[castleofargh]

trying to enforce our own discoveries shows a lot of charisma and leadership(2 things that have no place in objective audio experiment). while doubting ourselves can be a sign of real lack of confidence, or a sign of good objective ability, and awareness of our own human weaknesses.
now light up the incense stick and repeat the mantras.

 

[Claritas]

  That's why I recommend that he test songs which he could easily perceive a difference with during normal listening.

 
That doesn't answer my question. Even if he failed a test--you know how strict a test is--why do you think that would make him suddenly stop hearing a difference after the test?
 
All it would prove is that under certain conditions, he heard it less--not that he isn't hearing it ever. It might make him doubt he's really hearing a difference but as it doesn't change his auditory faculties in any way, he would still hear whatever difference he was hearing before. Does that sound reasonable to you? 
 

  Convincing someone in the first camp to undergo an objective test is just as hard as convincing someone in the second camp to be chill with an anecdotal experience.

 
You're regrettably right. The second camp does little actual testing either, and both camps seem to misunderstand what a test can prove.

 

[bigshot]

You're regrettably right. The second camp does little actual testing either, and both camps seem to misunderstand what a test can prove.

I test everything I buy.

A test can prove objective differences. I've found that subjective folks are happy to accept test results as long as it follows their subjective impressions. The only time they have trouble with them is when a test demonstrates the limitations of the accuracy of their impressions.

 

[Music Alchemist]

  That doesn't answer my question. Even if he failed a test--you know how strict a test is--why do you think that would make him suddenly stop hearing a difference after the test?
 
All it would prove is that under certain conditions, he heard it less--not that he isn't hearing it ever. It might make him doubt he's really hearing a difference but as it doesn't change his auditory faculties in any way, he would still hear whatever difference he was hearing before. Does that sound reasonable to you? 
 
You're regrettably right. The second camp does little actual testing either, and both camps seem to misunderstand what a test can prove.

 
Depends which definition of hearing you use. One relates to perception (regardless of whether there is an actual difference) and one relates to the sound waves transmitted to the ears and brain. It can go either way. That's why it's a good idea to do real tests whenever you think you hear a difference when there "shouldn't" be any. Ultimately, if you measure the sound waves and there is zero difference, that means it's impossible to hear a difference that doesn't exist unless you are using the perception definition. This also applies to playing the same file twice. You can fool yourself into thinking that you hear something different, but it's just your mind playing tricks on you. It's not just the auditory faculties at play, anyway. I've thought I heard different things in two files before, but after doing more tests, realized they were identical. The mind/brain is a crucial factor, after all. He may perceive things differently, or may not. There's no point speculating about it. My only purpose for this thread was to examine what (if anything) is going on with his system.

 

[Claritas]

 
[Explanation, beta version]
 
My only purpose for this thread was to examine what (if anything) is going on with his system.

 
I asked why you think anyone would stop hearing a difference because of failing a test. Your explanation doesn't answer that question.
 
I don't believe for a minute that's your reason for starting this thread.

 

[Music Alchemist]

  I asked why you think anyone would stop hearing a difference because of failing a test. Your explanation doesn't answer that question.
 
I don't believe for a minute that's your reason for starting this thread.

 
And I'm saying there's no point in caring about subjective perceptions either way. My prerogative is to get to the bottom of what is actually going on.
 
You are free to believe what you wish.

 

[Head Injury]

   
I asked why you think anyone would stop hearing a difference because of failing a test. Your explanation doesn't answer that question.
 
I don't believe for a minute that's your reason for starting this thread.

No one's going to stop hearing differences just because they failed a test. That's not how placebo works. No one's trying to make him stop hearing what he hears. The test is more to determine if the difference heard is real or placebo. If it's real, we can then examine reasons for why it's real. If it's not, we have our explanation already. In either case, we will have test results to back up or dismiss claims, and can reference back to them if the claims are brought up again. The test-taker can go back to hearing the differences (or not) in peace, maybe having learned something.

 

[Music Alchemist]

  No one's going to stop hearing differences just because they failed a test. That's not how placebo works. No one's trying to make him stop hearing what he hears. The test is more to determine if the difference heard is real or placebo. If it's real, we can then examine reasons for why it's real. If it's not, we have our explanation already. In either case, we will have test results to back up or dismiss claims, and can reference back to them if the claims are brought up again. The test-taker can go back to hearing the differences (or not) in peace, maybe having learned something.

 
This is a perfect summary of what I was going after, with the exception that post-test perception can go either way.
 
(I'm speaking from experience. In past experiments, I thought I heard differences that didn't exist, and after realizing I was wrong, I didn't perceive them anymore...mainly because I wasn't trying to create them in my mind by over-analyzing everything.)

 

[Claritas]

  No one's going to stop hearing differences just because they failed a test. That's not how placebo works. No one's trying to make him stop hearing what he hears. The test is more to determine if the difference heard is real or placebo. If it's real, we can then examine reasons for why it's real. If it's not, we have our explanation already. In either case, we will have test results to back up or dismiss claims, and can reference back to them if the claims are brought up again. The test-taker can go back to hearing the differences (or not) in peace, maybe having learned something.

 
So you agree there's no reason why a test should change what we hear. Good.
 
Why do you think the test determines anything besides the test results: what the participant heard during a particular test? Anything beyond that and you're making assumptions that you would need to account for.

 

[Music Alchemist]

Why do you think the test determines anything besides the test results: what the participant heard during a particular test? Anything beyond that and you're making assumptions that you would need to account for.

 
Ah, so you're referring to untested songs. I already specified that they can be tested as well, if the listener so desires. The last thing I want to do is make assumptions.

 

[Head Injury]

   
So you agree there's no reason why a test should change what we hear. Good.
 
Why do you think the test determines anything besides the test results: what the participant heard during a particular test? Anything beyond that and you're making assumptions that you would need to account for.

It doesn't determine anything else. You can't prove a negative. I can't prove unicorns don't exist. I have to prove they do exist. This is why burden of proof is on the one claiming they can hear a difference. If he can't, we have results which suggest (but don't prove) the phenomena isn't audible. We can then reference it when the question comes up again. But ultimately yes, each person making the claim will need to prove their claim. And once we have a significant body of negative results, we can pretty safely dismiss the issue until someone can prove it.
 
And as Music Alchemist says, the test-taker can test as many files as he likes. That's what's so great about these ABX tests, the advantage is in the test-taker's favor!

 

[Claritas]

It doesn't determine anything else. You can't prove a negative. I can't prove unicorns don't exist. I have to prove they do exist. This is why burden of proof is on the one claiming they can hear a difference. If he can't, we have results which suggest (but don't prove) the phenomena isn't audible. We can then reference it when the question comes up again. But ultimately yes, each person making the claim will need to prove their claim. And once we have a significant body of negative results, we can pretty safely dismiss the issue until someone can prove it.

 

So you agree that a test itself doesn't determine anything beyond the results without making further assumptions. Good.
 
I would suggest that the burden of proof is equally distributed on everyone. It's worth considering whether the claim to hear no difference is actually a positive claim about the world that looks like a negative claim because it uses the word "no." Maybe if someone claims there's no difference, he should test for that too. That test likewise doesn't determine anything beyond the results without making further assumptions.
 
Personally, I don't believe KK3d is hearing a difference because I don't hear one in regular listening. I suspect that's what much talk about testing usually comes down to.
 
Quote:

   
This is a perfect summary of what I was going after, with the exception that post-test perception can go either way.
 
(I'm speaking from experience. In past experiments, I thought I heard differences that didn't exist, and after realizing I was wrong, I didn't perceive them anymore...mainly because I wasn't trying to create them in my mind by over-analyzing everything.)

 
 
That doesn't really answer my question. The music is the same. The hearing is the same. Why would anyone stop hearing a difference? It's pretty strange to me that you actually stopped hearing a difference because you failed a test.

 

[Head Injury]

I would suggest that the burden of proof is equally distributed on everyone. It's worth considering whether the claim to hear no difference is actually a positive claim about the world that looks like a negative claim because it uses the word "no." Maybe if someone claims there's no difference, he should test for that too. That test likewise doesn't determine anything beyond the results without making further assumptions.

We are testing to see if there's no difference, but we can never prove it with 100% certainty using ABX tests because they're done on an individual basis. ABX tests are tools for the people making the claims to support them. If they can't support them, that's points for us but they cannot be used to prove a negative.
 
We can prove with certainty that there are differences or not by examining the files themselves, as people have done with lossless codecs and hi-rez files. Would you care to try to red herring these as well?
 
I know you don't have much faith in our testing methods because you don't like being told the stupid crap you buy into doesn't actually do anything, but ABX tests do work when used appropriately, as do other methods of blind testing.

 

[Music Alchemist]

  That doesn't really answer my question. The music is the same. The hearing is the same. Why would anyone stop hearing a difference? It's pretty strange to me that you actually stopped hearing a difference because you failed a test.

 
The reason is because the differences I perceived were from my brain playing tricks on me, or rather, I was playing tricks on my brain. Expectation bias was involved. You can even trick yourself into experiencing differences when listening to the same file repeatedly. Just focus on certain parts one time, then other parts the next, for example.

 

[BlindInOneEar]

  Flac wasn't uncompressed FLAC, but the compressed variety.
 
http://www.computeraudiophile.com/blogs/mitchco/flac-vs-wav-vs-mp3-vs-m4a-experiment-94/
 
http://www.computeraudiophile.com/blogs/mitchco/flac-vs-wav-part-2-final-results-155/
 
Testing of jitter of heavily vs lightly loaded computer. 
 
 
http://archimago.blogspot.com/2013/03/measurements-hunt-for-load-induced.html
 
Measurements of lossless formats at the analog output.
 
http://archimago.blogspot.com/2013/05/measurements-do-lossless-compressed.html
 
 
 
Also have done my own testing.  Used a soundcard that can record SPDIF  while also playing through the rest of my stereo there was never any difference in data coming from the different file formats.  Nor any difference in a lightly loaded vs heavily loaded CPU. 
 
Doing loopbacks with some decent recording ADC's and good quality consumer DAC's I have recorded test signals and music.  Once you line up the files you can null them and listen to the result.  There is nothing to hear at any volume level I can accomplish with my stereo.  Looking at the results in FFT's and such you see residual levels not far from the thermal noise floor.  There just isn't any difference in the resulting waveform that gets close to being audible.  The ADC and DACs I used were capable of about 19-20 bit performance which is not often exceeded in audio equipment due to noise limitations in the analog realm.  Further the tiny residual differences looked the same if I compared the file to itself or to another file format.  Leading to the conclusion the tiny residuals were due to larger factors than the effect if any of the file format.

Thanks for the links, esldude!