READERS GUIDE

1. What does the title mean? How does that change your perspective on underwater sound?

2. Is the ocean ever silent? Why or why not?

3. What did you find most surprising about ocean life and sound?

4. How does the book help you understand your own sense of hearing?

5. Why is funding studies in this area on many kinds of species important? What value do fish sounds provide to science? To other fields?

6. One scientist who was interviewed said, “By constantly comparing to our own frames of reference, we are missing the interesting questions. What are animals doing that we are rubbish at?” After reading, what might your answer be?

7. How are climate change and commerce changing our underwater soundscape? What is at risk?

8. The book often cites scientific underwater sound recordings and data which, for various reasons, could not be published at the time. What are some of those reasons? What do we lose when knowledge is limited? Or is there a greater good?

9. What impact do underwater sounds have on the food sources that larger animals rely on?

10. What did the pandemic teach us about the impact of humans’ underwater noise in the ocean?

11. What solutions or strategies can help preserve the underwater soundscape? Why is it essential that humans and their marine neighbors coexist?

12. To whom would you recommend this book, and why?