Unlike seen objects, which are reasonably persistent, sound is fleeting. But despite the transient nature of sound and the utter relentlessness of its input as it washes over us, our ears and, in particular, our brains do an amazing job of making sense of it. By some measures, the auditory system is the most computationally intensive neural network. This is particularly true in terms of timing. No other sensory system, vision included, can approach the speed at which the auditory system processes the incoming soundscape. Much of this need for speed is due to the simple fact that sounds evolve over time.
