I agree that counting any bird that is heard only for your life list is uncommon--at least based on my personal experience. But every birder I know counts heard only birds for every other type of list--year, state, county, big day, big year, etc. And I expect a lot of birders, at least in the U.S., will count some birds that are heard only for their life lists, e.g. owls, nightjars, and/or rails.I'm not sure I've ever had a birder say to me that they 'count' birds heard only. I know a lot of birders including two of the top ten world listers. Now I have to admit it's not a conversation I've had often, and I've never had it with the two birders in question, so maybe people do but, if so, they don't seem to broadcast the fact.
But with the advent of eBird, I expect ticking any heard only bird for your life list will become more common. eBird is a citizen science platform, and how you personally encounter a bird is irrelevant to the science, so eBird doesn't distinguish heard only from visual ticks when it generates your life list. So the point of distinguishing the two is probably going to seem more and more quaint to birders who grow up with eBird. I know I no longer make the distinction for listing purposes (though I started birding many decades before eBird)--so you can now say you have "met" one such birder.
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