[mmerrill99]

@Broko, in writing a reply post to Gregorio I realised where most of the friction might be coming from & I wanted to clarify something with you
"Finally "magic" Vs "mysteries" I have never used the word "magic" but I do find auditory perception both fascinating & mysterious. I do understand that there are lots of unanswered questions & aspects yetto be worked out about it's processing. Given this, I am of the opinion that our measurements are not sophisticated enough to map to our perceptions. Now this is maybe where I differ from the body of posters here & where the friction comes from - if every time I raise an issue someone say well show me the measurements to prove it, then this becomes fractious. Broko stated "actually use this section for the reason it is here - to actually delve into the true science (known and unknown) about audio. By doing this everyone might learn something" If in this section we can't discuss what's unknown about sound science (which to me includes auditory perception) then I obviously misinterpreted the section title."

Can I ask - is this section just for the "known" science i.e those that have "proof" or is it an area for also discussing what we don't know?

Edit: Your example of my point as obfuscating & gaoding & off the point I would like to respond to. When i stated exactly what you just did that time was an inherent part of sound & not just amplitude & frequency, I was told that frequency involves time - this to me is obfuscating & off the point - we get it again in Gregorio's last post. So I believe you are misrepresenting me in that quoted text - I already gave pretty much the same explanation as you but was answered with "frequency contains time" as if my point was somehow stupid or moot. I gave the simple example that I did as my explanation obviously failed to be read or understood.

 

[ralphp@optonline]

@Broko, in writing a reply post to Gregorio I realised where most of the friction might be coming from & I wanted to clarify something with you
"Finally "magic" Vs "mysteries" I have never used the word "magic" but I do find auditory perception both fascinating & mysterious. I do understand that there are lots of unanswered questions & aspects yetto be worked out about it's processing. Given this, I am of the opinion that our measurements are not sophisticated enough to map to our perceptions. Now this is maybe where I differ from the body of posters here & where the friction comes from - if every time I raise an issue someone say well show me the measurements to prove it, then this becomes fractious. Broko stated "actually use this section for the reason it is here - to actually delve into the true science (known and unknown) about audio. By doing this everyone might learn something" If in this section we can't discuss what's unknown about sound science (which to me includes auditory perception) then I obviously misinterpreted the section title."

Can I ask - is this section just for the "known" science i.e those that have "proof" or is it an area for also discussing what we don't know?

What I see as creating friction is that you often confuse the electrical/equipment side of reproduced audio with what is happening after the sound leaves the speakers. What happens between the speakers and the listener is filled with all the issues that you like to discuss and if you limited the discussion to that area few of the posters would argue since many of the features of auditory perception are no well understood. It's only when you hint that perhaps these effects are caused by some mysterious change to the electrical/equipment side of the audio chain.
 
Music can sound flat and lifeless because of poor treble response and poor treble response is not something that can be corrected with a new cable. Look all of us know that different combinations of equipment can often times produce very different results but we also know that two pieces of equipment that measure the same will sound basically the same.
 
Limit your discussions to the listener/loudspeaker side and hopefully we can all move forward.

 

[pctazhp]

@Broko. I started reading this thread this morning and was getting a painful headache. I'm a lawyer - not an engineer or scientist, so admittedly I don't understand a lot of the science involved. But your analysis of what was wrong with the discussion here was absolutely brilliant. It immediately cured my headache and I thank you for that.
 
I know my understanding of this discussion is grossly overly simplistic. But from what I think I understand, the components (amplitude and frequency) of a waveform is well understood and can be measured far beyond the limits of the ability of human hearing. But the science of what happens between the ears and the portion of the brain that gives rise to perception has a long way to go. If I listen sighted to two different systems that produce the same sound wave that reaches my ear but prefer one over the other, then my preference is based on something happening between my ears and my brain - not a difference in how the two systems convert the source waveform to the sound wave reaching my ears. There is no "magic" in the design of one system over the other, with the exception of the comparative cosmetics of the two systems or what I might have read of others perceptions of the two systems, or some other factor external to the actual design and performance of the two systems.
 
I don't see how the lack of scientific understanding of what happens between the ears and the brain could ever be used to justify the validity of sighted tests. Ergo, I really don't understand most of what @mmerrill99 is talking about.
 
I do need to say that personally, in my choice of components, I am a total subjectivist. I chose what sounds good to me and don't worry much about the science involved. Nor does what I have written above prevent me from discussing my subjective preferences in other appropriate forums.

 

[pctazhp]

 
What I see as creating friction is that you often confuse the electrical/equipment side of reproduced audio with what is happening after the sound leaves the speakers. What happens between the speakers and the listener is filled with all the issues that you like to discuss and if you limited the discussion to that area few of the posters would argue since many of the features of auditory perception are no well understood. It's only when you hint that perhaps these effects are caused by some mysterious change to the electrical/equipment side of the audio chain.
 
Music can sound flat and lifeless because of poor treble response and poor treble response is not something that can be corrected with a new cable. Look all of us know that different combinations of equipment can often times produce very different results but we also know that two pieces of equipment that measure the same will sound basically the same.
 
Limit your discussions to the listener/loudspeaker side and hopefully we can all move forward.

You just said what I was thinking, only you said it much better )))

 

[mmerrill99]

@Broko, in writing a reply post to Gregorio I realised where most of the friction might be coming from

What I see as creating friction is that you often confuse the electrical/equipment side of reproduced audio with what is happening after the sound leaves the speakers. What happens between the speakers and the listener is filled with all the issues that you like to discuss and if you limited the discussion to that area few of the posters would argue since many of the features of auditory perception are no well understood. It's only when you hint that perhaps these effects are caused by some mysterious change to the electrical/equipment side of the audio chain.

That's reasonable but let me explain my position. The reason that we are all involved in this audio hobby is for the joy that it gives. We know that audio playback is an illusion & isn't a faithful capturing of the "real" live event (let's not talk about studio recreations as it only adds confusion). There are limitations to how realistic an illusion can be created with the technology & recording methods but we have lived with stereo for decades & it has fulfilled enough of our requirements that it has survived. Given this I believe that there are differences between systems in how realistic an illusion is portrayed. The final arbiter in judging this "realism" is our auditory perception & I believe, how closely the reproduced sound comes to our expectation of the "realistic" sound (I'm using "real" & "realism" here to mean the stored models & rules that are used by auditory perception in interpreting the signals). So in other words, if a reproduced sound ticks more of the psychoacoustic boxes, it will be considered more "realistic" than one which doesn't. Here's the rub - we don't know all the boxes that can be ticked so I'm leaving room for the possibility that better understanding of what these boxes are can feed back into how we capture & reproduce music to give us a more involving/realistic illusion & experience. Once we know what is important to auditory perception we can devise measurements to analyse audio reproduction & check how well it satisfies these checkbox requirements for "realism"

You seem to want to limit this section/(my discussion) to electrical measurement/equipment - I'm coming at the issue from the other aspect - the goal of the whole hobby - to create the most realistic auditory illusion.

Music can sound flat and lifeless because of poor treble response and poor treble response is not something that can be corrected with a new cable. Look all of us know that different combinations of equipment can often times produce very different results but we also know that two pieces of equipment that measure the same will sound basically the same.

Limit your discussions to the listener/loudspeaker side and hopefully we can all move forward.

The example of Krismusic is a good one & if you can do the measurements to show why the Apple iPhone 6 sounds flat & the Onyko amp+DAC sounds more musical when both us ethe same IEMs I would be interested. I believe you are assuming it's a HF issue but surely this would have been shown to be an issue before now - those IEMs are used with iPhone 6's by a number of people. It would be good to see those measurements - as I said before, in another thread on USB cables - it would be good for people to audition one of these & then measure it instead of making assumptions.

 

[gregorio]

Can I restate a central point again "I'm suggesting the same understanding be applied to auditory perception - understanding the interpretation processes of this sense."

 
I have no problem with this, except that: 1. Understanding the process of auditory perception requires more than just the understanding of this one sense (hearing) and 2. We're not going to get very far in discussing interpretation processes and auditory perception if you insist that the auditory perceptions we are talking about are not in fact auditory perceptions but reality.
 
 

[1] I think you are mixing up the "art" of the recording engineer with the actual recording. [2] If I can go back to the example I gave castle, David Greisinger has done recordings using in ear microphones & without any manipulation of these recordings has proclaimed that they are scarily realistic when played back with IEMs.

 
1. I don't understand what you're saying. You seem to be saying that I'm confusing Michelangelo's art with the actual Mona Lisa painting, which makes no sense to me.
 
2. As far as I'm aware, David Griesinger developed his own mics and placed them inside a dummy head complete with models of his own pinna. How much more "manipulation" could there be? If we just took any two mics, placed them anywhere, recorded their output without any balancing or panning, would David Griesinger (or anyone else) proclaim the result as "scarily realistic"? Are you saying that manipulation by the recording engineer doesn't count and that only manipulation by the mix engineer is really manipulation? I can't grasp your logic or your understanding/interpretation of the facts which has lead you to that logic.
 

Nowehere did I ever state that "characteristics of the signal" equal loudeness

 
Now you're playing semantics! You stated "But loudness is not in one's imagination - it is based on characteristics within the signal.". It is not, loudness is based on one's imagination. It's ONLY by applying imagination (human perception) to the signal that we can arrive at a determination of loudness. Without imagination (human perception) there is no loudness.
 

Stating with the McGurk effect that "what we hear is unrelated to the actual soundwaves" is incorrect - we only hear variations of Ba or Fa or Ga - we don't hear Hi or Fi - so the actual soundwave characteristic is instrumental in what we perceive.

 
No it's not! Regardless of whether we hear Fa, HiFi or anything else, the fact is that we are hearing something different between two sets of soundwaves. Where does this difference come from, it's obviously nothing to do with any characteristics of the soundwaves themselves, as the characteristics of both sets of soundwaves are identical, it's the same set of soundwaves!
 
G

 

[ralphp@optonline]

  @Broko. I started reading this thread this morning and was getting a painful headache. I'm a lawyer - not an engineer or scientist, so admittedly I don't understand a lot of the science involved. But your analysis of what was wrong with the discussion here was absolutely brilliant. It immediately cured my headache and I thank you for that.
 
I know my understanding of this discussion is grossly overly simplistic. But from what I think I understand, the components (amplitude and frequency) of a waveform is well understood and can be measured far beyond the limits of the ability of human hearing. But the science of what happens between the ears and the portion of the brain that gives rise to perception has a long way to go. If I listen sighted to two different systems that produce the same sound wave that reaches my ear but prefer one over the other, then my preference is based on something happening between my ears and my brain - not a difference in how the two systems convert the source waveform to the sound wave reaching my ears. There is no "magic" in the design of one system over the other, with the exception of the comparative cosmetics of the two systems or what I might have read of others perceptions of the two systems, or some other factor external to the actual design and performance of the two systems.
 
I don't see how the lack of scientific understanding of what happens between the ears and the brain could ever be used to justify the validity of sighted tests. Ergo, I really don't understand most of what @mmerrill99 is talking about.
 
I do need to say that personally, in my choice of components, I am a total subjectivist. I chose what sounds good to me and don't worry much about the science involved. Nor does what I have written above prevent me from discussing my subjective preferences in other appropriate forums.

There is nothing wrong with being, as you call it, "a total subjectivist" or with discussing subjective preferences (where appropriate) so long one fully understands the subjective nature of it all. it's when purely subjective observations are mistaken for objective observations.
 

  You just said what I was thinking, only you said it much better )))

Thank you! I really appreciate the feedback. More importantly let's hope that all this air clearing and soul searching leads to a better forum with more exchanging of ideas and information and less flame wars.

 

[pctazhp]

You seem to want to limit this section/(my discussion) to electrical measurement/equipment - I'm coming at the issue from the other aspect - the goal of the whole hobby - to create the most realistic auditory illusion.
 

 
Of course we all want the most realistic (or pleasant) auditory illusion. But the soundwaves that reach our ears are what they are (amplitude and frequency). Are you suggesting that there is some component of the soundwaves and waveforms we have not discovered or been unable to measure that could explain why two systems that produce the exact same measured soundwaves at the ears might in reality sound different?

 

[mmerrill99]

@Broko. I started reading this thread this morning and was getting a painful headache. I'm a lawyer - not an engineer or scientist, so admittedly I don't understand a lot of the science involved. But your analysis of what was wrong with the discussion here was absolutely brilliant. It immediately cured my headache and I thank you for that.

I know my understanding of this discussion is grossly overly simplistic. But from what I think I understand, the components (amplitude and frequency) of a waveform is well understood and can be measured far beyond the limits of the ability of human hearing. But the science of what happens between the ears and the portion of the brain that gives rise to perception has a long way to go. If I listen sighted to two different systems that produce the same sound wave that reaches my ear but prefer one over the other, then my preference is based on something happening between my ears and my brain - not a difference in how the two systems convert the source waveform to the sound wave reaching my ears. There is no "magic" in the design of one system over the other, with the exception of the comparative cosmetics of the two systems or what I might have read of others perceptions of the two systems, or some other factor external to the actual design and performance of the two systems.

What you state makes perfect sense but can I just outline a couple of things:
- Not just amplitude & frequency are important, time is a hugely important factor & one that has much larger importance to auditory perception. I mentioned this before - in silent movies the number of frames recorded per second (& hence played back per second) often fluctuated because the recording device speed was manually cranked. People were happy with the movie. When "talkies" were introduced people were no longer happy with the fluctuating playback, not just because the frequencies changed but because the tempo was varying.
- Here's the crucial point - how do you know that two waveforms that reach your ear are exactly the same? The choice of measurements (what's not being measured) & the analysis of these measurements need to be carefully looked at. So what set of measurements is need to fully characterise the waveform? This is not an agreed set - just look at Schiit's piece on the measurements that are run on audio equipment & look towards the bottom of the list where there's unexpected "stuff" which can be where the differences are discovered
- Now if you measure two different devices there will always be differences, ALWAYS, even between two devices in the same batch. You can never say they are exactly the same. So the analysis/interpretation of these measurements relies on the criteria of what is audible. This also is not fully defined or not fully understood.
- so there are many pitfalls in stating that " two different systems that produce the same sound wave that reaches my ear but prefer one over the other, then my preference is based on something happening between my ears and my brain - not a difference in how the two systems convert the source waveform to the sound wave reaching my ears." I know it sounds like a very logical & easy to understand statement but there is complexity hidden in that statement

I don't see how the lack of scientific understanding of what happens between the ears and the brain could ever be used to justify the validity of sighted tests. Ergo, I really don't understand most of what @mmerrill99
 is talking about.

I do need to say that personally, in my choice of components, I am a total subjectivist. I chose what sounds good to me and don't worry much about the science involved. Nor does what I have written above prevent me from discussing my subjective preferences in other appropriate forums.

I don't want to get back into sighted listening Vs blind tests but just to say that formal blind testing, I have absolutely no problem with because it controls the many variables necessary for such testing Forum-style blind tests are mostly not, IMO, worthwhile & given the choice of forum-style blind tests Vs sighted test I will go with sighted listening

 

[ralphp@optonline]

That's reasonable but let me explain my position. The reason that we are all involved in this audio hobby is for the joy that it gives. We know that audio playback is an illusion & isn't a faithful capturing of the "real" live event (let's not talk about studio recreations as it only adds confusion). There are limitations to how realistic an illusion can be created with the technology & recording methods but we have lived with stereo for decades & it has fulfilled enough of our requirements that it has survived. Given this I believe that there are differences between systems in how realistic an illusion is portrayed. The final arbiter in judging this "realism" is our auditory perception & I believe, how closely the reproduced sound comes to our expectation of the "realistic" sound (I'm using "real" & "realism" here to mean the stored models & rules that are used by auditory perception in interpreting the signals). So in other words, if a reproduced sound ticks more of the psychoacoustic boxes, it will be considered more "realistic" than one which doesn't. Here's the rub - we don't know all the boxes that can be ticked so I'm leaving room for the possibility that better understanding of what these boxes are can feed back into how we capture & reproduce music to give us a more involving/realistic illusion & experience. Once we know what is important to auditory perception we can devise measurements to analyse audio reproduction & check how well it satisfies these checkbox requirements for "realism"

You seem to want to limit this section/(my discussion) to electrical measurement/equipment - I'm coming at the issue from the other aspect - the goal of the whole hobby - to create the most realistic auditory illusion.
The example of Krismusic is a good one & if you can do the measurements to show why the Apple iPhone 6 sounds flat & the Onyko amp+DAC sounds more musical when both us ethe same IEMs I would be interested. I believe you are assuming it's a HF issue but surely this would have been shown to be an issue before now - those IEMs are used with iPhone 6's by a number of people. It would be good to see those measurements - as I said before, in another thread on USB cables - it would be good for people to audition one of these & then measure it instead of making assumptions.

I do agree with the a lot of the points in your first paragraph and I also see this line of reasoning as leading to another possibility - one where we, as listeners, always know that we are listening to construct of a musical event and not the actual musical event. Even today's best, state of the art, cutting edge audio system reproducing a construct of a musical event cannot equal a real, live musical event simply because the live musical event does not need to be recreated. Think of the spectacular failure of 3D HDTVs - people were never "fooled" by 3D but rather, only annoyed. A similar "failure", but on a much smaller scale, would that of multi-channel audio and a discussion of that failure might turn out to be quite informative.
 
As for the second paragraph you are leaving out the fact that what is under discussion is not how different people like or dislike the iPhone 6s with the same set of earphones but rather how one person prefers the sound of the iPhone->Onkyo amp/DAC-> earphones over the sound of just the iPhone->earphones. There are several different and important electrical characteristics of the iPhone-earphone interface versus the iPhone->Onkyo amp/DAC-> earphones interface that quite easily explain the sonic differences. And again this is different from one person preferring the sound of the iPhone->earphones over that of iPhone->Onkyo amp/DAC-> earphones.

 

[SoundAndMotion]

One source of confusion in this thread is the mixing of different definitions of perception, or to perceive:
 
perceive
1.
to become aware of, know, or identify by means of the senses:
I perceived an object looming through the mist.
2.
to recognize, discern, envision, or understand:
I perceive a note of sarcasm in your voice. This is a nice idea but I perceive difficulties in putting it into practice.
 
When we talk about perception in the context of this thread, we mean the first one. Don’t mix it with the second one!
 
Quote:

  You stated "But loudness is not in one's imagination - it is based on characteristics within the signal.". It is not, loudness is based on one's imagination. It's ONLY by applying imagination (human perception) to the signal that we can arrive at a determination of loudness. Without imagination (human perception) there is no loudness.
 
 
No it's not! Regardless of whether we hear Fa, HiFi or anything else, the fact is that we are hearing something different between two sets of soundwaves. Where does this difference come from, it's obviously nothing to do with any characteristics of the soundwaves themselves, as the characteristics of both sets of soundwaves are identical, it's the same set of soundwaves!

 
You seem to have mixed up the two definitions! Loudness is not based on imagination and IS based on characteristics of the sound waves. And what we hear during the McGurk Effect DOES depend on the sound waves (but also the visual stream). Only certain differences are possible; it is language dependent; and the auditory signal plays a central role. NO visual stimulus will make "ba" "fa" or "ga" sound like "elephant"

 

[pctazhp]

What you state makes perfect sense but can I just outline a couple of things:
- Not just amplitude & frequency are important, time is a hugely important factor & one that has much larger importance to auditory perception. I mentioned this before - in silent movies the number of frames recorded per second (& hence played back per second) often fluctuated because the recording device speed was manually cranked. People were happy with the movie. When "talkies" were introduced people were no longer happy with the fluctuating playback, not just because the frequencies changed but because the tempo was varying.
- Here's the crucial point - how do you know that two waveforms that reach your ear are exactly the same? The choice of measurements (what's not being measured) & the analysis of these measurements need to be carefully looked at. So what set of measurements is need to fully characterise the waveform? This is not an agreed set - just look at Schiit's piece on the measurements that are run on audio equipment & look towards the bottom of the list where there's unexpected "stuff" which can be where the differences are discovered
- Now if you measure two different devices there will always be differences, ALWAYS, even between two devices in the same batch. You can never say they are exactly the same. So the analysis/interpretation of these measurements relies on the criteria of what is audible. This also is not fully defined or not fully understood.
- so there are many pitfalls in stating that " two different systems that produce the same sound wave that reaches my ear but prefer one over the other, then my preference is based on something happening between my ears and my brain - not a difference in how the two systems convert the source waveform to the sound wave reaching my ears." I know it sounds like a very logical & easy to understand statement but there is complexity hidden in that statement
I don't want to get back into sighted listening Vs blind tests but just to say that formal blind testing, I have absolutely no problem with because it controls the many variables necessary for such testing Forum-style blind tests are mostly not, IMO, worthwhile & given the choice of forum-style blind tests Vs sighted test I will go with sighted listening

Then I assume you believe that the accuracy of our current measurement techniques is not adequate to measure differences that could be detected within the range of human hearing ability. I seriously doubt that is correct. Please correct me if I am wrong.
 
I just don't understand your point about time as a separate component of waveforms. Perhaps I am missing something, but I understand time to be inherent in frequency.
 
I agree that many "blind" tests may not be done under control conditions that are scientifically justifiable. But there is a mountain of reported information that seems to suggest that sighted tests are inherently unreliable: http://www.head-fi.org/t/486598/testing-audiophile-claims-and-myths. I am unaware of a single double blind test that has supported the validity of sighted tests or comparisons. Again, please correct me if I am wrong.
 
The right side of my brain would love to learn that there is some heretofore undiscovered scientifically based reason why two different systems that measure the same using our current technology in reality are different. Somehow I guess that would justify my decades of subjective audio choices. But the pesky left side of my brain just won't keep quiet.

 

[mmerrill99]

Can I restate a central point again "I'm suggesting the same understanding be applied to auditory perception - understanding the interpretation processes of this sense."

I have no problem with this, except that: 1. Understanding the process of auditory perception requires more than just the understanding of this one sense (hearing) and 2. We're not going to get very far in discussing interpretation processes and auditory perception if you insist that the auditory perceptions we are talking about are not in fact auditory perceptions but reality.

I'm getting tired answering the same things over & over - first I thought we dealt with "reality" already? We are both in agreement about what perception is - it's an interpretation - we don't need to go back over this, do we?
Sure there is a bigger picture to the understanding of auditory perception I'm not disputing that but the understanding of visual perception is far more advanced than understanding the processes involved in auditory perception so are you saying that auditory perception is not amenable to research/analysis?

[1] I think you are mixing up the "art" of the recording engineer with the actual recording. [2] If I can go back to the example I gave castle, David Greisinger has done recordings using in ear microphones

1. I don't understand what you're saying. You seem to be saying that I'm confusing Michelangelo's art with the actual Mona Lisa painting, which makes no sense to me.

The "art" is in the skill & experience of the record engineer/producer to manipulate the sound to achieve their concept which I presume is something the band also like. You are a recording engineer - you can tell the "art" of production better than I.

2. As far as I'm aware, David Griesinger developed his own mics and placed them inside a dummy head complete with models of his own pinna. How much more "manipulation" could there be? If we just took any two mics, placed them anywhere, recorded their output without any balancing or panning, would David Griesinger (or anyone else) proclaim the result as "scarily realistic"? Are you saying that manipulation by the recording engineer doesn't count and that only manipulation by the mix engineer is really manipulation? I can't grasp your logic or your understanding/interpretation of the facts which has lead you to that logic.

He did actual in ear microphone recordings also. The point I'm making is that listening to an orchestra performing live or a solo guitarist in a room requires no manipulation to achieve soundstage. What Gresinger is doing is as close to this live as is possible & there is no manipulation & there is a scarrily real soundstage, just like live listening (obviously within limits of head movement, etc)

Nowehere did I ever state that "characteristics of the signal" equal loudeness

Now you're playing semantics! You stated "But loudness is not in one's imagination - it is based on characteristics within the signal.". It is not, loudness is based on one's imagination. It's ONLY by applying imagination (human perception) to the signal that we can arrive at a determination of loudness. Without imagination (human perception) there is no loudness.

You can't play fast & loose with words & try to make them mean whatever you decide "imagination" IS NOT human perception - ask any cognitive scientist

Stating with the McGurk effect that "what we hear is unrelated to the actual soundwaves" is incorrect - we only hear variations of Ba or Fa or Ga - we don't hear Hi or Fi - so the actual soundwave characteristic is instrumental in what we perceive.

No it's not! Regardless of whether we hear Fa, HiFi or anything else, the fact is that we are hearing something different between two sets of soundwaves. Where does this difference come from, it's obviously nothing to do with any characteristics of the soundwaves themselves, as the characteristics of both sets of soundwaves are identical, it's the same set of soundwaves!

G

You cited the McGurk effect as an example that "These auditory perceptions arise from the brain, which usually have relatively little to do with the vibration of the air molecules on the ear drum and sometimes have absolutely nothing to do with those vibrations." & in answer to the wider point that I stated about the unknowns of auditory processing.

I don't think there's anything to be gained by discussing this further - I still maintain that what we hear is directed by the signals arriving via the tympanic membrane. Of course there are auditory illusions, just as there are visual illusions but they don't define how we hear - they are very much the exceptions - the McGurk effect is a particular example of how in speech processing that auditory perception uses visual cues to decide on the most likely interpretation of the signal but it is still interpreting a signal. Just like the recent example posted that we also use our skin as an input for interpreting what we hear - the "p" generates a puff of wind from the mouth that we can pick up on in our interpretation of the aural signal.

 

[pctazhp]

By the way, I'm aware that the debate over sighted listening has been going on for decades and started long before the internet. The same arguments are still raging today as they were 40 years ago and the same things are being said over and over by both sides. Unfortunately, these discussions almost invariably seem to degenerate into flame wars with each side talking past the other. I'm not trying to stoke any fires. Just been trying to clear my brain so I can get on with my day ))))

 

[mmerrill99]

That's reasonable but let me explain my position. The reason that we are all involved in this audio hobby is for the joy that it gives. We know that audio playback is an illusion

I do agree with the a lot of the points in your first paragraph and I also see this line of reasoning as leading to another possibility - one where we, as listeners, always know that we are listening to construct of a musical event and not the actual musical event. Even today's best, state of the art, cutting edge audio system reproducing a construct of a musical event cannot equal a real, live musical event simply because the live musical event does not need to be recreated. Think of the spectacular failure of 3D HDTVs - people were never "fooled" by 3D but rather, only annoyed. A similar "failure", but on a much smaller scale, would that of multi-channel audio and a discussion of that failure might turn out to be quite informative.

yes, we are only talking about stereo system & it's limitations do come into consideration in the "illusion" effect

As for the second paragraph you are leaving out the fact that what is under discussion is not how different people like or dislike the iPhone 6s with the same set of earphones but rather how one person prefers the sound of the iPhone->Onkyo amp/DAC-> earphones over the sound of just the iPhone->earphones. There are several different and important electrical characteristics of the iPhone-earphone interface versus the iPhone->Onkyo amp/DAC-> earphones interface that quite easily explain the sonic differences. And again this is different from one person preferring the sound of the iPhone->earphones over that of iPhone->Onkyo amp/DAC-> earphones.

Indeed, preference & perception need careful differentiation. His reporting of "more musical" & "less thin" for the Onyko Vs the iPhones "flat & thin" to me isn't just preference - he's naming perceptual qualities & not just "I like the Onyko more than the iPhone". You may be correct that there are measureable & easily explained differences in the waveform that comes out of the IEM which I would like to see.