Master Thread: “Objectivism versus Subjectivism” debate and is there a middle ground?

[Chrispy]

I miss Mr Carlin....

 

[litemotiv]

To come back to the original question of the thread, "Are subjectivists blind?", the answer to that might be 'yes'.

This video from The School of Life about Plato's allegory of the cave explains quite nicely why that is, and what we can do to try to change that:

 

[Ingenieur]

You have to understand that every form of subjectivity is part of a belief system, and you cannot change people's beliefs simply by giving them facts. Belief systems have self reinforcing feedback loops which can be difficult to break.

"In the US, for example, where 67 percent of the general population compared to 30 percent of scientists identify as religious, only one-third of scientists view the science-religion relationship as one of conflict. "

Source: Religion among Scientists in International Context: A New Study of Scientists in Eight Regions

Believing that an invisible man with a beard floats in the sky who gets angry when you watch porn is arguably a lot more insane than believing that several similarly measuring audio devices can still sound different, yet here we are.

Not sure if it is an issue as long as you differentiate between faith and fact, a belief system and science.

I'm not sure they believe the Earth is only 5,000 years old and we are some unique and divine life form. I'm sure they believe evolution is fact and the Earth is not flat.
The Bible is not a historical document.

The issue is when people judge others and think they are smarter, not about facts, but beliefs.

I have 0 issues with someone thinking only their ears tell the truth. I do have a small issue when they refute basic physics, but in reality, I don't care, no dog in the fight.

 

[Ingenieur]

Tell that to the people of Sodom and Gomorrah, or the Egyptian children that were allegedly slain… Or all the others for that matter.

Would you prefer He hate you?
Relax

 

[Ingenieur]

Many of the SQ experts have never had a hearing test. Many are > 60 years old.
There range and discernment is limited.

Our measuring instruments are calibrated annually.

Again, I think it comes down to not understanding what they are looking at and how it relates to what they hear. That is OK.
They do not understand the entire system or signal path so have no idea of relative impact of each component.

The power fuse type causes a profound impact? They do not grasp that transducers, optical, a phono cartridge, speaker, physical to electrical, are heavily weighted in the signal train.
How the environment impacts a 0.000x signal vs. a x.0 V one.

So they rely on the only tool they have, their ears. Which is fine, but the absolute smugness is amusing.

 

[JSmith]

ASR is full of crap

It's always easy to get angry when ones belief system is challenged, then comes the finger pointing at those that seek facts and sense which is why ASR is constantly targeted in this way. Eventually these people will become the minority in the audio world and may well be so already. However, there will always be a core group that believe in magic... the same kinds that believe aliens pop in from time to time to disembowel cows.

JSmith

 

[Ingenieur]

They use buzz words from trade rags, PRaT, musicality, etc. But they do not understand the basics.

You can get more performance out of a car if you know it's basic dynamics, how it works. Hifi is no different.

You hear people talking about things they know nothing about. A common one is fighting. They have never been in one, never trained for one, but will tell you how to win one (hint, NO ONE wins one).
The same for legal matters, medical subjects, etc.

Reading something teaches little about technical matters. Read a physics book. But unless you work the problems and do the lab you get nothing from it.

The audio press is one of the most hyperbolic BS based media around. At least National Enquirer does not expect to be taken seriously and have you make financial decisions based on "Elvis is an alien".

 

[wwenze]

They are not blind, coz they can't do blind test properly.

 

[Larry B. Larabee]

Even if the OP isn't a shill planted to boost hits to this 'social media site cum important source of audio information' he certainly hasn't discovered that there's a search function available here that would tell him that his question has been asked hundreds of times. Multiply that by the hundreds of times asked on a hundred other like sites and answers filled with speculation and the possibilities for a resolution to the mystery of audio reproduction and you start to wonder if you're being played or duped by the industry as a whole.

What drew my attention, other than the obvious redirection to a topic unrelated to what was asked by the OP (which took a record 5 posts, nice job guys), was talk about quantifying soundstage and depth differences. One of those mysteries that can't be associated with measurements after some 60 yrs, I found hard to believe. The fact is that this impression is directly related to channel separation and crosstalk between channels. If important information commonly available to everyone is TOTALLY ignored how would you expect progress in relating measurement to impressions. 'It's because everyone hears differently and the circle of confusion and fill in the blank', absolute unmitigated bullshit, and if you say it isn't that means everyone who makes a claim can't be sure of a single word they say about the results of a test or opinion.

This stuff is getting to be a monumental snore.

 

[Ingenieur]

Case in point
Get your hip waders

I'm not even sure wth it is!?
A head shell weight? Weed?
That little colored dot?

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Two more PHT crops harvested... Black Widow (Type I) & Green Dream (Type S).

We also have a few sets of the original PHT Blue Velvet and Purple Haze, as reviewed by Michael Fremer, in stock.

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Michael Fremer of Stereophile wrote:
"...adding that blue PHT produced an ear-popping, Cinerama-like, wraparound soundstage, and an overall sound even less tethered to the speaker positions. The image focus was increasing razor sharpness, and there was greater front-to-back separation of sources within the soundstage... Decays were longer, and the backgrounds they faded into were ’blacker’... with the blue PHT in place the sound was clearly better overall, with improved focus, three-dimensionality, and transparency... "

 

[Trell]

But he loves you.

Depends on the size of your collect.

 

[Ingenieur]

Even if the OP isn't a shill planted to boost hits to this 'social media site cum important source of audio information' he certainly hasn't discovered that there's a search function available here that would tell him that his question has been asked hundreds of times. Multiply that by the hundreds of times asked on a hundred other like sites and answers filled with speculation and the possibilities for a resolution to the mystery of audio reproduction and you start to wonder if you're being played or duped by the industry as a whole.

What drew my attention, other than the obvious redirection to a topic unrelated to what was asked by the OP (which took a record 5 posts, nice job guys), was talk about quantifying soundstage and depth differences. One of those mysteries that can't be associated with measurements after some 60 yrs, I found hard to believe. The fact is that this impression is directly related to channel separation and crosstalk between channels. If important information commonly available to everyone is TOTALLY ignored how would you expect progress in relating measurement to impressions. 'It's because everyone hears differently and the circle of confusion and fill in the blank', absolute unmitigated bullshit, and if you say it isn't that means everyone who makes a claim can't be sure of a single word they say about the results of a test or opinion.

This stuff is getting to be a monumental snore.

I know what the search function is.
I chose not to use it.
But thanks for caring enough to write all that

 

[Ingenieur]

Holy smokes!!! It IS those little dots!!!
No...freakin'....way, lol

Future PHT crops:​

Every 90-days or so SR will have a new crop of 2 new strains of precision handmade micro PHTs, one Type ’I’ and one Type ’S’ for you to try in your system for 30-days risk-free. Should you collect all 8-strains of PHT in the first year you’ll receive a free presentation case to hold all your PHT- plus one strain of PHT not available for sale, absolutely free! PHT’s are sold for $125 each or $199 for two. Crop yields are limited and when sold out, they’re sold out. Initial PHT crop yield was 750 Blue Velvet, 750 Purple Haze, 750 Black Widow and 750 Green Dream precision handmade micro PHTs.

 

[Blumlein 88]

If there is a real difference in soundstage perception, it has by necessity changed the signal getting to one's ears. In principle even if we haven't the ability yet or haven't bothered such a change is measureable.

I proposed in another thread we might measure such a thing if we used spaced microphones at the LP. Or possibly three microphones spaced in a triangle near head-sized dimensions. In principle if not in practice that or something similar could be done.

Of course if the amps and preceding gear are of high enough fidelity such a difference in soundstaging will not really occur. Also we know that the brain influences what is heard by what is seen. Just seeing a tube amp can convince some to hear a different result when that amp is not connected and nothing has changed.

If we were doing ground zero experiments one approach would be blind testing to confirm two amps have different soundstaging, and then develop our measurements to see how the sound at the ears change. Probably would have to rinse and repeat a few times to determine what measurements were showing a difference that correlates with what is heard, and how it correlates.

The thing to remember is by necessity some difference that could most easily and accurately be measured at the speaker terminals has to occur for the person listening to hear a difference with his ears.

Now I do think for instance triode amps with some speakers can add a sense of space, and 3D soundstaging which isn't in the recording, and yet is perceived as that by the listener. Of course such amps are providing measurably different signals to the speaker terminals. My reason for thinking this is that I have in the past taken amps, gave them a loudspeaker-like load, and tapped the output with an attenuation circuit so it provided unity gain. Fed that into a power amp connected to speakers and listened with and without the power amp under test in the circuit between source and final power amp. A triode inserted sounds rather different than a straight wire connection. It sounds better on some material. Good SS amps you can't hear if they are in circuit or out. Which is why I conclude in this case the better 3D sound is an additive coloration.

 

[Inner Space]

What drew my attention, other than the obvious redirection to a topic unrelated to what was asked by the OP (which took a record 5 posts, nice job guys), was talk about quantifying soundstage and depth differences. One of those mysteries that can't be associated with measurements after some 60 yrs, I found hard to believe. The fact is that this impression is directly related to channel separation and crosstalk between channels.

Soundstage width can be panned across the eight feet or so of available canvas, whereas depth is theoretically more or less infinite, in that it's mostly amplitude based. I could take a sound at reference level and have it way upfront in the mix, and then back it off, dulling the FR and adding and changing reverb as we go, until it fades into the noise floor, which represents a huge perceived regression. Played on its own, you'll hear it get further and further and further away, until it eventually disappears into the far distance.

Yet on replay, depth is usually perceived as more limited than width - maybe at best half the width dimension in comparison. That's because the perception is curtailed by masking by louder sounds and lack of clarity in the speaker. Those things should be measurable, subject to informed interpretation. But I have never really found a measurement suite that tells us immediately, "Yeah, this speaker should handle depth perception better than that speaker."

 

[jsrtheta]

Many of the SQ experts have never had a hearing test. Many are > 60 years old.
There range and discernment is limited.

Our measuring instruments are calibrated annually.

Again, I think it comes down to not understanding what they are looking at and how it relates to what they hear. That is OK.
They do not understand the entire system or signal path so have no idea of relative impact of each component.

The power fuse type causes a profound impact? They do not grasp that transducers, optical, a phono cartridge, speaker, physical to electrical, are heavily weighted in the signal train.
How the environment impacts a 0.000x signal vs. a x.0 V one.

So they rely on the only tool they have, their ears. Which is fine, but the absolute smugness is amusing.

It's a process, how they get there. I am not particularly, or even slightly, scientifically or mathematically literate. I am well educated, but not in those areas. So when I at last got to a point where I had the coin to finally buy a decent stereo, I was walking prey. (Even that's not entirely fair, since I became friendly a few people who sold audio, and learned that some of them believed in snake oil as much as anyone.)

And it isn't obviously wrong to think that amplifiers of the same wattage, from different makers, should sound different from each other. And the audio pornographers put a lot of effort and ink into convincing customers that there were stark differences between the sound of CD players. Most people are scientifically illiterate. So, not knowing the right questions to ask, let alone the answers, they are open to whatever "knowledgeable" tell them.

Once I learned more about audio, and how it works, and what matters and what doesn't, and why, then "I got better"! (I am in no wise as smart about audio as almost everyone else here. I never will be.) And what purchases I make are made with my eyes open. Or nearly, anyway.

 

[watchnerd]

I personally can't Imagine forgoing the most effective system upgrade available.

Oh definitely.

$35 in cannabis vape lasts me weeks, improves my system by thousands of dollars.

 

[jsrtheta]

...Transform your turntable’s performance dramatically with the NEW Synergistic Research PHT!

Coincidentally, "Phhhhhtttttttt!" is the same sound your money makes flying out of your wallet.

 

[voodooless]

The fact is that this impression is directly related to channel separation and crosstalk between channels.

Is it? Have any research to back this up? From what I’ve gathered you need surprisingly little channel separation to give the effect of panned sound. Do you think you can hear the difference between -50 dB separation and -100 dB?

 

[antennaguru]

Is it? Have any research to back this up? From what I’ve gathered you need surprisingly little channel separation to give the effect of panned sound. Do you think you can hear the difference between -50 dB separation and -100 dB?

Many excellent phono cartridges can "only" muster 30 to 40 dB of channel separation, and still that's plenty to highlight these differences. Think about when stereo was first introduced/promoted to a dubious public already happy with their mono systems - pushing those heavily panned records like "Persuasive Percussion". Very boring after the first listen, but proving to the most doubtful that even a lowly phono cartridge or tape head can sufficiently provide proof of the beneficial stereo effect, and that they needed to double their system when they could afford to. In any case, there's a good reason why we use a logarithmic decibel scale: 10 Log (P2/P1). 30 dB is 1000 times stronger/weaker in linear terms; 40 dB is 10,000 times stronger/weaker in linear terms; 50 dB is 100,000 times stronger/weaker in linear terms; 60 dB is 1,000,000 times stronger/weaker in linear terms. Too many zeros to keep track of with linear terms, so decibels are better when the differences are so vast. We're already in the realm of enough with a "mere" 30 to 40 dB. Tape is even better, and digital even better yet, depending always upon the master. In panning across the sound-stage what's the difference if the left side is 1000 times or 1,000,000 times more/less than the right, and vice versa?

For a particular recording we do know that the sound-stage Left to Right at its front edge (a line across the front of the speakers) is based on channel separation, and that depth within the overall sound-stage is based on the amplitude of the signal within that L/R position. Then the most linear amplifiers should be able to place depth most accurately because of their high amplitude linearity, but does this consistently correlate with what's heard?

What about image height above and/or below the speakers? Maybe this is just the psychoacoustics of expectations?