wrote:
"So long as one thinks that *all* questions about perception are directly
translatable into questions about comparison or discrimination (or
categorization), one is apt to miss his point entirely."

You have it backwards, perception artifacts not in the signal is offered
as an explanation. One need not have any such model when making the
simple observation that placing a cloth over connections causes previously
easy to discriminate differences to fall into the level of random guess.

We see the statement a lot that "the differences disappear when a cloth
goes over the equipment." But in most blind tests, it isn't just the
"blindness" that has been changed. Especially in tests designed to show
objectively that a difference based in sound was perceived, the
listener is required to discriminate under a certain set of conditions,
and to make the discrimination a large number of times in a fairly
brief period of time. So more has changed than "putting a cloth over
the components."

It too is interesting that clear differences are stated when switching is
said to have occured when in fact only one bit of gear was used. These
two small facts are such stubborn things and do drive anyone wanting to
have a fuller understanding to consider perception artifacts as an
explanation..

It's very simple: people's experience of music is a combined result of
the sound, and how one responds to the sound (call it the "subtle
internal dance"). If either one changes, then the experience changes. I
find that the internal response to the sound is something that can be
modelled and understood, and explains a great many experiences, as well
as casts light on the shortcomings of the common blind test.

Mike