[rroseperry]

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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?

Well no, the human eye is not more accurate than a camera. We're limited wrt resolving power, magnification, and wavelength.  I'm sorry what's IMD and what was the effect?

 

[nick_charles]

 
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Well no, the human eye is not more accurate than a camera. We're limited wrt resolving power, magnification, and wavelength.  I'm sorry what's IMD and what was the effect?

IMD is intermodulation distortion, two frequencies interact and case distortion, not nice as the distortion sidebands are not harmonics...
 

 

[JerryLove]

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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?
 

Real things or voices in one's head?

 

[rroseperry]

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Well no, the human eye is not more accurate than a camera. We're limited wrt resolving power, magnification, and wavelength.  I'm sorry what's IMD and what was the effect?

IMD is intermodulation distortion, two frequencies interact and case distortion, not nice as the distortion sidebands are not harmonics...
 

Ok, thanks. That's what the balanced cables are about, yes?
 

 

[Justin Uthadude]

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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?
 

Real things or voices in one's head?

JerryLove-
You are funny.
Sometimes the voice in my head measures how much it's gonna cost me for that real comment I just made to my wife . .
.

 

[binson]

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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.

 
Could be that I'm misunterstanding the original question, or we're just trying to explain different things.
 
However, to comment your post.. The point I was trying to make was, that what you hear (or imagine, like you put it) doesn't necessarily correspond to the 'measurement data' that your ear provides. Surely, ear records every change there is in the sound signal, just like a microphone does. And, if the change in the sound signal, or the level of the sound signal is low enough, you can't hear it, but you might be able measure it. I'm not trying to argue this. But there are cases when certain signals or changes in signals make you hear things that do not show in the measurements. Like in the examples I've written above. You can call it imagining sounds, but I take it as a normal behavior of hearing. 
 
Hearing is what you eventually hear (perceive as sound), not what your ear records. Without this, for example, mp3 wouldn't be possible. Based on your opinion, how would you explain the loudness-functionality in the old amplifiers?
 
Btw. When we talk about measuring, I'm considering normal technical measurement techniques (time- and frequency-domain). Of course, if include a model of human hearing as part of the measurement system, then most of the psychoacoustic phenomena could be measured as well.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

 

[InnerSpace]

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... the human eye is not more accurate than a camera. We're limited wrt resolving power, magnification, and wavelength.

You got data on that?  Resolving power re a candle a mile away, ability to handle light/dark contrast, etc?  I'm not sure you're correct.

 

[InnerSpace]

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Based on your opinion, how would you explain the loudness-functionality in the old amplifiers?

No question that as SPLs decrease, we become less sensitive to frequencies outside the midrange.  My point is that if amp "A" is held to have a more effective "loudness" button than amp "B", the difference between the two is either measurable or imaginary.
 
There are many psychoacoustic phenomena ... increased SPLs tend to make notes sound flatter in pitch, for instance.  The "flatter" part is in your head, but the "increased SPLs" are measurable, and the former can't happen without the latter.

 

[binson]

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There are many psychoacoustic phenomena ... increased SPLs tend to make notes sound flatter in pitch, for instance.  The "flatter" part is in your head, but the "increased SPLs" are measurable, and the former can't happen without the latter.

But, you are hearing both the flattening and the increase in SPL, although only the latter is measurable. Isn't that what the original question was about, are there things that we can hear but are not measurable. What if you'd hear just the increased SPL version of the sound. How can you measure how much the sound has flattened? That just proofs that what we hear is not what we measure.
 
Anyway, I think we both get the idea when we hear "real" things and when it's "imaginary, so not much to add on my side. Thanks for good comments!
 

 

[InnerSpace]

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Anyway, I think we both get the idea when we hear "real" things and when it's "imaginary, so not much to add on my side. Thanks for good comments!
 

You too!

 

[rroseperry]

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... the human eye is not more accurate than a camera. We're limited wrt resolving power, magnification, and wavelength.

You got data on that?  Resolving power re a candle a mile away, ability to handle light/dark contrast, etc?  I'm not sure you're correct.

Resolving power is the ability to distinguish between two things lying close together. Here we are relative to light and electron microscopes. A camera as a series of lenses can have the resolving power of the microscopes, which is better than our eyeballs.
 
Think about this, we can photograph details on the moon and other planetary objects that we cannot see with the unaided eye.  We can make images of things with ultraviolet and infrared frequencies that we cannot see. How can you think that the human eyeball is better?

 

[InnerSpace]

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Resolving power is the ability to distinguish between two things lying close together. Here we are relative to light and electron microscopes. A camera as a series of lenses can have the resolving power of the microscopes, which is better than our eyeballs.
 
Think about this, we can photograph details on the moon and other planetary objects that we cannot see with the unaided eye.  We can make images of things with ultraviolet and infrared frequencies that we cannot see. How can you think that the human eyeball is better?

OK.  We can magnify with lenses, for sure.  But there seems to be a mixture of abilities ... e.g. nighttime photographs of e.g. cityscapes are much worse than what we see.

 

[rroseperry]

It depends on the lens and the exposure. Nighttime photos of cityscapes can be as detailed as this or a long exposure smear like this.
 
In either case, the camera can do things that our eyes can't.  Understand me, I think human sight is a fine thing.  But it has limits that machines don't.

 

[khaos974]

I realize this question is not exactly related to to subject, but still, it has to do with human interpretation of external stimulus.
 
Are the human ears (and the brain) subject to phenomenons analogous to metamerism?
 
Let me explain, human eyes view colors through the combination of 3 color cones, red, blue and green, it turns out that images with different spectral content can stimulate those cones equally, creating the exact same image in the brain. There are some problems when it comes to reproducing that metamerism though. Inks in printer try to exactly match the perception of the human brain, however, it does not always work.
 
Let's say, a printed subject has a spectral content A, you now use another printer (different inks) to print the same image, you get spectrum A', both images have the different spectrum, yet appear the same to the eyes due to metamerism. Yet, you now change the lighting, from incandescent to fluorescent light, now with spectra B and B', the images appear different to you eyes, because your eyes aren't fooled anymore, the printed images were never the same to begin with.
 
In other words, using a certain set of criteria, what is different could appear the same, using another, they would be different
 
Now, let's take 2 systems, measured at the listening position, same distortion figures, noise, frequency response, impulsion response (no null test though), would it be possible for those systems to sound different to your ears?
 
 

 

[Rdr. Seraphim]

What about things that are measurable and effect our hearing? http://www.positive-feedback.com/Issue52/ultrasonic.htm