Testing audiophile claims and myths

[bigshot]

The one that always gets me is “organic.”

Fertilizer is organic.

 

[BobG55]

Fertilizer is organic.

 

[MrHaelscheir]

"Toe tapping". If I find my head nodding, it's the music or recording itself combined with the happenstance of my headphone DSP sounding really good at that moment.

 

[gregorio]

The one that always gets me is “organic.” The number of times I’ve read someone describing their HP’s sound as, organic, is astounding. What that means is beyond me.

“Organic” as a term does have a legitimate meaning, as in: Organic as opposed to synthetic, IE. Real acoustic instruments rather than synthesised instruments/sounds. This difference was particularly obvious in the 1980’s and ‘90s, both in terms of deliberately obvious synth sounds and of “sampled”/synthesised acoustic instruments, most commonly electronic drums, pianos, strings and horns. Not only has the quality of samples improved dramatically but control of them in modern DAWs has too. The constant variation in timing, tuning/intonation and attack, hold and decay envelopes characteristic of real musicians playing acoustic instruments was at one time near nonexistent with sampled/synthesised instruments and is now very sophisticated. In many cases today, it’s pretty much impossible to differentiate the real from the sampled instruments and even the deliberately electronic sounding synth sounds typical of some genres (EDM most obviously) can be made to appear less computerised/mechanical if desired. So “organic” as a term is less useful/valid than it was 30 or so years ago but is still used occasionally.

The above all obviously relates to the music creation/recording process but how any of it applies to HPs is as you say “astounding” and seems to make no sense relative to HP performance. It appears to be just another example of the audiophile community bastardising a term legitimately employed decades ago by the pro-audio community.

G

 

[MrHaelscheir]

Considering how there exist folks for which extrasonic factors appear to be able to induce drastic perceived differences while others like myself under sighted conditions perceive nigh absolutely none such, other than the latter case itself perhaps being influenced by expectation bias (though there are some who claimed to have originally been skeptical then made a 180-degree turnaround after a certain experience), are there any formal studies on something like a "susceptibility" to such extrasonic factors on one's perception of music? May it simply be the reinforcement of the subjective effects of the original period of ignorance to the notion of there being no audible differences?

 

[bigshot]

I read that a couple of times and couldn’t figure out what you’re asking.

 

[MrHaelscheir]

I read that a couple of times and couldn’t figure out what you’re asking.

1. There appear to exist people who for very similarly measuring gear hear drastically different sonic properties.
2. There are also people who even under sighted conditions don't hear such differences at all.
3. The personnel in (2) may also be subject to expectation bias about the lack of audibility, but some individuals among the personnel in (1) claim to have originally been skeptics before they had an experience that changed their minds.
4. Considering (1), (2), and (3), are there any formal studies on the extent to which individuals are more or less affected by sighted bias in their perception of music?
5. Regarding (4), I speculate that the susceptibility may arise from the repeated confirmation bias of hearing differences during the period prior to their being told that no differences are supposed to be heard.

 

[bigshot]

I would think that studies on susceptibility to being influenced by sight would be done by psychologists, not audio engineers. I doubt that sight has any different effect in audio than it does in any other comparison between two very similar things. And I suspect that the results of that kind of study would show that everyone is susceptible in equal measure.

However I would bet that the harder someone holds on to a belief, the more likely validation bias plays a big role in how much of a factor sight plays. The key factor is validation, not just sight.

 

[2leftears]

Re. perception of sound, I would find it interesting to see research done (if it hasn't been done already) that focuses not an an average group of people, but intentionally limits the subjects to a group of neurodivergent people (with respect to hearing). E.g. people with APD (auditory processing disorder) struggle to isolate speech from a noisy background, but what if other neurological disorders actually improved certain aspects of perceptibility?

E.g., how would established research results re. limits of perceptible levels of of distortion, frequency range etc. hold up if the test subjects were exclusively made up of people with e.g. synesthesia? Getting a large enough group of test subjects would be problematic. But it would be interesting to see what such research could tell us about the physical limits of human hearing versus those potentially resulting from neurological processing limits in the (normal) brain.

It is highly likely that the results would point to the established limits on hearing being mostly a physical one, resulting from the physical and biological construction of the human hearing such as the inner ear/cochlea/Reissner's & basilar membranes, organ of corti etc. But on the other hand, would it not be equally interesting if it turned out that some neurodivergent people (again e.g. synesthetes) could indeed consistently perceive differences that conventional science has shown us to be imperceptible by listeners with normal hearing and perception?

 

[castleofargh]

1. There appear to exist people who for very similarly measuring gear hear drastically different sonic properties.
2. There are also people who even under sighted conditions don't hear such differences at all.
3. The personnel in (2) may also be subject to expectation bias about the lack of audibility, but some individuals among the personnel in (1) claim to have originally been skeptics before they had an experience that changed their minds.
4. Considering (1), (2), and (3), are there any formal studies on the extent to which individuals are more or less affected by sighted bias in their perception of music?
5. Regarding (4), I speculate that the susceptibility may arise from the repeated confirmation bias of hearing differences during the period prior to their being told that no differences are supposed to be heard.

Biases are systematic, that is their definition. But that’s about the notion of ”mental shortcut”. The consequences in experience or decision making could just show a statistical tendency toward something. And it would be incorrect to assume that we’re only facing one bias in our sighted, variable free-for-all, experience we call listening.
There is no way to test what you describe in that context IMO.
But surely we all are different with different experiences and beliefs, and those create errors of their own that make us the somewhat unique brains that we are as individuals. It’s not an audio thing, we would all be the same computers if we all reacted the exact same way when presented with the same data.
In your scenario, we almost never get the same data because the listenig conditions and even the music will usually be different. But let’s say we do manage to set circumstances where we get the same data. We would still have a truckload of history, beliefs, desperate rationalization(a most human thing), leading to worlds apart interpretations. The main data could even easily becomes an insignificant part of the interpretation in some cases.


And out of the very many audiophiles who will experience really audible changes at some point in their lives under different conditions, most will generalize that anecdote(which rarely is a good move), and many will attribute the change to the wrong cause. Once that is done, they have created their very own preconception about how different the sound should be the next time they change the thing that never was the cause of the sound change.
And we know that imagining a sound generates similar brain activity to actually hearing it.
There is almost no limit to how far we can take a false idea, poor testing, generalization and of course jumping to conclusion with the first correlation equals causation we can think of.
In psychology, there is that idea that you can always find positive evidence(even for false hypotheses). It’s a warning for people to stick with the scientific approach instead of just seeking to validate ideas. We don’t have that safeguard when a random dude tries some gear. Years, decades of fallacious conclusions from bad testing can surely create parallel universes inside one’s mind.




If you’re looking for diversity of response, any paper will do, and if they didn’t publish the individual data, an email to one of the researcher will almost always get you a positive response. But of course those will tend to be about some hyper specific variable under controlled conditions. Not what you're talking about.

 

[castleofargh]

Re. perception of sound, I would find it interesting to see research done (if it hasn't been done already) that focuses not an an average group of people, but intentionally limits the subjects to a group of neurodivergent people (with respect to hearing). E.g. people with APD (auditory processing disorder) struggle to isolate speech from a noisy background, but what if other neurological disorders actually improved certain aspects of perceptibility?

E.g., how would established research results re. limits of perceptible levels of of distortion, frequency range etc. hold up if the test subjects were exclusively made up of people with e.g. synesthesia? Getting a large enough group of test subjects would be problematic. But it would be interesting to see what such research could tell us about the physical limits of human hearing versus those potentially resulting from neurological processing limits in the (normal) brain.

It is highly likely that the results would point to the established limits on hearing being mostly a physical one, resulting from the physical and biological construction of the human hearing such as the inner ear/cochlea/Reissner's & basilar membranes, organ of corti etc. But on the other hand, would it not be equally interesting if it turned out that some neurodivergent people (again e.g. synesthetes) could indeed consistently perceive differences that conventional science has shown us to be imperceptible by listeners with normal hearing and perception?

As a superman, I can think of the blind dude who can ”see” shapes with the reflections from clicking his tongue. That’s a brain thing, he doesn't have special hearing.

 

[bigshot]

Generally, perceptual anomalies fall into the category of disabilities. It’s hard to imagine a person born with the ears of a bat. Our hearing ability is directly related to our species and the bits of bone and flesh that come with that.

Keep dreaming though… maybe someday you’ll be able to fly if you believe hard enough.

 

[MrHaelscheir]

Maybe the Bene Gesserit will raise such a Golden Ear in 10,000 years.

 

[castleofargh]

For countries that don’t have those tethered caps yet, it’s great, you will love it

 

[2leftears]

For countries that don’t have those tethered caps yet, it’s great, you will love it

They've just introduced those caps on the Alpro soy milk cartons here. They are a friggin' pain the butt.

Disclaimer: I mean soy milk substitute of course, lest the dairy industry decides to take me to court re. that blasphemy. Funny how they don't go after the peanut butter though...