? How do we know this?

p. 7 “At both of our case study sites the results of the walking interviews with members of the local community as well as tourists highlighted that silence is not in fact the absence of any sound as we commonly understand it, but rather the absence of human made sounds.”
Did this apply universally? There are some types of nonhuman sound that many people find very annoying (e.g. early morning raucous birds). In some contexts, I can see these kinds of sounds being excluded from a definition of ‘silence’. Did any of your informants express such a view? Could you see this happening in some contexts?

p. 10 “The raw sound recordings can then also be used via advances in machine listening techniques to identify individual bird species (Kahl et al. 2021) and thereby quantify the amount of biophony at a given location.”
I’m not familiar with these approaches. Is there more you can say here about the accuracy of this automated species identification?

 

 

 

Comments for author File: Comments.pdf

Author Response

Comments 1: In the attached PDF version of the article I have highlighted several words/sentences with typos that might be corrected.

Response 1: We really appreciate your careful reading of the text. We have made appropriate edits in the main body of the text marked in red: see lines 61, 63, 65, 133-4, 228, 303, 440, 441,442 and 473.

Comments 2: The terms ‘site’ and ‘case study’ are both used to refer to the field sites. It would be simpler for the reader if only one were used.

Response 2: This is a good point. After discussion with my co-authors we have settled on the use of ‘field site’ and updated the text throughout(marked in red).

Comments 3: There is a strong focus in the paper on the value of what people perceive to be natural (visually and/or acoustically). The motivation of the authors in understanding these perceptions seems to be aligned with conserving (and perhaps restoring) places that have a high ‘naturalness value’ for users. That is a worthwhile project, but I wonder if it is worth noting explicitly in the introduction that these kinds of perceptions of naturalness may not (always) be good indicators of some of the things we think of as characterising more ‘natural’ areas, i.e. high biodiversity (e.g. in places with high biodiversity of kinds that don’t make a lot of noise (that is pretty much everyone other than birds), or are hard to see). As such, what is being ‘conserved’ here seems to be a landscape of human amenity as much as anything else (one that much of the time aligns with other kinds of conservation goals, like biodiversity conservation, but can’t be assumed to always do.

Response 3: We thank the reviewer for this important point. Within the paper we have tried to highlight the importance of soundscapes as a shared space, which is of value to both human and the other animal species we share them with. As such, non-anthropogenically dominated soundscapes are firstly an important niche for animal communication (e.g. during breeding and foraging) and as such require protection via nature conservation;  secondly natural soundscapes are something that humans both as individuals and as a society value (e.g. for wellbeing and their cultural worth); and thirdly natural soundscapes, as with the natural world more widely, are something that is worth saving in their own right, as a feature of life on earth with intrinsic value (as is evidenced by the rights of nature movement). Whilst in our field sites we focus on human perceptions and values for natural soundscapes, and how this can be related to data on those species present, it is well established in the wider conservation context (see for example their recognition in the targets listed under the current Convention on Biological Diversity) that these same intact natural areas are also important reservoirs for key species and habitats, thereby providing connectivity which allows species to move and respond to landscape and climate change. As such we have now added the following sentence to the introduction ‘Sound, in its variety, its presence and its absence, is a part of conservation, in three important ways. Firstly, it is part of how ecosystems function, such as the role of birdsong in bird communication, and thus worth conserving in its own right. Secondly, measuring sound can be a proxy for measuring other aspects of biodiversity, for example recording birdsong can be used to monitor bird abundance. Thirdly, sound can be part of the ways in which humans relate to, and value, the environment, such as appreciating the beauty of birdsong, or the sense of solitude that comes from silence. It should be noted that these do not always align – for example, humans might value the calls of invasive bird species, whose presence might reflect a damaged environment. Similarly, not all humans will relate to and value sounds in the same way – silence can be both comforting and unsettling, and the call of a bird can be important part of cultural identity to one person, and a cacophony to another.’ See lines 69-80

 

Comments 4: The idea of scaling the findings in this research places significant weight on the particular perceptions of naturalness of the people interviewed. Is there anything more than can be said about their representativeness of the population at large? Might different cultural groups perceive different sounds as natural? The idea that bird sounds are all perceived as indicators of naturalness by all people seems a bit too simple. Some birds (e.g. introduced ‘pest’ species or those with harsh calls) are viewed as undermining the naturalness and amenity of landscapes by particular humans.

Response 4: We agree this is an important and necessary future direction for our methodological approach.  Broadening the participant groups to capture a wider perspective and any linked variance in cultural groups. A key group to work with in more depth would be local reindeer herders, which were challenging to recruit for the walking interviews given their busy working schedules. To that end we have added a new sentence to line 558-562 as follows: ‘Equally the humanities can help us understand the values ascribed to different ‘natural’ sounds by different groups – for example, whether the sounds of non-native and native species are considered equally ‘natural’ by the local population, or whether indigenous herders in Lapland value or indeed use sound differently to other social groups.’  (in red in the main text)

 

Comments 5: Firstly, whilst the work of conservation biologists has slowed rates of biodiversity loss” – Given that rates of loss continue to accelerate, it seems odd to say that the work of conservation has slowed them. Is the point that they’re slower than they might have been without that work? How do we know this?

Response 5: The point we were trying to make in the relevant sentence is that both are true: “Firstly, whilst the work of conservation biologists has slowed rates of biodiversity loss, extinction and habitat loss continue at a rapid rate (Neugarten et al. 2024).” Whilst the overall trend is negative, there are nevertheless examples of successful interventions to halt biodiversity loss and we have added a citation in line to support this (Johnson et al. 2017). Please see line 28 and 675-676.

 

Comments 6: “At both of our case study sites the results of the walking interviews with members of the local community as well as tourists highlighted that silence is not in fact the absence of any sound as we commonly understand it, but rather the absence of human made sounds.”
Did this apply universally? There are some types of nonhuman sound that many people find very annoying (e.g. early morning raucous birds). In some contexts, I can see these kinds of sounds being excluded from a definition of ‘silence’. Did any of your informants express such a view? Could you see this happening in some contexts?

 

Response 6: The reviewer makes a good point, and we note that these responses were not present in the interviews, a fact which we attribute to the rural focus of the field sites, where raucous dawn choruses or the sounds of notoriously noisy ‘invasive’ species such as the rose-ringed parakeet are not present in the way they might be in urban areas. 

 

Comments 7: The raw sound recordings can then also be used via advances in machine listening techniques to identify individual bird species (Kahl et al. 2021) and thereby quantify the amount of biophony at a given location.” I’m not familiar with these approaches. Is there more you can say here about the accuracy of this automated species identification?

Response 7: Yes this is now a growing field and we have amended the sentence and added an additional reference as follows: ‘The raw sound recordings can then also be used via advances in machine listening techniques to identify individual bird species (Kahl et al. 2021) and using community-based confidence thresholds, accurately quantify the different species found at a given location (Funosas et al. 2023).’ See lines 392-395 and 646-647.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf