I went for a walk the other evening and found my path blocked by a tree. 
In that last scene, the trees on the railway cutting make “a sort of rustling, whispering sound” as they move, and I wondered what sort of noise the tree in the picture had made.
Since it was on a path across the local common where I wouldn’t expect many people to walk in bad weather, it was logical to go on to wonder if anyone heard it when it fell. And, of course, whether it actually made any noise at all.
Which brings us nicely on to these verses:
There was a young man who said “God
Must find it exceedingly odd
To think that the tree
Should continue to be
When there’s no one about in the quad.”
“Dear Sir: Your astonishment’s odd;
I am always about in the quad.
And that’s why the tree
Will continue to be
Since observed by, Yours faithfully, God.”
The first is by Ronald Knox, but I am not sure whether he wrote the reply himself or not.
Reading around a bit as I drafted this post, I ended up on the Wikipedia page If a tree falls in a forest. I knew about Bishop Berkeley, having read my brother’s philosophy textbooks at an impressionable age. I did not, however, know that William Fossett wrote about the same question. I rather like the quote:
“If a tree falls in a park and there is no-one to hand, it is silent and invisible and nameless. And if we were to vanish, there would be no tree at all; any meaning would vanish along with us. Other than what the cats make of it all, of course.”
I wonder if any of the local cats were out hunting on the common when the tree fell.
don't confuse the narrator 
Reading through the Wikipedia entry makes me increasingly uncertain whether Wikipedia should be trusted with anything as delicate as truth.
As an example:
“Of course, from a scientific viewpoint, it exists.[8]”
which leads to [8]
Plymouth States, BA in Philiosophy introductory course
http://www.plymouth.edu/department/history-philosophy/degrees-options-minors/baphilosophy/what-is/
At the bottom of the page, the query is used as an example – where it is split into two parts
If sound is defined as vibrations in a medium, then Yes.
If sound is defined as an experience, then No.
It even says “On first take, some want to answer that obviously the tree will make a sound. ”
But even this has major flaws in that we’re reducing a philosophical enquiry to the perceived measurements that Plato’s Cave and other philosophical conundrums would render irrelevant.
E.G. If we’re all brains in a jar, there’s no such thing as trees in the first place.
I can’t wait to see if clouds can ever be defined as wandering.
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On the internet, nobody knows you’re just a brain in a jar.
You might enjoy this page, which I also found while I was researching the blog post:
http://mirror.uncyc.org/wiki/Curiosity
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