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Science is....not often found in these threads

post #1 of 69
9/24/09 at 11:57pm
Thread Starter 
As someone who does science for a living, I find the quality of discussion in this new sub-forum pretty awful. Science is not fancy equipment, big words, or fancy degrees.

Science is simple. Make a guess about some phenomenon. Do an experiment. Observe. Reject bad guesses. Iterate until it becomes very difficult to reject the guesses.

A child can do science, but many supposedly smart people often get it wrong. The goal is not to achieve sophisticated hypotheses, but to identify the simplest guiding principles that cannot be disproven. The devil is in the details. The best scientists aren't/weren't so unbelievably brilliant as to make conclusions that the rest of the world cannot (else, how could we understand those discoveries?) Rather the best scientists design clever experiments that clearly separate the principle being tested from all the millions of minutia that could confuse things.

As an example, take the cable debacle. This one really blows my mind. Does cable X sound better than cable Y? Maybe. Test it. Good luck nailing down all the variables that can change in the system.

Opinions in here aren't worth the time it takes to read them. Show some data. Have the guts to put your hypothesis out there, test it, and make observations. Share the results with everyone, converge on better ideas.

Just a suggestion.
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post #2 of 69
9/25/09 at 12:02am
Not many people are willing to take the time to do a "proper" comparison. A/B comparisons are the easiest, and while useful, are clearly flawed. I'm guilty too. I'd rather be doing a host of things than blind cable tests.
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post #3 of 69
9/25/09 at 12:17am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Omega View Post
As an example, take the cable debacle. This one really blows my mind. Does cable X sound better than cable Y? Maybe. Test it. Good luck nailing down all the variables that can change in the system.
Science can't answer this.
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post #4 of 69
9/25/09 at 12:36am
Quote:
Originally Posted by robm321 View Post
Science can't answer this.
PRECISELY!

The difference between cables lies somewhere near Russell's teapot
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post #5 of 69
9/25/09 at 12:37am
Well at least in the sound science forum there's a requirement for objective support meaning that murky, purely subjective claims can't be made. Cable X is better than Y because I think so is not a valid argument. Scientific speculation - RMAA shows less than .1 db variation between cables is a reasonable statement even though that person did not sit down and design an experiment to test it.

Good luck getting people to spend the time on an ABX (finding participants, finding equipment, designing the experiment...); educated speculation based on science and past ABX seems to be a reasonable way to come to conclusions without spending hours and hours to resolve every issue.
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post #6 of 69
9/25/09 at 1:33am
Quote:
Originally Posted by robm321 View Post
Science can't answer this.
Yes. Bad choice of words.

Better would be something along the line of "Is cable x audibly distinguishable from cable y?"

k
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post #7 of 69
9/25/09 at 3:07am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Koyaan I. Sqatsi View Post
Yes. Bad choice of words.

Better would be something along the line of "Is cable x audibly distinguishable from cable y?"

k
and by whom.
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post #8 of 69
9/25/09 at 3:28am
Not to be pedantic, here, but we've had excellent contributions from a number of members on topics like cables, but Omega is not one of them, so far as I have seen.

Step up to the plate, scientist. Give it what you got.
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post #9 of 69
9/25/09 at 3:30am
Quote:
Originally Posted by boomana View Post
and by whom.
By whomever.

k
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post #10 of 69
9/25/09 at 3:41am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Omega View Post
As someone who does science for a living, I find the quality of discussion in this new sub-forum pretty awful. Science is not fancy equipment, big words, or fancy degrees.
As someone who also "does science" for a living, I have completely given up here. How do you have a meaningful discussion about the scientific method, experimental design, statistical analysis, and drawing appropriate conclusions with people who:

a) have already pre-decided their conclusions (i.e. cables make audible differences, therefore any experiment that shows otherwise is flawed), and
b) have no basic background at all in the scientific method, experimental design, statistical analysis, etc., yet expect to intelligently discuss and understand these concepts that ordinarly take years of coursework and/or practical experience to grasp
c) even in the face of overwhelming data, will be unable to see that they are incorrect because of cognitive dissonance (i.e. they have spent so much money on exotic cables, they would rather deny the overwhelming evidence than accept the unpleasant thought they they wasted all their hard-earned money.)

Sorry to say, there is no scientific discussion occuring on the "sound science" forum.
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post #11 of 69
9/25/09 at 4:11am
It ain't about science.

It's about making money.
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post #12 of 69
9/25/09 at 4:15am
Quote:
Originally Posted by boomana View Post
and by whom.
Just to make sure I understand what this means, are you saying that if a scientific study concluded that there is no audible difference between two components but only used, let's say, 100 or 1000 subjects, that would be insufficient to show that there is no audible difference, only that those 1000 people couldn't hear it? And if so, does that render every experiment that uses fewer than every person in the world as a subject invalid?
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post #13 of 69
9/25/09 at 8:51am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Omega View Post
As someone who does science for a living, I find the quality of discussion in this new sub-forum pretty awful. Science is not fancy equipment, big words, or fancy degrees.

Science is simple. Make a guess about some phenomenon. Do an experiment. Observe. Reject bad guesses. Iterate until it becomes very difficult to reject the guesses.

A child can do science, but many supposedly smart people often get it wrong. The goal is not to achieve sophisticated hypotheses, but to identify the simplest guiding principles that cannot be disproven. The devil is in the details. The best scientists aren't/weren't so unbelievably brilliant as to make conclusions that the rest of the world cannot (else, how could we understand those discoveries?) Rather the best scientists design clever experiments that clearly separate the principle being tested from all the millions of minutia that could confuse things.

As an example, take the cable debacle. This one really blows my mind. Does cable X sound better than cable Y? Maybe. Test it. Good luck nailing down all the variables that can change in the system.

Opinions in here aren't worth the time it takes to read them. Show some data. Have the guts to put your hypothesis out there, test it, and make observations. Share the results with everyone, converge on better ideas.

Just a suggestion.
Agree that most posts in this forum are a waste of time (including mine), disagree that we should only do our own research ... I know the scientific method, but it is a lot more convenient for me to read what professional scientists have already published than to try and run my own experiment. Even the best experiments people have run here have a very very low sample size. It's just not feasible for anyone on here to create their own ABX trials with enough participants to actually mean something. So instead of running our own small experiments, I think posters in the "sound science" forum should use the secondary data already available. I mean, we are a pretty educated group of people, we have access to university libraries and professional databases, lots of head-fiers should be educating the community by helping find experiments that have already been published.
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post #14 of 69
9/25/09 at 8:54am
Quote:
Originally Posted by SmellyGas View Post
As someone who also "does science" for a living, I have completely given up here. How do you have a meaningful discussion about the scientific method, experimental design, statistical analysis, and drawing appropriate conclusions with people who:

a) have already pre-decided their conclusions (i.e. cables make audible differences, therefore any experiment that shows otherwise is flawed), and
b) have no basic background at all in the scientific method, experimental design, statistical analysis, etc., yet expect to intelligently discuss and understand these concepts that ordinarly take years of coursework and/or practical experience to grasp
c) even in the face of overwhelming data, will be unable to see that they are incorrect because of cognitive dissonance (i.e. they have spent so much money on exotic cables, they would rather deny the overwhelming evidence than accept the unpleasant thought they they wasted all their hard-earned money.)

Sorry to say, there is no scientific discussion occuring on the "sound science" forum.
Lol, this is where I say: "I told you so"

I found out long ago that this forums are no science forums. It can be frustrating to try and explain something here. It is also not worth anyone's time to try and explain something that requires some time to understand, but well, at least you tried.

SO this forums could be called pseudo-science with subjective intrusions. You just have to check one thread where the OP asks for "skeptics" point of view on something, and the first 2 pages were from "believers" who answered the contrary of what he was asking or just spitting out there thoughts.

You need not worry, there is another site (hydrogenaudio) with some interesting threads.
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post #15 of 69
9/25/09 at 11:09am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by robm321 View Post
Science can't answer this.
1. I never said it would.
2. Why not? Don't have to PROVE anything, just have to demonstrate beyond all reasonable doubt that there is a measurable or perceivable difference in some part of an audio system, that can be caused by cables. Low bar to pass--only have to show that cables are sufficient to make a difference, no burden to prove necessity.
3. I retract my #2, because I have no desire to enter a debate on philosophy of science on the internet. Go ahead if you want to, I guess.
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