On 4/16/2014 1:39 PM, news wrote:
...if they can tell the white from the red, or the
fancy from the table wine, at least 12 out of 16 times (95% level of
confidence) then they would have proven that there is a difference, but not
a preference. If they can't even do THAT, then not only could they not have
a preference, but they cannot even tell under blind conditions whether there
is any difference between the two at all.
It probably should be noted that the wine tests cited were not really
difference tests, but rather a demonstration of the rather large effect
of suggestibility.
A real difference test would be to give the subjects two different wines
(a red and a white, or an expensive and a cheap) and see if they could
detect the difference while blindfolded. My hunch is that they would be
able to do so at the 95% confidence level.
But the expirement didn't do that. Instead, the expirement gave the
subjects two identical wines (except for the food coloring and the
bottle) and the subjects perceived large differences when there was
none. That's explained by suggestibility.
Agree with your larger point - in order to get to *preference* one must
first establish *difference*.
The subjectivist audio press comes out with endless prose and poetry about
what they hear in the latest products, but it is totally meaningless if it
is done under sighted conditions. They will never say "well, this new
$50,000 amplifier is certainly the same as all other decent amplifiers."
That wouldn't show the fineness of their hearing or advance their magazine
sales.
But most of us know all that. Just saying for the benefit of the newbies
lurking in.
The science of why $50k amplifiers and $15k cables sound better than
$500 amplifiers and Belden 8451 is pretty well explained by the Asch
Paradigm.
See
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asch_c...ty_experiments
--
//Walt