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Bromo wrote:

On 6/20/04 12:47 PM, in article XcjBc.148843$Ly.52420@attbi_s01, "Steven
Sullivan" wrote:

Are you suggesting we should not worry about people measuring everything
that
matters or failing to measure everything that matters?

Hardly. I am suggesting that a common subjectivist
reaction to measurement-based claims of 'no audible difference' is that
the wrong thing has been measured. Bromo was kind enough to also allude
to the *other* standby, namely, 'there are things science can't measure
(optional: yet)'.

The first could be true, but without some viable suggestion for
what the 'right thing' might be, it's hand-waving. The second is a
truism, but again, where's the independent evidence or argument-from-data
to believe it's true in *this* case?

I would agree with you broadly - though it is just as wrong for people who
think they (or really do hear) differences to shut up and 'accept' the
status quo as it is wrong for those who have technical measurements to show
the state of the art cannot find any reason a person ought to be able to
hear differences.

Of course, but we should also keep in mind that after 30-40 years of argument
about wire/amplifier/bit sounds we still do not have a single credible
bias-controlled listening test where any subject has been able to show an
ability to 'hear' these qualitiies when normal sources of listener bias have
been screened.

If there were real differences of such a nature than someone would have
observed them under bias-controlled or accidental conditions. I wonder why it's
only the "subjectivists" who espouse them; and why none of them has ever
produced a replicable experiment that shows they actually have an acoustic
cause? Not a single one.

I'm not arguing against the possibility of differences occuring, indeed I've
spent the last 20 years chasing them down, but IF there were things to "hear"
that are replicable (to a given subject or multiple subjects) then I wonder
why some interested party hasn't shown that they remain 'hearable' when even
the most modest of bias controls are implemented?

In my opinion the "status quo" is the reverse of what you suggest. The state of
audio is that one is expected to believe in amp/wire/parts/bit sound even when
it hasn't been shown to have an acoustical source or cause. This because
manufacturers/salesmen/high-end audio reviews "say" so.

I would agree with you broadly - though it is just as wrong for people who
think they (or really do hear) differences to shut up and 'accept' the
status quo as it is wrong for those who have technical measurements to show
the state of the art cannot find any reason a person ought to be able to
hear differences.

I think that those who "(or really do hear) differences" should shut up and
show that they really CAN hear these differences.

I've spent a considerable amount of time and money tracking down these
"differences" that always seem to be just a fine-hair away from being "proven"
or validated ..... but so far not one person (this covers 20 years of personal
research and 25 years of published work) has ever been able to show an ability
to hear amplifiers (of wildly differing cost), cables (interconnects and
speaker wire .... including the 'designer' of same) and only ONE subject was
able to differentiate a 14-bit Phillips cd player from a Sony ES of 10 years
its junior (and that test was not closely time sync'd).

So I'm of the opinion that IF folks want us to buy into amp/wire/bit sound you
have to step up to the plate and hit the ball. Argument and debate just isn't
good enough.