"Hein ten Horn" wrote in message
...
Ron Baker, Pluralitas! wrote:
Hein ten Horn wrote:
Ron Baker, Pluralitas! wrote:
David L. Wilson wrote:
Hein ten Horn wrote:

So take another example: 25000 Hz and 25006 Hz.
Again, constructive and destructive interference produce 6 Hz
amplitude variations in the air.
But, as we can't hear ultrasonic frequencies, we will not produce
a 25003 Hz perception in our brain. So there's nothing to hear,
no tone and consequently, no beat.

What is the mathematical formulation?

sin(2 * pi * f_1 * t) + sin(2 * pi * f_2 * t)
or
2 * cos( pi * (f_1 - f_2) * t ) * sin( pi * (f_1 + f_2) * t )

So every cubic micrometre of the air (or another medium)
is vibrating in accordance with
2 * cos( 2 * pi * 3 * t ) * sin(2 * pi * 25003 * t ),
thus having a beat frequency of 2*3 = 6 Hz

How do you arrive at a "beat"?

Not by train, neither by UFO.
Sorry. English, German and French are only 'second'
languages to me.
Are you after the occurrence of a beat?

Another way to phrase the question would have been:
Given a waveform x(t) representing the sound wave
in the air how do you decide whether there is a
beat in it?

Then: a beat appears at constructive interference, thus
when the cosine function becomes maximal (+1 or -1).
Or are you after the beat frequency (6 Hz)?
Then: the cosine function has two maxima per period
(one being positive, one negative) and with three
periodes a second it makes six beats/second.

Hint: Any such assessment is nonlinear.
(And kudos to you that you can do the math.)

Simplifying the math:
x = cos(a) * cos(b) = 0.5 * (cos[a+b] + cos[a-b])
(Where a = 2 * pi * f_1 * t and b = same but f_2.)
All three of the above are equivalent. There is no difference.
You get x if you add two sine waves or if you
multiply two (different) sine waves.

??
sin(a) + sin(b) sin(a) * sin(b)
In case you mistyped cosine:
sin(a) + sin(b) cos(a) * cos(b)

It would have been more proper of me to say
"sinusoid" rather than "sine wave". I called
cos() a "sine wave". If you look at cos(2pi f1 t)
on an oscilloscope it looks the same as sin(2pi f t).
In that case there is essentially no difference.
Yes, there are cases where it makes a difference.
But at the beginning of an analysis it is rather
arbitrary and the math is less cluttered with
cos().


So which is it really? Hint: If all you have is x then
you can't tell how it was generated.

What you do with it afterwards can make a
difference.

Referring to the physical system, what's now your point?
That system contains elements vibrating at 25003 Hz.
There's no math in it.

Whoops. You'll need math to understand it.

More on that in my posting to
JK at nearly the same sending time.

gr, Hein