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Capacitor upgrade in crossover - You CAN'T handle the TRUTH! - Part 3

NTK

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So Kaiser, calling an un-named person a Bozo is what branch of "science"? Glad you think it is so funny. For anyone here at ASR posting graphs, charts, measurements, and/or lecturing about equivalent circuit equations, provide the following information along with the proclamations of "proven", final answer, complete, exclamation point.

1) Brand, Model, and serial number of all equipment used in the experiment.
2) When were the items in 1) calibrated.
3) If calibrated, traceable to the Nation Bureau of Standards?
4) If not calibrated, explain why not.
5) What is the length, resistance, inductance, and capacitance of all cabling used.
6) Detailed diagram of the test configuration
7) Detailed test procedure
8) How is the unit under test (UUT) identified, stored, and handled
9) Complete description and details of the test location and environment
10) Procedure used to eliminate Bias of the tester.

If those 10 points are present, then a good start toward following a "scientific" process. Otherwise, simply an experiment - not scientific certainty.
Smart scientists, and by extension, smart people, don't waste their time and money on things that are essentially meaningless and provide less than negligible returns. And also, smart people (which include smart scientists) don't waste their time on trolls either.
[BTW, NBS has changed its name to NIST 32 years ago. If your cal certs say they are traceable to NBS, may be your things are overdue for a re-cal.]

P.S. If you are so concerned about instrument calibrations, I'd suggest you stay home and not venture outside onto public roads. At least not until your government has enacted laws requiring certifications that all vehicles on roads have their tire pressures and oil levels measured per government approved procedures every other day with NIST traceable tire gauges and NIST traceable dipsticks. You know, it's only your life that is at stake here.
 
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SIY

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Smart scientists, and in extension, smart people, don't waste their time and money on things that are essentially meaningless and provide less than negligible returns. And also, smart people (which include smart scientists) don't waste their time on trolls either.
[BTW, NBS has changed its name to NIST 32 years ago. If your cal certs say they are traceable to NBS, may be your things are overdue for a re-cal.]

P.S. If you are so concerned about instrument calibrations, I'd suggest you stay home and not venture outside onto public roads. At least not until your government has enacted laws requiring certifications that all vehicles on roads have their tire pressures and oil levels measured per government approved procedures every other day with NIST traceable tire gauges and NIST traceable dipsticks. You know, it's only your life that is at stake here.
Now talk about removing bias from an AP.

Thank the various gods that the scientists who work for me are smarter than this troll.
 

tmtomh

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I see two fundamental problems with the discussion in this thread, one caused by how @ctrl has framed it, and one caused by the sloppiness of the arguments put forth in comments by @A800 and others:

1. Bad Framing: "You CAN'T handle the TRUTH!" is, with respect, a dumb and unproductive way to start a discussion. The idea there is that objectivists are threatened by listening results that seem to contradict measurements. The implication is that a belief in science is just another "ism" that's emotionally driven and on par with a belief in listening without regard to measurements. Not only is this implication false, but more importantly it covers over the fatal error in the entire premise of the "you can't handle the truth" claim: The subjectivist position is a version of the "God of the Gaps" concept of religion: anything that appears to one particular layperson to be unexplained by a particular set of measurements, is asserted to be forever inexplicable, to everyone including experts, no matter how many or types of measurements one might take.

To put it more simply, the person saying "you can't handle the truth" has no earthly idea what the truth actually is. "I heard something" is not the same as "I heard something and I would still hear it under more rigorous testing conditions and others would be able to repeat my results under those conditions, and the reason is that X capacitor is better than Y capacitor for reasons that are not and cannot be reflected in measurements." It's total nonsense, and it's based on a willful refusal to look further into what might actually be going on.

2. Sloppy Arguments: There's nothing wrong with using and buying equipment or doing upgrades and such based on what sounds good to you. Have at it: do it, enjoy it, tell others about it. Where the problem comes in, though, is that folks are not content to say "it sounds better to me." They claim they don't care about science or measurements or expertise, and yet they inevitably cite "engineers" who "know what they're doing" and "know how to conduct tests"; and they claim that their preferred audiophile tweaks will sound better to anyone "with sufficiently good hearing" or "with sufficiently resolving equipment."

So the self-proclaimed subjectivists actually believe very strongly in expertise, engineering, testing, and equipment that is as audibly high-fidelity and transparent ("resolving") as possible. They believe in all the tools and principles that they mock objectivists for believing in - they just want to use those tools and deploy those principles in sloppy, selective, and self-serving ways.

Consensus Beneath the BS: If we dispense with all this nonsense, we can see that there's no need for such polarizing arguments. The most easily identified objectivists in this thread are more than happy to look further into the differences between capacitors - it's not that they're unwilling to do so ("can't handle the truth"), but rather that they're unwilling to stop looking into it at some arbitrary superficial, self-satisfied level (want to see what the truth actually might be).

So maybe asking, "What is the TRUTH about capacitor upgrades in crossovers?" might be a good way to reframe the conversation.
 
OP
C

ctrl

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"You CAN'T handle the TRUTH!" is, with respect, a dumb and unproductive way to start a discussion....

I agree, the subtitle is idiotic.
@tmtomh did you read the first post at all or just the headline?

The subtitle is meant as an ironic allusion to the main content of the post, namely the review of the Youtube video by "new record day" and GR-Research with the title "You CAN'T handle the TRUTH! with GR-Research", which is about the fact that allegedly a component upgrade of a crossover is not measurable but clearly audible.
1599838506417.png


Maybe I put too much on the readers, I actually assumed that this becomes obvious when the amount is read. I assumed that after reading the first lines and later with the video link, the irony in the subtitle would become clear:

1599839012646.png
 

Xulonn

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“Scientific certainty” is an oxymoron.

As an older non-scientist, but with many years of college/university education in the sciences, and employment in various science "support" roles (research technician, scientific software sales), I cringe whenever I see the words "proof" or "certainty" used by the uninformed amongst us.

Well-funded anti-science propaganda efforts rose to prominence in the U.S. in 1954, although the first health-related anti-smoking campaign was in Germany in the 1920s. The pro-smoking effort was supported by very well-paid corrupt scientists hired by tobacco companies to convince the public that cigarette smoking does not cause cancer. Powerful and effective psychology-based campaigns supported a popular, yet very unhealthy and profitable habit by claiming that "strong, documented links" were not "proof", and that unless there was "proof", the conclusion that "tobacco smoking causes cancer" could not be considered valid. [LINK1] [LINK2]

In audio, Covid-19 denial and other arenas, the magnification effect of first television, and now the internet and social media, has amplified (audio pun intended) anti-science attitudes to a mind-boggling level in modern society. This thread is just another example of the popularity of righteously defended "beliefs" that are not supported by rationality, knowledge, logic and science.

(I find the Hollywood-style "western' shirt and supposed "cowboy" neckerchief - although neckerchiefs were popular - in the below video to be hilarious. Below the video is my "proof" of what real cowboys looked like - five of them in a photo from the Slaughter Ranch in Arizone in 1885.)


slaughter-cowboys.jpg
 

KaiserSoze

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So Kaiser, calling an un-named person a Bozo is what branch of "science"? Glad you think it is so funny. For anyone here at ASR posting graphs, charts, measurements, and/or lecturing about equivalent circuit equations, provide the following information along with the proclamations of "proven", final answer, complete, exclamation point.

1) Brand, Model, and serial number of all equipment used in the experiment.
2) When were the items in 1) calibrated.
3) If calibrated, traceable to the Nation Bureau of Standards?
4) If not calibrated, explain why not.
5) What is the length, resistance, inductance, and capacitance of all cabling used.
6) Detailed diagram of the test configuration
7) Detailed test procedure
8) How is the unit under test (UUT) identified, stored, and handled
9) Complete description and details of the test location and environment
10) Procedure used to eliminate Bias of the tester.

If those 10 points are present, then a good start toward following a "scientific" process. Otherwise, simply an experiment - not scientific certainty.

Octalman, I have looked back over your posts in the effort to figure out exactly what it is that you are claiming, i.e., what your hypothesis is, exactly. Here is what I found:

Capacitors Identified as "Audio" quality are audibly different. ... Over the last 4 months of incremental modifications and careful listening, capacitor quality does make a difference. My musically trained ear ... Why would capacitors have an audible characteristic that is not measurable? My 40+ years in Military/Aerospace lead to a theory. The source of raw materials processing of raw material, storage, manufacturing process, physical construction and other factors play a role. ... I believe there are contributing factors to an audible difference between capacitors that are simply not revealed by electrical measurements.

Your hypothesis is that different kinds of capacitors sound different even when no differences between them can be detected by taking measurements. When you go about setting up the controlled tests to prove your hypothesis, you need to make absolutely certain that it is not possible to detect any differences between the two capacitors using measurements alone, before undertaking the listening tests. But how do you make certain that no measurement would ever be able to detect any difference between the two capacitors? You could not, and this is why your hypothesis amounts to jabberwocky. When you made your claim you did not realize that part of what you were claiming is that you have discovered a way to prove that no measurements would ever be able to detect a difference between the two capacitors used to perform the controlled experiment. This would be the more earth-shattering aspect of your hypothesis, if there were any merit to it. The scientific community would hardly even take note of what you had proved with respect to the audibility of different capacitors, because they would be completely caught up in the way you had gone about proving, for the pair of capacitors you had selected, that no measurements would ever be able to tell one from the other.

The first that I was aware of your existence was when you wrote the post wherein you insulted me out of the blue. I replied three weeks later. Here is an excerpt of what I wrote in my reply:

"The most fundamental thing that you need to understand is that if you want to make a claim such as the one you made, the onus is on you, not people who are skeptical of your claim, to conduct proper scientific tests to support your claim."

In the first post I wrote, the one that you took exception to, I explained why this is how the world works. That explanation shouldn't have been difficult to follow. The statement I had made where I used the word "bozo" was also in the post that you first took exception to, where I had discussed the reasons why this debate is flawed out of the gate. The part where I used the word "bozo" was near the end. Here it is:

"...unless and until the people making fringe claims start acting like responsible, professional engineers and scientists, all of it should be treated like a pile of malarky. In any scientific field, it is preposterous for a bunch of professional people to accept a bunch of unproven crap in the total absence of any scientific evidence or even an honest scientific effort to prove the hypotheses. At present we have a fellow who willingly put himself in the spotlight because he wanted to increase his revenue. He is obviously not a scientist, as evidenced by his utter lack of understanding of scientific process. Scientists are rightfully annoyed when they encounter some bozo running around making preposterous claims all the while displaying a complete lack of understanding of what would be expected of him before any of his claims would be taken seriously by the scientific community."

Again, this was not directed at you. It was written before I had any awareness of Octalman. That said, I don't have any regrets about using the word "bozo" in the way I did, to characterize someone who would aggressively display a total lack of understanding of scientific process while running around making claims that he makes only because it is part of a money-making scheme. I can't think of a single reason why I would want to withhold use of the word "bozo" in reference to someone who would do that.
 

chych7

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Perhaps components don't matter, perhaps they do, but in the end they are small $$. I'd rather get the best components if they aren't too expensive. If I am DIY'ing a speaker and the materials cost $500-$1000, requires say 20 hrs of work (I value my time at $100/hr), then an extra $50 for nicer caps/resistors is insignificant.
 

paddycrow

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Audio grade is another adjective that doesn't have a precise engineering definition. A manufacturer could make two identical parts and package one as audio grade. (And charge more for them.)

Better quality generally means lower variation.
 

KaiserSoze

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Perhaps components don't matter, perhaps they do, but in the end they are small $$. I'd rather get the best components if they aren't too expensive. If I am DIY'ing a speaker and the materials cost $500-$1000, requires say 20 hrs of work (I value my time at $100/hr), then an extra $50 for nicer caps/resistors is insignificant.

Or you could spend the $50 on something that would make a difference. Even nicer finishes and grill cloths make a difference.
 

chych7

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Or you could spend the $50 on something that would make a difference. Even nicer finishes and grill cloths make a difference.

Or you can do both, no need to nickle and dime here. Being an audiophile is not a cheap hobby, and debating over $30-$50 components is really questionable. I guess if you want you could use a coat hanger to wire up your $1k+ speakers, after all, it doesn't make a difference, right?

Also I'm inclined to follow the guidance of actual speaker designers who've really delved deep into this subject, versus armchair measurement "scientists" who are adamantly trying to prove a negative.
 

SIY

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Or you can do both, no need to nickle and dime here. Being an audiophile is not a cheap hobby, and debating over $30-$50 components is really questionable. I guess if you want you could use a coat hanger to wire up your $1k+ speakers, after all, it doesn't make a difference, right?

Also I'm inclined to follow the guidance of actual speaker designers who've really delved deep into this subject, versus armchair measurement "scientists" who are adamantly trying to prove a negative.

If you "delve deep," you can find that the fancy and expensive parts are inferior to mass-produced. Especially capacitors, where I have many horror stories.
 

chych7

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If you "delve deep," you can find that the fancy and expensive parts are inferior to mass-produced. Especially capacitors, where I have many horror stories.

So 100% of more expensive parts are worse than cheaper parts, according to your logic?
 

SIY

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I certainly don't claim that, just asking for a clarification of your statement "fancy and expensive parts are inferior to mass-produced".

Nice excision. When you're ready to have an honest discussion, please let me know.
 

chych7

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Nice excision. When you're ready to have an honest discussion, please let me know.

Please explain to me what I'm missing here... just trying to parse your initial post saying that expensive parts, especially capacitors, are inferior to mass-produced ones.
 

SIY

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Please explain to me what I'm missing here... just trying to parse your initial post saying that expensive parts, especially capacitors, are inferior to mass-produced ones.

Not yet, apparently.

Sea lions are delightful creatures.
 

kn0ppers

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I think he already let you know very clearly why he isn't interested in having this discussion with you and totally agree with SIY. If someone starts off a "discussion" the way you did, I'd also show little interest.

Take a step away from the keyboard, log out, read your posts as if they were another persons and re-evaluate your approach to having a discussion.
 

KaiserSoze

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Or you can do both, no need to nickle and dime here. Being an audiophile is not a cheap hobby, and debating over $30-$50 components is really questionable. I guess if you want you could use a coat hanger to wire up your $1k+ speakers, after all, it doesn't make a difference, right?

Also I'm inclined to follow the guidance of actual speaker designers who've really delved deep into this subject, versus armchair measurement "scientists" who are adamantly trying to prove a negative.

What you said doesn't make sense. Your reasoning is implicitly something like this: "He doesn't believe that more expensive capacitors make a difference, therefore he doesn't believe that anything makes a difference, therefore he would advocate wiring a speaker with coat hanger wire." Hopefully you are able to see that your implied reasoning does not make logical sense. In order for it to make any sense, it would need to first have been established to a very high degree of certainty that more expensive capacitors sound better. This has not been proven, therefore the implied logic in what you wrote does not make logical sense, therefore what you wrote is nonsense. See how easy that was?

I gotta say I'm having a chuckle over the "armchair measurement 'scientists' who are adamantly trying to prove a negative." This illustrates the very reason that I advised ctrl (and anyone else who tries to do what he did) to refrain from trying to disprove other people's unproven hypothesis, even in cases where the hypothesis is as silly as the hypothesis that different capacitors can sound different even if no known measurement is able to tell them apart.

If you attended college, you should have taken some introductory philosophy, and if you had, you should have known enough not to have written just about everything you wrote. No one has ever proven anything or even won an argument by claiming or insinuating that the people who agree with their opinion are informed and that the people who disagree them are not informed. There is only one question here that matters one whit: whether there is any evidence to back up the notion that capacitors can sound different even if it isn't possible to distinguish them through measurements. This is the only real question here, and it is highly unlikely that anyone who has a moderately broad understanding of such things as physics and engineering would think this hypothesis could possibly be true. And there is a big logical problem with it, as I already pointed out, which is that it is predicated on the idea that it would be possible to prove that no measurement would ever be capable of distinguishing between the two capacitors that are deemed to sound different but measure identically. Talk about trying to prove a negative. How would you go about proving that it would never be possible for measurements to distinguish between a given pair of capacitors?
 
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