[PhilS]

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheOnlyOne /img/forum/go_quote.gif On cables, give me real proof, real facts. TheOnlyOne

Thousands of experienced, intelligent, serious people claim to hear differences. This is a fact. It is worthy of consideration. There is a possibility, of course, that they could all be wrong (although it is is doubtful their observations are wrong in every circumstance), but you cannot just discount these observations completely, unless you are completely dogmatic and close-minded -- and I suspect you are probably in that group (no offense). And assuming you do discount this entirely, there's really not much to talk about.

 

[TheOnlyOne]

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilS /img/forum/go_quote.gif Thousands of experienced, intelligent, serious people claim to hear differences. This is a fact. It is worthy of consideration. There is a possibility, of course, that they could all be wrong (although it is is doubtful their observations are wrong in every circumstance), but you cannot just discount these observations completely, unless you are completely dogmatic and close-minded -- and I suspect you are probably in that group (no offense). And assuming you do discount this entirely, there's really not much to talk about.

Unfortunately, intelligent has nothing to do with being right. People claim many things, but this is an audio forum so I will let the other things lie. Calling someone who is scientific, dogmatic, is much like calling a politician honest, a scientist can be dogmatic and a politician can be honest, but it isn’t likely. Observations are just that, observations, they are not tests.

TheOnlyOne

 

[PhilS]

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheOnlyOne /img/forum/go_quote.gif Unfortunately, intelligent has nothing to do with being right. People claim many things, but this is an audio forum so I will let the other things lie. Calling someone who is scientific, dogmatic, is much like calling a politician honest, a scientist can be dogmatic and a politician can be honest, but it isn’t likely. Observations are just that, observations, they are not tests.

Someone (scientist or not) who says; "I don't care who has reported hearing audible differences, and how many have heard it, and I have never made any observations myself, but I am certain that any such differences do not exist, that such observations are irrelevant, and that everyone who claims to have heard it is being duped" is, IMO, dogmatic. Someone who says, "I have considered the observations, made some of my own, and, in my view, these observations are flawed in certain respects and are outweiged by what I believe the science or technical data shows, and therefore I don't believe cables make a difference based on the current evidence that I have seen" is, IMO, not dogmatic.

 

[TheOnlyOne]

In you job, you should will know how good human observations are, give me the facts after the observations point out that there may be something there. I have not read any scientific peer reviewed papers on cables that show that there should be audio differences.

TheOnlyOne

 

[PhilS]

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheOnlyOne /img/forum/go_quote.gif In you job, you should will know how good human observations are . . .

Sometimes they are pretty good; sometimes they are very inaccurate. But they are admissible and considered as evidence, along with other relevant evidence, by the person or panel trying to determine the facts. You are limiting your evaluation to "scientific peer reviewed papers," and thus confirm my previous point.

 

[TheOnlyOne]

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilS /img/forum/go_quote.gif Sometimes they are pretty good; sometimes they are very inaccurate. But they are admissible and considered as evidence, along with other relevant evidence, by the person or panel trying to determine the facts. You are limiting your evaluation to "scientific peer reviewed papers," and thus confirm my previous point.

Not at all, you are assuming that I have never done testing, that I don’t have ears, and don’t have a human brain. I had do tests and the tests have confirmed that people can fool themselves time and time again. It is only after doing an objective test that the results speak for themselves. And when doing objective tests on cables, people do no better then guessing. And you still haven’t given me any reason to believe that the results would be any different.

TheOnlyOne

 

[PhilS]

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheOnlyOne /img/forum/go_quote.gif It is only after doing an objective test that the results speak for themselves. And when doing objective tests on cables, people do no better then guessing. And you still haven’t given me any reason to believe that the results would be any different.

This is a DBT-free forum. So we really can't delve into that subject here.

 

[TheOnlyOne]

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilS /img/forum/go_quote.gif This is a DBT-free forum. So we really can't delve into that subject here.

No need too, it is already proven.

TheOnlyOne

 

[PhilS]

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheOnlyOne /img/forum/go_quote.gif No need too, it is already proven.

Once again confirming my previous point in post #108; but I'm not going to waste any more time on this.

 

[TheOnlyOne]

I didn't make the limited rules of this forum.

I am still waiting to hear why one wire would sound different from an other wire unless it was messed with by the manufacture by adding inductance and or capacitance. Metal is linear and does not added distortion, dielectric material at audio frequencies means nothing and capacitance and inductance in wire at audio frequencies has no audio affect.

TheOnlyOne

 

[bigshot]

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilS /img/forum/go_quote.gif A hawk just flew by my office window. It's been flying by for several days now and a dozen other people in my office have seen it and commented on it. We believe it actually exists, based on these perceptions.

Are you sure your coworkers and office exist?

See ya
Steve

 

[bigshot]

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilS /img/forum/go_quote.gif Thousands of experienced, intelligent, serious people claim to hear differences.

Thousands of experienced, intelligent, serious people claim to have seen ghosts, been abducted by aliens, seen Elvis at a Burger King, and have the power to read minds. I'm sure there are sane, rational people who believe this stuff. But that doesn't mean that any of that is true. That's why we test our perceptions to determine what is true, and what is a product of fertile imagination.

It isn't a failing in a person to be fooled by his or her perceptions. Everyone is fooled from time to time. It is a failing though, to be arrogant and illogical enough to believe that one's own anecdotal perceptions are more real than tested and verified knowledge.

See ya
Steve

 

[bigshot]

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilS /img/forum/go_quote.gif "I have considered the observations, made some of my own, and, in my view, these observations are flawed in certain respects and are outweiged by what I believe the science or technical data shows, and therefore I don't believe cables make a difference based on the current evidence that I have seen"

You can quote me on that.

See ya
Steve

 

[Steve999]

Quote:

Originally Posted by PhilS /img/forum/go_quote.gif "I have considered the observations, made some of my own, and, in my view, these observations are flawed in certain respects and are outweighed by what I believe the science or technical data shows, and therefore I don't believe cables make a difference based on the current evidence that I have seen."

X2. That is my point of view.

 

[Steve999]

In my view, we do testing to see if someone can reliably tell two sounds apart. Taking multiple tests to establish reliability is part of it. But it's more involved than that -- people are trying to tell if they hear differences even as they never get to hear the same sound in exactly the same way. It's a very complex perceptual task. I first came to grips with it when trying to set the bias on three-head cassette decks by ear. Absolutely infuriating. You have tiny differences in volume influencing you, differences in ideal settings for different music with different frequency content, worrying about frequency response versus distortion versus noise, and heaven help you if there's background noise! It's bafflingly complex until you get an intuitive idea what's going on with your ears and in your head perceptually. The "answer" to the question with cables is perhaps more clear cut, yes, but the subject is no less complex. There is plenty of data to show that if someone makes a minor turn of the head, or shifts their headphones even a little bit, there will be an audible difference in what is perceived by the listener. Thus, the subjectivist who says he hears a difference is often being more accurate and honest than an objectivist who claims to hear no difference and who discounts any anecdote from a subjectivist listener as not credible. The testing comes into play to see at what point someone can tell the difference between two sounds in this highly complex situtuation, a body of knowledge sometimes referred to as "just noticeable differences" for variables like noise, frequency response, and distortion. Then there is a body of knowledge as to what electrical properties in a wire will produce just noticeable differences or greater. The statistics and the electrical engineering theory are both beyond my understanding. At some point I simply did enough reading and research so that I bought into the objectivist point of view. Doing sighted and unsighted listening tests comparing MP3 files that clearly had different data helped to reinforce what I had come to believe over the years.