[tmars78]

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Many of the psychoacoustic related phenomena are not measurable. For example, perceived frequency balance is level dependent, playing louder makes you hear more bass (compared to mid frequencies) but this you cannot measure with a microphone. Missing fundamental -effect is another example. If you have a harmonic series of pitches, e.g. 200Hz, 300Hz, 400Hz,.. with appropriate gains, you can actually hear the 'missing' fundamental, 100 Hz in this case. That you cannot measure either. You can google 'psychoacoustics' for more examples. 

That's not quite true. Ever been to a DB drag event? The louder my volume, the more SPL the stereo outputs...so you can measure that. Its not perceived to be louder, it actually is. I could be totally off in how I am thinking of it though. 

 

[InnerSpace]

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hearing is measuring

Yes, it is, in a way.  And seeing is measuring, too, I suppose.  But both "measure" rather crudely with a high baseline threshold.  An electron microscope can "measure" better than the human eye.  Lab gear can "measure" better than the human ear.  Bottom line: you can't hear things that can't be measured, but you can measure things that can't be heard.

 

[binson]

Quote:

example, perceived frequency balance is level dependent, playing louder makes you hear more bass (compared to mid frequencies) but this you cannot 


That's not quite true. Ever been to a DB drag event? The louder my volume, the more SPL the stereo outputs...so you can measure that. Its not perceived to be louder, it actually is. I could be totally off in how I am thinking of it though. 

 
Yes, you are right about SPL level getting higher when you turn up the volume. And certainly, you can measure this. But, when you increase the volume, the lowest frequencies, and also the highest frequencies, in music are perceived to get louder than the mid frequencies. This you can easily hear, but it does not show in measurements. The opposite happens when you turn down the volume. This phenomena is the reason for inventing the Loudness -button. When you play your music at low volumes, the bass sounds really thin and the highs are missing. The Loudness-effect tries to compensate for this by boosting the bass and the treble.
 
You can read more on this, for example, in here. 
 
 

 

[binson]

 
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Quote:

hearing is measuring

Yes, it is, in a way.  And seeing is measuring, too, I suppose.  But both "measure" rather crudely with a high baseline threshold.  An electron microscope can "measure" better than the human eye.  Lab gear can "measure" better than the human ear.  Bottom line: you can't hear things that can't be measured, but you can measure things that can't be heard.

 
Hearing is measuring, in one sense. But, sound perception is not the direct outcome of this 'ear measurement'. Your brain makes hard work trying to make some sense out of this measurement data. Your brain has spend years on learning to interpret this data, and whenever you listen to something the brain tries to make the most logical decision based on the data it has available (hearing, seeing, feeling, knowing, expecting,...). If you reduce these 'info channels', which actually happens with headphone listening, then it's quite easy to fool your brain to hear things that doesn't exist.
 
Good example is that if you are a regular hat user and you put on your hat while listening to something the sound doesn't change, because your brain has learned to adapt to this change. With a microphone you can easily measure this.
 
Another, different, example is that if you have a series of harmonic pitches, e.g., 200Hz, 300Hz, 400Hz,...,  with appropriate gains, you can hear the (non-existent) 100Hz frequency. This is called a 'missing fundamental' -phenomenon. If you know what kind of data ear outputs, and brain being used to that many sounds have a periodic series of pitch components, this is actually quite logical interpretation of the data.
 
So, the bottom line is that you can hear things that can't be measured, and you can also measure things that can't be heard.
 
 

 

[InnerSpace]

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... the bottom line is that you can hear things that can't be measured ...
 
 

I don't agree.  Whatever your learned or psychoacoustic interpretation, you are reacting to sound waves physically present in the air.  Those can be measured and described mathematically with great accuracy.  If you later hear a difference - e.g. a louder phantom fundamental - either the sound waves have changed (and their new configuration can be measured and described) or they haven't (in which case you're imagining the difference.)  Your ear is a crude gauge compared to modern instrumentation, therefore differences well below the threshold of human discrimination can be measured, i.e. you can measure things that can't be heard, but you can't hear things that can't be measured.

 

[EthanWiner]

^^^ Absolutely, which is why I generally stick to discussing actual measurements as related to assessing fidelity - faithfulness to the source. When people start talking about preference I lose interest, because there can be no definitive answer.
 
--Ethan

 

[Happy Camper]

Quote:

^^^ Absolutely, which is why I generally stick to discussing actual measurements as related to assessing fidelity - faithfulness to the source. When people start talking about preference I lose interest, because there can be no definitive answer.
 
--Ethan

Sure there is, we're right and they're wrong.

 

[Prog Rock Man]

You only hear things that cannot be measured when your brain 'changes' the sound based on other factors, such as placebo. The actual signal as it arrives at your ear can be measured so that you know what you should be hearing and if one signal is the same as another.

 

[Justin Uthadude]

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Bottom line: you can't hear things that can't be measured, but you can measure things that can't be heard.

 
I agree with you. But, do you think it's possible that you can hear things that we don't know how to measure yet?
 

 

[InnerSpace]

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... do you think it's possible that you can hear things that we don't know how to measure yet?
 

My assumption is that audible effects might stem from things that aren't routinely measured at the moment.  In theory I suppose there are a million and one parameters that could be measured.  I suppose we know how to measure them, but we simply don't bother.  One or more of them might prove important.

 

[rroseperry]

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Quote:

... do you think it's possible that you can hear things that we don't know how to measure yet?
 

My assumption is that audible effects might stem from things that aren't routinely measured at the moment.  In theory I suppose there are a million and one parameters that could be measured.  I suppose we know how to measure them, but we simply don't bother.  One or more of them might prove important.

But audible effects, at least before they go into the brain are just physics. Are people saying that the tympanum-bone-cochlea set up of our ears is somehow more sensitive than microphones and other recording devices?  I gotta say that seems improbable.

 

[InnerSpace]

Quote:

But audible effects, at least before they go into the brain are just physics. Are people saying that the tympanum-bone-cochlea set up of our ears is somehow more sensitive than microphones and other recording devices?  I gotta say that seems improbable.

Well, it doesn't matter whether or not our ears are more sensitive than microphones and recording devices, because (in this context) all we can listen to is the product of microphones and recording devices, so it's a moot point.  (And, e.g. the human eye is more sensitive than a camera, right?  But vision in humans seems more acute than hearing, agreed.)
 
But my point was, is our current menu of tests adequately exhaustive?  Is there a parameter not yet routinely measured that might be influential?  E.g. way back, no one measured for IMD, yet its importance was eventually recognized.  Are there other things we don't measure right now that might be important?

 

[Justin Uthadude]

I'm trying to say something different, but am having a hard time describing it.
Let's say that people are hearing a difference in two amps, headphones, whatever, and they 'test' identical as far as frequency response, etc. Then a scientist discovers that the amount of gauss that they put out makes a difference in sound that can be measured and correlated. This validates their claim, and the tests prove it, but no one ever thought to list those specs or realize their effects until the 'gaussian discovery'. I realize this sounds weird, but scientific history is full of these types of revelations. I'm not referring to gross differences in sounds, we probably have that nailed now, but smaller things that may affect low level details, etc.
 
edit: didn't see innerspace's post

 

[googleborg]

oh all i meant by hearing is measuring is that ears react accordingly to what is physically acting upon them  once the nerve impulses get into the brain all sorts of stuff happens, including cables making all these differences 'cos ya gone done spent all yer cash on them .  but the bit before that is utterly measurable, obviously.  
 
my issue with the argument of 'immeasurable stuff' is how can it be that cables are being designed to better something that has no physical properties or ability to be measured!  how could you know what you were designing or what affect your designs had!  it's pure bunkam not in the least because it violates logic like a horny viking.

 

[EthanWiner]

Originally Posted by Justin Uthadude /img/forum/go_quote.gif

I agree with you. But, do you think it's possible that you can hear things that we don't know how to measure yet?

No, everything that affects audio fidelity has been known and fully understood for a very long time. If there were some unknown parameter it would have been revealed long ago in a null test. Full explanation here:
 
Audiophoolery
 
Even more in this hour-long video, including a description of null tests starting at 53:39:
 
AES Audio Myths Workshop
 
--Ethan