Full of sound and fury-signifying nothing. That snippet from Macbeth's soliloquy sums up a key argument against car alarms. They go off in the middle of the night with a relentlessness that disturbs even the most hardened urbanite, rousing whole neighborhoods of people from their sleep. Most of the time, these anti-theft devices are triggered not by an attempted break-in, but by a passing rain shower or motorcyclist.

In recent years, the criticism of car alarms has grown more intense. No longer regarded as mere annoyances, they are now viewed as part of a noise pollution problem that threatens our physical and mental health. Alarms are said to not only diminish our sleep but to harm our hearing, cardiovascular and neurological systems and the cognitive development in children.

Health issues aside, the strongest argument made against car alarms may be that they are an ineffective deterrent to theft. Panelists at a forum on "Car Security in New York City," held earlier this year at Fordham University, were briefed on a 1997 analysis of claims indicating that cars with alarms showed "no overall reduction in theft losses compared to cars without alarms." With as many as 99 percent of the alarms going off falsely in the city, most people tend to ignore them, says Harold Takooshian, an associate professor of psychology at Fordham, who reported his own findings at the forum. That's reassuring to thieves, 80 percent of whom are professionals and can disable an alarm system easily in any case.

Owners themselves aren't likely to be too well-disposed toward their cars when alarms go off in the wee hours of the morning. Their sentiments may have influenced automakers, who are shifting from standard installations of audible alarms to passive immobilizing devices such as ignition and fuel-injection cutoffs. Meanwhile, there is growing receptivity by car owners to remote transmitters warning of a break-in and to satellite-tracking systems that assist the recovery of stolen vehicles.

Hostility to car alarms has been growing steadily over the years in New York City, which in 1994 enacted a law (largely ignored by the public and the police) that requires owners to install alarms that automatically shut off in three minutes or face a summons or tow away. Now, the City Council is weighing two bills to further quiet our streets.

One bill, Intro 194, would ban the sale and installation of all audible alarm systems, except those installed by auto manufacturers. A second bill, Intro 448, goes much further-too far, in the Club's opinion-in its zeal to combat noise pollution. It would ban the sale, installation and use of all audible alarm systems, including those installed before the legislation was enacted. This is unfair to those car owners who spent considerable money on an anti-theft device that was not only legal at the time of purchase but actually encouraged through the mechanism of insurance deductions.

As if that wasn't bad enough, Intro 448 also authorizes police officers to issue violations based on nothing more than the written complaint of another resident. This is a wrongheaded and, in all likelihood, legally unsustainable approach to a serious issue; we know of no other state or local law where violations can be issued in such a manner.

The city that "never sleeps" does deserve some peace and quiet late at night. But let's not add the dissonant sound of unreasonableness to our crusade against noise. The City Council should hit the cutoff switch on Intro 448.