There's a lot of odd stuff we're gradually figuring. Also interesting, some of the hair cells in the ear act as amplifiers and you can hook them up to an electrical sound signal and have them dance around:
I suspect the standard explanation for that as given under the youtube video:
> Since the amplitude, and hence the mechanical energy, of airborne sounds is tiny, the cochlea mechanically amplifies the incoming vibrations.
is wrong as it doesn't really make sense from an engineering point of view - if you've already detected the sound to activate the hair cell then that job's done. My theory is they actively damp down the large vibrations so you can pick up the small ones. There's a 10^5 amplitude difference between large and small.