Can anyone explain the vinyl renaissance?

[Galliardist]

Genetic mutations, when highly beneficial, can spread through populations very fast. I believe there is current research showing that lactose tolerance spread within just a few generations in European populations prehistorically, allowing for major cultural shifts.

Show that the change spread to the entire population when only a tiny percentage were drinking milk, and I'll withdraw on my assertion: except that I don't see that we evolved to use symbols better within a few generations as a general population.

See under, for example, continuing misuse of apostrophe's among native English writers.

I guess I'll have to read the book to find out what this is really about.

 

[Edward W. Stanley]

With the albums and cinnamon, one will be prepared for the great apocalypse ...

 

[pderousse]

Show that the change spread to the entire population when only a tiny percentage were drinking milk, and I'll withdraw on my assertion: except that I don't see that we evolved to use symbols better within a few generations as a general population.

See under, for example, continuing misuse of apostrophe's among native English writers.

I guess I'll have to read the book to find out what this is really about.

The book is written by a linguist who studies how our brains process language as we read on different media (my point), not a biologist making some point about evolution (not my point). A convince me attitude on something very tangential to the thesis of an unread book shows only that one has dug in their heels (In rereading the chain, I can see I may have misled you by a word you and others picked up on. It is difficult to give one sentence summaries of books.). However, we also cannot cavalierly dismiss a genetic component to our species’ aptitude for language and symbolic thinking. To do so would reauqire also throwing out all of Noam Chomsky’s work on linguistics.

 

[IPunchCholla]

Show that the change spread to the entire population when only a tiny percentage were drinking milk, and I'll withdraw on my assertion: except that I don't see that we evolved to use symbols better within a few generations as a general population.

See under, for example, continuing misuse of apostrophe's among native English writers.

I guess I'll have to read the book to find out what this is really about.

I need to look into the research myself, I just remember it was mentioned in passing in a dietary analysis I was reading. And certainly even if true means nothing about our relationship to symbols.

 

[Galliardist]

The book is written by a linguist who studies how our brains process language as we read on different media (my point), not a biologist making some point about evolution (not my point). A convince me attitude on something very tangential to the thesis of an unread book shows only that one has dug in their heels (In rereading the chain, I can see I may have misled you by a word you and others picked up on. It is difficult to give one sentence summaries of books.). However, we also cannot cavalierly dismiss a genetic component to our species’ aptitude for language and symbolic thinking. To do so would reauqire also throwing out all of Noam Chomsky’s work on linguistics.

Indeed, my reaction was to your post, not the book. If I defend that reaction, it doesn't mean that I'm attacking the book, either.

Nor am I going to deny a very long past of our having spoken language, something that has not (except maybe as art) been restricted to a small section of society for most of that time, either.

 

[stringer]

Show that the change spread to the entire population when only a tiny percentage were drinking milk, and I'll withdraw on my assertion: except that I don't see that we evolved to use symbols better within a few generations as a general population.

See under, for example, continuing misuse of apostrophe's among native English writers.

I guess I'll have to read the book to find out what this is really about.

The mutation spread in a few generations because of other population pressures at the time. Mainly plague and famine. If you could live off of milk over the winter you lived and passed on your genes. If you couldn't you died. I don't know what this has to do with punctuation.

 

[Galliardist]

The mutation spread in a few generations because of other population pressures at the time. Mainly plague and famine. If you could live off of milk over the winter you lived and passed on your genes. If you couldn't you died. I don't know what this has to do with punctuation.

My original assertion that was answered with the lactose mutation was that humans did not evolve to better understand pre-digital media because only part of tbe population encountered it until recent times,

The point about apostrophes is partly a joke, but makes the point, I feel.

 

[Axo1989]

Sorry, I can’t brook all of these premises (pictograms date to at least c. 2800 BC, tokens a few centuries earlier, cave prints c. 30k BC, cutting-tool funerary epitaphs, etc. to at least 100k BC) or be the spokesperson for an entire field of linguistics (AXO), let alone a scholarly witness of reading neuroscience at the moment when developed countries started to turn from the codex, c. 2008. One either reads a book, or does not read a book. Have we drifted from the analogy?

Interesting, but how true? Most people would only have had physical media for more than pictures of things for a few hundred years. Society can evolve in one sense of the word over that time, but humans? Most human learning over millennia will have been either through demonstration, or oral/maybe by gesture.

Responding to @Galliardist (and including @pderousse's post for context): speaking of theories of pedagogy, it's been such a while since i was involved in education/behaviour change projects I feared I'd lost the thread, but after sleeping on it I managed to recall I was impressed by Vygotsky's perspective on education and wider human development, which includes emphasis on learning by demonstration, etc and 'non-hereditary adaptation'.

I appear to have kept none of my materials from what was one of my first work projects but this reference is a decent start if you are vaguely interested. As for how it holds up I haven't really kept up with developments (V was influenced by Spinoza and Piaget notably, so one could read for days).

 

[Axo1989]

Veering back to the vicinity of the topic and apposite to the general discourse on ASR, while jogging my memory I came across the elaboration of Peter's (originally satirical) observations:

1. Unconscious Incompetence. Not knowing how to do a task without knowing you don’t know.
2. Conscious Incompetence. You still don’t know how to do the task but now you know you don’t know. You are aware of a gap in your knowledge.
3. Conscious Competence. You can now do the task but it requires a lot of concentration.
4. Unconscious Competence. You can perform the task with ease. This is achieved by repeated practice.

Peter, L. J., & Hull, R. (1969). The Peter Principle.

We could call stage 1 the subjectivist maw, and stage 2 the objectivist's enlightenment (somewhat tongue-in-cheek but close enough). And contra constant critics like our serially sh*t-stirring old mate, when we know our (in my case hypothetical, but for others, real) records and turntables embody certain sonic characteristics and still enjoy them, we've likely transcended that binary.

 

[Anton D]

Veering back to the vicinity of the topic and apposite to the general discourse on ASR, while jogging my memory I came across the elaboration of Peter's (originally satirical) observations:

1. Unconscious Incompetence. Not knowing how to do a task without knowing you don’t know.
2. Conscious Incompetence. You still don’t know how to do the task but now you know you don’t know. You are aware of a gap in your knowledge.
3. Conscious Competence. You can now do the task but it requires a lot of concentration.
4. Unconscious Competence. You can perform the task with ease. This is achieved by repeated practice.

Peter, L. J., & Hull, R. (1969). The Peter Principle.

We could call stage 1 the subjectivist maw, and stage 2 the objectivist's enlightenment (somewhat tongue-in-cheek but close enough). And contra constant critics like our serially sh*t-stirring old mate, when we know our (in my case hypothetical, but for others, real) records and turntables embody certain sonic characteristics and still enjoy them, we've likely transcended that binary.

An old favorite!

“There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don't know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don't know we don't know.”

My favorite Rumsfeld quote.

 

[Newman]

Veering back to the vicinity of the topic and apposite to the general discourse on ASR, while jogging my memory I came across the elaboration of Peter's (originally satirical) observations:

1. Unconscious Incompetence. Not knowing how to do a task without knowing you don’t know.
2. Conscious Incompetence. You still don’t know how to do the task but now you know you don’t know. You are aware of a gap in your knowledge.
3. Conscious Competence. You can now do the task but it requires a lot of concentration.
4. Unconscious Competence. You can perform the task with ease. This is achieved by repeated practice.

Peter, L. J., & Hull, R. (1969). The Peter Principle.

The Johari Window (1955) is probably more useful for building self awareness. But I am not in favour of bringing tools and labels from psychology into these discussions, because the inevitable consequence will be incompetent weaponising of them against people who disagree with one's opinions, in order to ridicule and pointscore. Oh look, I'm too late:-

We could call stage 1 the subjectivist maw, and stage 2 the objectivist's enlightenment (somewhat tongue-in-cheek but close enough). And contra constant critics like our serially sh*t-stirring old mate, when we know our (in my case hypothetical, but for others, real) records and turntables embody certain sonic characteristics and still enjoy them, we've likely transcended that binary.

Transcended LOL.

Let's keep it simple: when one can grasp, acknowledge and accept Toole's summaries of the best research into the audio science of sound reproduction in the home, and doesn't feel compelled to try and dismiss it (sometimes with handwaving over-generalisations about the "nature of science itself") whenever it conflicts with one's own sighted listening observations, then one is making progress.

cheers

 

[Axo1989]

The Johari Window (1955) is probably more useful for building self awareness. But I am not in favour of bringing tools and labels from psychology into these discussions, because the inevitable consequence will be incompetent weaponising of them against people who disagree with one's opinions, in order to ridicule and pointscore. Oh look, I'm too late:-

The Peter principle quote was more a humorous segue back to the audio topic, not intended as an invitation to a paradigmatic pissing contest.

Let's keep it simple: when one can grasp, acknowledge and accept Toole's summaries of the best research into the audio science of sound reproduction in the home, and doesn't feel compelled to try and dismiss it (sometimes with handwaving over-generalisations about the "nature of science itself") whenever it conflicts with one's own sighted listening observations, then one is making progress.

I think you've misread—or I wasn't clear enough—the 'sonic characteristics' I referred to are mostly deficiencies, or sometimes euphonic characteristics that some people enjoy (note that I said "and still enjoy them" in other words, despite technical shortcomings). We 'know' they are there because we can (often) hear and (generally) measure them. People may enjoy them for many reasons, some to do with the sound waves themselves. Other triggers for enjoyment relate to ritual, nostalgia, tactility, biases and narratives, etc as discussed here at length.

 

[Brian Hall]

Vinyl records can sound really good. I was listening to "The Wall" earlier. It sounded great. I'm amazed at how good it can sound compared to the setup I had in college many years ago. Then the side ended. Instead of turning it over and continuing, I switched to the ripped CD version and listened to the same songs. It sounded even better. Objectively, it makes no sense to listen to vinyl records when better formats with better sound quality are readily available, much more convenient and less expensive.

It has to be nostalgia that makes us waste time and money on vinyl setups and paying more for the vinyl records. Even so, I would probably spend a little more time listening to them if I didn't have to flip it over or switch to something else every ~15 to ~20 minutes.

 

[killdozzer]

I love the last couple of dozen of posts that finally explained, once and for all, the vinyl renaissance. It is, indeed, because of how we learn the symbolic communication system. Yes.

I remember once, I wrote something about how vinyl-heads try to circumvent all good counter-arguments for records by developing some idiotic steam-punk BS with 2 meter tone-arms and machined TT stand weighing a ton and selling for 5 digit prices (in US dollars) and silly elaborate suspension contraptions (none of which are needed in a 500$ Denon CD Player), and immediately someone jumped to yell "strawman, strawman!!". But, learning the language... Yeah, fine. No problem there.

 

[killdozzer]

Not quite a palindrome: the UI turned only 90 degrees. Regardless, my idea was just to reassure when I replied to Mikig who stated they were "concerned" and "I tend to forget more easily" when reading a screen. The book reference was meant to reassure that it is a pretty well studied phenomenon. So part of the analogy is physical text : deeper comprehension :: vinyl : ? Whether others wish to explore that and complete the anology to something about vinyl, I do not know, but I do find it interesting that in both cases we are talking about a media recension. I'm here for you if you really want to talk books, etc. elsewhere, but I'm sensitive to diverting from the OP, so no not a post and run.

You would be well advised to discard such nonsense and see it for what it is. When you hear "neuroscience" thrown around haphazardly the best way to understand it is in a manner in which "quantum" sells BS snake-oil in audio to those who don't enjoy thinking much.

There are so many variables that changed, or just came about yesterday, when it comes to learning/reading from screens that you'll recognize an honest researcher by the fact he'll admit that it is next to impossible to single out the paper/screen variable, measure it substantially and draw any firm conclusion from it. You would literally need to go back in time with a smartphone and give it to a 50' scholar to see if he'll remember any worse. It's fashionable babble, not science nor proven.

Neuroscience became the proverbial broad-brush that paints all lacks in knowledge. However, neuroscience itself is still a complete mystery. Monitoring the neuron firing and comparing it to other neuron firing is far from satisfactory.

It does even worse job explaining enjoying records since you don't read of of a record. It gets turned into a sound both when it comes to CDs and records and reaches your ear through the same medium - a sound wave propagated via air. And since you can rip the entire audible content of a record onto a CD and dupe EVERY single one of vinyl-heads, much to the glory of the "MoFi case", it's certainly not the medium nor the method of recording sound.

There is nothing really mysterious about records. You have preference, nostalgia and ego-stroking. These cover all aspects of the renaissance. It only fails to explain a casual "every-now-and-then" listener who is not a part of the renaissance anyway.

Renaissance is a fad that'll whither away. A bit slower than others perhaps, since you have your money invested in it so you'll try to make it work, but it will go away. If for no other reason then because CDs are now getting the nostalgia appeal and have better sound.

There's a huge portion of people who are now disappointed in their purchase and the decision to go vinyl. They expected a better sound and didn't get it. For awhile, they're willing to accept thinking they need to learn more, invest more, pay for someone to set it up etc. This will wear out and they'll hit play on their CD Players or PC player software. Even from personal experience, I see people doing such crazy things, desperately trying to make it work, asking me questions like; is there such a thing as a TT with amp built in and a headphones out and would this make it sound better and bypass some of the shortcomings? Many of them bought an absolute dread of a unit, like 49$ TT when new just to be able to say I'm playing records or throw "record-playing" parties. Non of these will last. It'll go back to genuine few that prefer records and the time will deal with them.

 

[killdozzer]

Photos, whether displayed on paper or a screen can not capture all the details and colors of a painting. Take it a step further.... go look at a "real" flower in a garden, whether painted or photographed the details, especially the colors, are not even close.

Oh, but people see the world in 2D and the rest is a trained skill. You don't really see reality. And many paintings and photos are far more beautiful and have more detail and color than the actual location.

 

[Jaxjax]

These threads always get so over complicated. It's not complicated at all. I don't know any vinyl collector that is an analog only type. Those people are rare nowadays. The real hard core analog types are running tape anyway.... Vinyl reminds me of hotrods, as most all new performance cars will outperform them but the big HP hotrod brings alot of joy.. drag racing is the same...Wife & I do jet sleds on small rivers that go creek size in summer & running 3-6" of water on narrow, F1 type corners, boulder riddled banks at high speed. There is only a few that do skinny water in sleds compared to prop heads...& they don't understand the why of it.. props are way more efficient. & cost way less per HP actualy used to move the boat/ A dang kayak will get ya to the same gravel bar I just crashed my sled on to get to the secret fishing hole. It's the journey up or down river, floaters see the beauty, we see the same eagles,etc, both dangerous as many drown here floating . Wrecked my sled 2 years ago dodging a fly fisherman...talk about obsolete way of fishing.. it's noy fly only here so why do it.? I get it but most don't. Never said a word & took my heavily damaged sled home after getting it off a gravel bar as I respect his way of fishing & would hope he did mine.

 

[pderousse]

You would be well advised to discard such nonsense and see it for what it is. When you hear "neuroscience" thrown around haphazardly the best way to understand it is in a manner in which "quantum" sells BS snake-oil in audio to those who don't enjoy thinking much.

There are so many variables that changed, or just came about yesterday, when it comes to learning/reading from screens that you'll recognize an honest researcher by the fact he'll admit that it is next to impossible to single out the paper/screen variable, measure it substantially and draw any firm conclusion from it. You would literally need to go back in time with a smartphone and give it to a 50' scholar to see if he'll remember any worse. It's fashionable babble, not science nor proven.

Neuroscience became the proverbial broad-brush that paints all lacks in knowledge. However, neuroscience itself is still a complete mystery. Monitoring the neuron firing and comparing it to other neuron firing is far from satisfactory.

It does even worse job explaining enjoying records since you don't read of of a record. It gets turned into a sound both when it comes to CDs and records and reaches your ear through the same medium - a sound wave propagated via air. And since you can rip the entire audible content of a record onto a CD and dupe EVERY single one of vinyl-heads, much to the glory of the "MoFi case", it's certainly not the medium nor the method of recording sound.

There is nothing really mysterious about records. You have preference, nostalgia and ego-stroking. These cover all aspects of the renaissance. It only fails to explain a casual "every-now-and-then" listener who is not a part of the renaissance anyway.

Renaissance is a fad that'll whither away. A bit slower than others perhaps, since you have your money invested in it so you'll try to make it work, but it will go away. If for no other reason then because CDs are now getting the nostalgia appeal and have better sound.

There's a huge portion of people who are now disappointed in their purchase and the decision to go vinyl. They expected a better sound and didn't get it. For awhile, they're willing to accept thinking they need to learn more, invest more, pay for someone to set it up etc. This will wear out and they'll hit play on their CD Players or PC player software. Even from personal experience, I see people doing such crazy things, desperately trying to make it work, asking me questions like; is there such a thing as a TT with amp built in and a headphones out and would this make it sound better and bypass some of the shortcomings? Many of them bought an absolute dread of a unit, like 49$ TT when new just to be able to say I'm playing records or throw "record-playing" parties. Non of these will last. It'll go back to genuine few that prefer records and the time will deal with them.

Latching on to a single word (neuroscience) in someone’s 1-2 sentence summary of a scholar’s book-length thesis in order to attempt to discredit the description and someone's research is captious in the extreme. I'm sure no one here is a fan of neuro-marketing, and it had nothing to do with my point. Notice that I deliberately did not complete the analogy “physical text : deeper comprehension :: vinyl : ?” That last “?” is where all of the data and methodology would need to go in order to support a conclusion, if one cared to do serious research on what people hear in vinyl by going down that road. Nevertheless, the last two posts complete it on the basis of no evidence with enjoying records and something about "read[ing] records." I agree that such an idea is most certainly wrong and methodologically facile - and again not what I wrote.

There are hundreds of pages worth of posts by people claiming that they hear something in vinyl. I’m skeptical, but humble enough in the face of such a large population to entertain the possibility that something unknown is producing preference. Concluding that vinyl lovers are simply nostalgic egotists is, well, it is a lot of things, but it both ignores every variable that impacts sound after the CD rip, including a person’s room, their hearing acuity and any of a number of other variables going on inside their brain, but it also assumes that all recordings are somehow equal, that a bad CD recording is inconceivable and the existence of a single better vinyl recording preposterous. Over-simplification to the point of misrepresentation is not productive of any knowledge. You are right that physical media - vinyl and CDs - will eventually whither away, as some portion of the millions of recordings migrate to the new medium. Many will not. This the definition of a recension.

 

[MattHooper]

Latching on to a single word (neuroscience) in someone’s 1-2 sentence summary of a scholar’s book-length thesis in order to attempt to discredit the description and someone's research is captious in the extreme. I'm sure no one here is a fan of neuro-marketing, and it had nothing to do with my point. Notice that I deliberately did not complete the analogy “physical text : deeper comprehension :: vinyl : ?” That last “?” is where all of the data and methodology would need to go in order to support a conclusion, if one cared to do serious research on what people hear in vinyl by going down that road. Nevertheless, the last two posts complete it on the basis of no evidence with enjoying records and something about "read[ing] records." I agree that such an idea is most certainly wrong and methodologically facile - and again not what I wrote.

There are hundreds of pages worth of posts by people claiming that they hear something in vinyl. I’m skeptical, but humble enough in the face of such a large population to entertain the possibility that something unknown is producing preference. Concluding that vinyl lovers are simply nostalgic egotists is, well, it is a lot of things, but it both ignores every variable that impacts sound after the CD rip, including a person’s room, their hearing acuity and any of a number of other variables going on inside their brain, but it also assumes that all recordings are somehow equal, that a bad CD recording is inconceivable and the existence of a single better vinyl recording preposterous. Over-simplification to the point of misrepresentation is not productive of any knowledge. You are right that physical media - vinyl and CDs - will eventually whither away, as some portion of the millions of recordings migrate to the new medium. Many will not. This the definition of a recension.

Killdozer, like some others, are not engaging in any real attempt to understand the motivations of people in regard to the vinyl phenomenon. Mostly it’s just an exercise and self gratifying pop psychology, attributing to others the more base motivations.

Like I just did

 

[Anton D]

Vinyl records can sound really good. I was listening to "The Wall" earlier. It sounded great. I'm amazed at how good it can sound compared to the setup I had in college many years ago. Then the side ended. Instead of turning it over and continuing, I switched to the ripped CD version and listened to the same songs. It sounded even better. Objectively, it makes no sense to listen to vinyl records when better formats with better sound quality are readily available, much more convenient and less expensive.

It has to be nostalgia that makes us waste time and money on vinyl setups and paying more for the vinyl records. Even so, I would probably spend a little more time listening to them if I didn't have to flip it over or switch to something else every ~15 to ~20 minutes.

That's AOK, it's not for you.

This makes no sense, however: "Objectively, it makes no sense to listen to vinyl records when better formats with better sound quality are readily available, much more convenient and less expensive."

Objectively?