American voices on BERG video?

Lots of rumors going around about the audio at the very end of the BERG video. Some people think the "terrorists" say something in English. I've taken the audio off the tape and processed it to remove the background noise a bit.

I know what it's supposed to say, but can you come up with it independently?

http://cronus.com/images/Noise-Reduced-Tail-End-Beheading-Audio-5-11-04.mp3

There are no upsetting sounds on this clip, it's only 17K, and there is no video. It's safe to listen to it for even the most squeamish. Just post here what you think you hear the man saying after listening to the clip.

http://brainbuttons.com/home.asp?stashid=13

- that's why I'm not telling. This is a little experiment to see if there's anything really there or if it's projection. I think it's projection myself.

But what the hell do I know. I can never hear anything in those "spirit recordings" either.

"turn me on, dead man".

Seriously, I can't make out anything remotely English-sounding.

Not sure.

That's very close to what others have said they hear. Not exact, but very close.

Then again I think many things could "sound" like that.

RC

but of course you'd have to assume that English is being spoken in the first place.

Frankly, it's either a job for an experienced linguist, or it can't be deciphered at all. I think we're wasting time on this snippet...

Orange jump suit, white chair, lighting, fresh paint on the walls the same color as at Abu Ghraib prison. Add to that a really dodgy looking video where even the face looks like it could have been superimposed, and you don't need to give me any more evidence. I'm convinced the video is a fraud and that it was staged in the prison.

Have you heard the rumor before, or did you come up with that completley independently?

If independently, that tend to corroborate the rumors.

http://brainbuttons.com/home.asp?stashid=13

Thy will be done.

http://www.breakfornews.com/berg-thywillbedone.mp3
610 kb

- I don't know what you did to this audio...but it doesn't sound anything like the original. Granted...you've taken out the background noise...but you've also taken out part of the frequency that makes the voices understandable.

- Try again. Use a noise gate and try not to lose so much of the voices.

I know what I took out and what I left in. If you can do better, please do so. Post it here.

...you've rendered the voices useless for evaluation. Perhaps you could include the original for comparison?

It's easy. And since you don't have the original to compare the audio to, your assertion that I chopped off the intelligibility is truly based on nothing at all on your part.

In actual fact, I have very, very high end audio here, and I listened to the original, the audio I threw out and the remaining audio. You only heard the processed audio yet you immediately made an assertion you can't support.

So why did you jump to that conclusion when you didn't have the original with which to compare? It boggles the mind.

Here's a link to the original audio only - this one includes screams and death throes, so it's not safe for the squeamish. It's also quite long to download.

http://rogerhedgecock.com/timages/page/media/Entire%20Beheading%20Audio%205%2011%2004.mp3

but it really doesn't sound like the original, which I've listened to several times. It's a little slow and throaty, but I'm sure you did your best. However, can you humor me and back up on the original a few seconds and pick up some really, really quiet words, right before this section. Something like "that was wicked".

one of those fat white asses is sitting in it.

..."now we are"...to me.

Sorry, I couldn't help myself.

Languages use unique phonemes. Some of the basic sounds used are found in some languages and not in others. This is what makes learning to speak a new language without an accent is so difficult after the basic sound set has been learned and "set in." Even HEARING the difference between sounds that the native speaker finds to be "obviously" distinct can be impossible for those whose language makes no use of that type of sound. Like 'ra' and 'la.' This is also evident in the various ways animal sounds are rendered and "mimicked" in different languages.

In short, unless we are fluent linguists, any English speaker will "render" or "hear" all ambiguous sounds in terms of the native phoneme set we have available to us - our aural map.

A prompt to give an English "interpretation" just assumes the answer to the essential question at hand. For myself, I don't hear anything like an American (Boston (or Southie, etc), Brooklyn, Baton Rouge, Buffalo, Bronx...???) accent, but I've spent long periods of my younger years immersed in non-English environments and have lived in many parts of this country and so possibly may have an advantage.

If the quality were adequate and the database adequate, scientific sound analysis could determine whether or not the vocalizations were peculiar to, or excluded, certain languages, but since I have seen no reports of this type of analysis being done on taped messages, the tech is probably undeveloped (or secret).

Sound illusions:
http://www.philomel.com/
http://ilabs.washington.edu/kuhl/research.html#Auditory-Visual
rtsp://media.depts.washington.edu/cmblcore/McGurk_effect.rm

I checked out the philomel site. A most curious phenomenon, to hear phantom words.

I would add that my job requires me to listen to different voices all day long on tape. What is on the Berg video sounds suspiciously like a Western inflection, but I cannot discern particular words, and it is easy to be influenced by suggestions of what those words might be.

It's just another piece of the puzzle of what really happened, another question for which we may not have an answer.

http://www.philomel.com/phantom_words/mp3/Track_06.mp3
http://www.philomel.com/phantom_words/22k/Track_06.wav
Listen with well separated stereo speakers.

I work in an environment with machinery that makes a range of loud sounds repeating in cycles and in synchrony, similar to the sample. Even though the noise is not very much like speech, it's easy to "hear words" in the noise if you are willing to play. A co-worker (a guy who stressed out easily) once approached me greatly puzzled about what he was hearing. From the associated text:

http://www.philomel.com/phantom_words/description.html#phantom_words
The brain is constantly attempting to find meaning in things, even where there is no meaning. This can often lead us to experience illusions. Just as, when we look into a cloudy sky, we may see strange faces and figures, so when presented with ambiguous sounds, we may hear words and phrases that are not really there.

The CD is named after the first few tracks, which contain sequences of repeating words and phrases that arise simultaneously from different regions of space. These illusions should be heard through stereo loudspeakers that are placed in front of you, with one to your left and the other to your right. The words coming from the different spatial locations are offset from each other in time. As a result, listeners are given a palette of sounds from which to choose, and so can create in their minds many different combinations of sounds. After continuous exposure to these repeating words, listeners begin to 'hear' words and phrases that are not really there. These 'phantom words' are generated by the brain in an attempt to extract meaning from the chaos of sound that is presented.

At the end I heard something like "Halleluljah"

No I haven't read the other posts, or know what it's supposed to say.

Any help?

I had an Arabic speaker listen to the entire video. It's all in Arabic.

He was so upset by the video he doesn't want to listen to it again, but I'll see if I can talk him into it and have him translate the part people think is in English.

Don't you think if it really was a CIA operation the CIA would be smarter than giving away hints like speaking english on the video.

Jesus christ.

And we have our doubts as to the competence of the CIA.

But this sample of audio is in my opinion too ambiguous to make a determination with any certainty. There is plenty of weirdness around the Berg murder, but I'm not sure this is particularly convincing.

Has anyone checked to see if it lines up in the video.

How about shadows? Are there any shadows in the background that don't match?