Mark DeBellis wrote:
wrote:
snip
First, for the THIRD time, you are not talking about "musical beauty."
You are talking about *perceptions of musical beauty.* That perception
is no different from any subjective impression of what one
hears--preference, harshness, smoothness, etc. [insert desired
subjectivist buzzword here]. The question is, are there unknown audible
differences between, say, cables, that cannot be detected in
traditional DBTs but can differently affect our subjective impressions
of what we hear?
I assume that the word "audible" could be removed from the question
without loss (except, possibly, of its making the answer "no"
tautological), because the real work is being done by "can differently
affect ... what we hear." Yes? (If not, why not?)
You are incorrect. There are certainly a host of differences between
components that are inaudible, that cannot be detected in a DBT, but
could affect subjective impressions (e.g. cost, color, style, etc.).
These *inaudible* differences are the reason for the blind protocol.
And the answer is no, there are no such unknown
audible differences, and therefore there cannot be any unknown audible
differences that can affect subjective impressions. That's the theory,
as it stands today.
OK. I know that you think that the answer is no (taking out the word
"audible," OK?),
No, it's not OK unless you wish only to discuss at cross purposes. If
the property or parameter causing the perceptual difference is not
audible, then clearly you are talking about preference, not *just* about
the sound waves being perceived. That is a different topic altogether.
and that science tells us that the answer is no. And
for all I know, you're right about that. For what it's worth, I, and
maybe others, would like to know how you or anyone *knows* that the
answer is no. Or what you think it takes to *establish* that the
answer is no. But since we've been over this ground so much before, I
say this more to point out what I think is at issue than from a real
belief that it's going to get resolved.
As has been repeated ad nauseam, *if* the theory or model accounts for
all the available data, the theory is accepted unless, and until,
countervailing evidence (an observation that is repeatable) is acquired.
In the absence of countervailing evidence, further testing is not
warranted. That is the basic threshold for scientific inquiry - you do
not look for cause where effect is not observed. So, where are those
observations?
To crack this, you have to tell us what that mystery difference is, or
you have to demonstrate through some sort of listening test that such a
difference exists. To argue, as you do, that our tests are not adequate
to detect something that we have no evidence for the existence of is to
engage is a pseudoscientific parlor game.
The claim, I think, is (more or less) that nothing assures us that the
tests can detect *all* "differences that can affect subjective
impressions."
Of course they can't, so what? They are designed to detect *audible*
differences! Not *ALL* differences. So tell us, why would you excise
"audible" just to make an argument not germane to the topic at hand?
Would you say that we are assured of this because none
of the evidence we have gathered through those tests points to a
difference that the test cannot detect? Surely that would be circular.
It would if that were remotely related to reality. The reality is that
you excised the predicate parameter (i.e. audibility) to erect another
strawman. You now want to discuss the strawman as though it has
relevance to the original discussion. Clearly you know, by now, that if
DBT is in the subject of the discussion, we are *ONLY* talking about
audible differences. So what is your purpose with this?
Keith Hughes