WHAT DOES NOTHING SOUND like and how can you copyright it? A silly question, to be sure, but the next time you ask a sound designer to come up with a sound for "confusion" or a note that gets across the idea of "fire" just remember the question above. Sound Design is not literal, no matter how literal it seems. Remember your favorite cartoon and all the notes jumping and falling makes? It ain't so. Remember the sounds the X-Wing fighters in Star Wars make as they zoom pass you at light speed? It ain't so. There is no sound in space. Sound is the great distractor of the eyes for the designer and his audience. They begin to believe what they are seeing, and they begin to see a bigger picture even when nothing is before their eyes. The sound designer sees the big picture. Always. All the time.