Owl Hearing

This chapter explains what factors the owl uses to determine the spatial origin of sound, and considers how these factors are analysed. It shows that the anatomy of the owl is important in shaping and enhancing the physical characteristics of sound that are used for localisation. However, it is the nervous system that actually analyses these physical characteristics and uses them to compute location. The chapter also explains the end stage of the owl's neural analysis of sound localisation. It was the realisation that this was really quite simple and easy to understand that greatly encouraged the search for the neural mechanisms that generate the end stage. Therefore, the chapter talks about the first stage of the localisation process, and explains how well authors can trace the mechanisms from there to the end stage.