Standard tuning - dumn or what?

O.k it's nice having two E-strings to give your guitar a bit of resonance but does anyone else think it's dumn having everything tuned to 5ths bar one exception which means that for every chord shape you have to learn no less than 3 other versions? Now I feel a bit cheated that I didn't start learning in this tuning; it's tough enough learning so many inversions and voicings for chords without this nonesense.
Personally I've just started experimenting with tuning all in 5ths (EADGCF). I'm finding it hard to learn the new chord shapes but it does have some advantages. For instance I love natural harmonics, for every string you can get a major arpeggio from harmonics just by stopping the 5,4 and 3rd frets. EAD give you all the chords you need for A major, GCF gives you all the chords you need for C major. Neat huh? Another advantage is that whillst staying in a given position your fingers can get one note higher in pitch.
There are disadvantages however; if you want to play chords which have more than one duplicated note sometimes the fingerings can become tricky.
Do you guys play in other tunings? What do you think about this?

They open up new doors as far as different chord voicings go, but I dont use them. If I wanna get harmonics around a chord like you said, I fret the chord and tap the harmonics.

And you spelled dumb wrong.

It's a good job dumb just means can't speak, not stupid, otherwise I might feel silly! O.K. maybe I do, a little bit.

Some people have tried different voicings and became proficient in it, Robert FRIPP is to first that springs to mind.
I had the same thought as you when I was 2/3 years into my guitar playing, but having to relearn and transpose everything just seemed too big a task for me.

whoever told you that "Dumb" means only "Without the ability to speak" is wrong. "Dumb" is one of thousands of words in the english dictionary with more than one meaning, and you obviously did not mean "Standard Tuning- Can't speak or what?" you meant "Standard Tuning- Stupid or what?"

Dumb can mean not being able to speak. You know like death/def and dumb. Like you know you can't hear and you can't talk.

Alot of people say mute now, instead of dumb.

True, everything as to be so politically correct or people like EAT you. I mean there are bigger things to be worried about rather than rather if you call a person dumb or a mute. I mean does it really matter which, they can't hear you! (of course unless they read lips)

Even if they had a problem wiht it they probably wouldn't be able to tell you about it.

Exactly survival of the fitteset or what not.

- With regard to Standard Tuning, it's standard for a reason. If it weren't very versatile and useful, it wouldn't be the standard. Chords are incredibly easy with Standard Tuning. Changing the high e to an F makes bar chords hella more difficult. Plain old major/minor/7th

- I've found only three alternate tunings useful so far... The first one is drop D. Most bar/upper register chords are still easy to play, but it's sometimes harder to catch the bass note with bar chords, but you have a bass player for this, so it doesn't really matter. The point is, the drop D can allow a drone for songs in D or a deep bass note for chords with a D in the bass. Too much lower than D and you hvvae to raise your action, the sound becomes muddled, or you might as well play the bass (unless, of course, you're going for the deep, dark metal sound). This tuning also makes power chords a lot easier.
- The second one is dropping the A string to a G, making the tuning, E, G, D, G, B, E. First off, this is an open Em7. Secondly, I was goofing off while wanking during a jam session and came up with a really cool little riff on one string... well, I aded a power chord to the bottom of this riff and it became a sweet rhythm. However it was really hard to play, so I dropped the A to a G and it worked perfectly. Dropping the A to a G is kind of like dropping your E to a D for ease of playing power chords, but you play the powerchords with a root on the A string with this tuning.
- The third and final tuning, perhaps my favorite after standard tuning, is DADGAD. Drop both E strings to a D, and drop the B string to an A. This is an open Dsus4 chord. I've written a couple cool rhythms with this tuning. Some neat tricks - A normal fretted D major chord in standard tuning = a Dm9 in DADGAD. You're playing x, x, 0, 2, 3, 2, which in DADGAD = x, x, D, A, C, E. Another cool thing is not only do complex chords have familiar shapes, but also you can go into some heavy riffage on the bottom three strings which are just like if you were playing in drop d.

After a lot of thought, I decided alternate tunings are cool, but I've learned so much about scale patterns and chords that I need to stay with standard tuning... if I were to switch it would take me years to undo my learning and reprogram myself... I can only solo on single strings in DADGAD :) ... another reason that I pretty much only use standard tuning and DADGAD is that who wants to tune their guitar differently for every song they play? I have three guitars, one electric and one acoustic I keep in Standard tuning, and my other electric I keep in DADGAD. Any mroe tunings and I'd have to go shopping...

Try open D5. Its my favorite alternate tuning and it allows for awsome power chords and cool drones.

Water is wet whether you touch it or not!

You only know its wet if you touch it.

One knows nothing until they sense it. Even then there's questions about the reality of it since anything that is observed passes through one's senses first, making the observation open to human imperfections. Anyway, water has been consistently wet not only for those who have touched it, but also for those who have observed water being touched. It's therefore been declared a scientific fact. Saying water isn't wet until you touch it is like saying a tree that falls in the forest doesn't make any sound unless someone/something is around to hear it. But even that may be true... perhaps when no one is around, trees realize that they don't need to make a sound to hold the reality of mere mortals together (I mean seriously, if you saw something huge falling and hitting the ground but not making a sound, wouldn't that be a bit trippy?) and they therefore convert all the energy of falling and hitting into heat energy rather than sound and that's the cause of forest fires... We need to get rid of those damned trees before they cause any more problems... I stayed up really late last night and go up really early... can you tell?

I`ve experimented with a few different tunings but i prefer the standard tuning

TheDirt, do you have a problem wiht trees?
I like the philosophy aspect of all this, but water being wet is like a programed fact in our minds, placed there by evolution. You'd think all these great philosophers and guru's would have stopped to think about that.
And about trees, they make a sound when they fall wether your there or not, its just hard to imagine stuff happening without us being there to see it.

Dude philosphy is based on knowing that you don't know nothing at all. So science is pretty much bull ****, as far as philosphy goes.

Originally posted by Josh Redstone

And about trees, they make a sound when they fall wether your there or not, its just hard to imagine stuff happening without us being there to see it.

This might seem far out, but a part of philosophy is called Epistemiology, and it teaches you that since you can't prove it (you're not there) there as much chance that it does make a noise or doesn't. (actually, Kant's books are pretty much about this: when you don't experience directly something, you can't proove it exists, but you can't proove the opposite either. Read Criticism of metaphysics to go further in this)
This kind of thinking is used in Zen to be able to focus and reach a state where you are fully aware. And even though it might sound stupid at first, those sentences and way of thoughts have been there for centuries, so don't trash it because you think they're stupid and pointless, because it's WAY deeper than that.

There's actually a physics branch that's called quantum (I don't know if that's the right translation) that's based on the fact that when you want to study a really small phenomenom (inside an atom, for example) your study changes the observation, by throwing photons (what makes light) in there that wouldn't have been there if you didn't watch it. And some quantum paradoxes pretty much relates to those zen questions.

Ain't questions great? :)