Can useful knowledge be gained via subjectivity?

[krabapple]

That's an incredibly narrow definition of the word "subjective". You turned it into a pejorative. Most definitions of the term do not match yours.

No if you understood what I wrote.

The use I am casting as 'pejorative' is exactly the one in play when audiophiles war over 'subjective' versus 'objective' reports of audio. Read 'not bias controlled' versus 'bias-controlled'. It's 'pejorative' in the same way that rejecting a paper on audio difference that used bad experimental methods would be 'pejorative'

But feel free to keep spinning your outrage wheels over this if it makes you (subjectively) happy.

 

[krabapple]

I'm talking of the term "subjective" all by its lonesome, with meanings that do not attach themselves automatically to "sighted listening".
In this forum, attaching oneself to the term "subjective" is automatically considered some sort of social faux pas. But people's responses to sound, sighted or not, are crucial, are a necessary part of the process. To then say that the term only relates to the known problems of sighted listening is to erase all the other potential meanings and usages of the term, which are quite important as regards sound quality.

Says you.

Try submitting to a journal of audio science and see how that meaning of 'sound quality' works for you.

--me , posting on a forum called 'Audio Science Review'

 

[Galliardist]

He isn’t defining the word that way. He is saying subjective listening can be sighted (open to non-sonic influence) or controlled (not open to non-sonic factors influencing our perception of sound). Then he discusses what goes wrong with sighted subjective listening.

Also, sighted subjective listening it is not “incredibly narrow”: it is general practice to listen that way.

And so it should be (gasp). That does not invalidate objectivism or any of the criticisms of sighted listening.

Let's try and unpack some of this.

When you're buying a system or components, the system is effectively defined as the contraption that takes the source information and spits out the soundwaves. That makes you the observer of the system. You need to observe the whole experience - you need to control the source, use the remote, see what is there (because sight is the strongest of our senses, it influences our understanding of the sound), you need to let your whole brain operate because your memories, learning and understanding all feed into what you hear. I'd define the room here as part of the environment of the system - if you change the environment, you also can also change the outputs of the system, so I think we're OK with that, though you could define a treated room for a particular setup as part of the system.

But let's change our focus to that of someone wishing to learn from a system owner's description of a component change. When we wish to study that experience, we need to view the system in a different way.

Now, we include the listener and the room as part of the system. The person reading the description - let's say, you - are an outside observer of the system. The output of the system, as far as you the reader of the description - isn't the sound waves at all. The output is the listener's response, as described. What we know is as good as the description and no more.

The point is that we miss the difference between these two things. It's too easy to assume that we know about the sound waves - either to assume that the report will apply to the same hardware in a different room to a different listener, or to assume that "understanding and fixing the sound waves" will improve the system, when better results come from treating "the part of the system with the ears".

When you are looking to change or evaluate components for the purpose of improving your own system, you are actually looking to improve the system of which you are a part. So, of course, you have to do it sighted, to experience everything, not just the sound waves.

I guess, the ability to be the dispassionate observer armed with objectivity, and the listener in the moment, is what arms you against snake oil products and allows you to give permission to yourself to be subjective at the same time.

It also tells us that if we want to improve audio, we have to observe and improve the system that includes the listener. And that allows for the research that gives us the various Harman curves, doesn't it?

 

[Killingbeans]

Boy thats alot of hypothesizing!!

I think a lot of professions see it as a crucial part of navigating the human experience. Doctors, lawyers, marketing strategists, therapists/psychologists/psychiatrist, to name a few. The susceptibility of human senses to suggestion is not a revelation to any of these people.

A different question for this thread might be: What is snake-oil? How do you define it, and/or where do you draw the line? Is any products in existence completely void of the mechanisms behind snake-oil? When is it important to minimize the impact of those mechanisms, and when is it just a natural part of the hobby?

 

[Mulder]

I think a lot of professions see it as a crucial part of navigating the human experience. Doctors, lawyers, marketing strategists, therapists/psychologists/psychiatrist, to name a few. The susceptibility of human senses to suggestion is not a revelation to any of these people.

A different question for this thread might be: What is snake-oil? How do you define it, and/or where do you draw the line? Is any products in existence completely void of the mechanisms behind snake-oil? When is it important to minimize the impact of those mechanisms, and when is it just a natural part of the hobby?

Snake oil is a product which promises an improvement but i reality has no effect whatsoever. Even a bad power-amplifer for example, still amplifies a signal. But a cable-lifter? Snake-oil is a kind of fraud. A bad product is bad, but normally not fraud.

 

[ahofer]

I suspect this has been said upthread, but subjectivity in audio only gives us useful information when it is controlled for other biases. Otherwise we have too large a multi-causal mess to untangle to find the information.

I guess “useful” here is in advancing the science of sound reproduction or room design, etc. Someone’s uncontrolled subjective observations are quite useful in assessing their state of mind.

 

[billyjoebob]

I think a lot of professions see it as a crucial part of navigating the human experience. Doctors, lawyers, marketing strategists, therapists/psychologists/psychiatrist, to name a few. The susceptibility of human senses to suggestion is not a revelation to any of these people.

A different question for this thread might be: What is snake-oil? How do you define it, and/or where do you draw the line? Is any products in existence completely void of the mechanisms behind snake-oil? When is it important to minimize the impact of those mechanisms, and when is it just a natural part of the hobby?

I like this train of thought!
You pointed out my #1 quirk that I often see posted. To me snake oil (as @Mulder pointed out) is the fraud in this industry. There is plenty and it needs to be called out.
What grinds my gears, is when poster states that a moderate upgrade is chasing snake oil or that the listener has (magic ears).
Even from the likes of a company like Topping. If someone says that they are interested in say the D90, they will sometimes be accused of chasing snake oil by the folks who think the D10 is all you will ever need!

 

[krabapple]

And so it should be (gasp). That does not invalidate objectivism or any of the criticisms of sighted listening.

Right. So why this thread, and why the page-long essays?

The verifiable issue with unconstrained (i.e. 'sighted') subjective evaluations of audio is that they are prone to providing unreliable information, to both the subject *and* those he reports to. The unreliable information is usually about what caused the audio to sound the way it does.

So again, why all this fuss? Take your sighted report -- and everyone else's -- with a big grain of salt. I skip past them here, except when they;re accompanied by a particularly snake-oily claim

 

[Galliardist]

Snake oil is a product which promises an improvement but i reality has no effect whatsoever. Even a bad power-amplifer for example, still amplifies a signal. But a cable-lifter? Snake-oil is a kind of fraud. A bad product is bad, but normally not fraud.

But a snake oil product does do something, even when the sound waves are the same.

If four decades of uncontrolled sighted subjective listening reports tell us anything, it’s that!

 

[Raindog123]

Snake oil is a product which promises an improvement but i reality has no effect whatsoever. Even a bad power-amplifer for example, still amplifies a signal. But a cable-lifter? Snake-oil is a kind of fraud. A bad product is bad, but normally not fraud.

Well, if I already have an amplifier, and a salesman promises me another amplifier with “improvement in this and that due to this and that…” without delivering, should I consider such amplifier [promising act] a snake oil [sale]?

 

[Robin L]

Well, if I already have an amplifier, and a salesman promises me another amplifier with “improvement in this and that due to this and that…” without delivering, should I consider such amplifier [promising act] a snake oil [sale]?

That's some kinda oily.

 

[ahofer]

I think we can take some license with the term “snake oil” to include vastly exaggerated benefits, not just zero benefit. Like the “black background” of digital fiber connections, or class A amplifier operation.

 

[billyjoebob]

I think we can take some license with the term “snake oil” to include vastly exaggerated benefits, not just zero benefit. Like the “black background” of digital fiber connections, or class A amplifier operation.

How is a class A amplifier snake oil?

 

[Galliardist]

Snake oil was about marketing and intent.

If, say, I make a mixture of camphor, menthol and peppermint and claim it could alleviate symptoms like a blocked nose, fine.

If I label it as a cure for tuberculosis and baldness, and claim it to be a secret recipe of a Native American healer, now the same product is snake oil.

 

[jsrtheta]

Subjectivity has gone so far off the rails in audio that any review lacking measurements is worthless. Of course I have some $8,000 interconnects for sale used for only $5,000 if you want them.

Would you take $4500?

 

[krabapple]

But a snake oil product does do something, even when the sound waves are the same.

If four decades of uncontrolled sighted subjective listening reports tell us anything, it’s that!

The product isn't doing anything. The user's belief system is.

 

[Galliardist]

The product isn't doing anything. The user's belief system is.

Can we not say that "knowledge of the change of product" is affecting what goes on in the user's head?

I'm being careful with my words here. I don't like the term "belief system" either, because there are plenty of reports of results that go against what the user professes to be their conscious beliefs.

We need to be careful about "isn't doing anything" as well. If what we are presented with is a report or an online post (as here) or a written description of the experience, we can draw reasonable conclusions based on what is described, but we don't actually know what the soundwaves are like, or if they are changing.

We can't trust a sighted subjective "no change" either, even if we agree that's what a particular change should do.

But in most cases we can act as if your statement is correct, even so.

 

[krabapple]

Can we not say that "knowledge of the change of product" is affecting what goes on in the user's head?

Yes, we can, and do.

I'm being careful with my words here. I don't like the term "belief system" either, because there are plenty of reports of results that go against what the user professes to be their conscious beliefs.

"user's belief system" encompasses both conscious and unconscious biases.

None of this is new -- there's even been best selling books about it - and there's no reason to keep tediously plodding along this same path again and again.

 

[Newman]

None of this is new -- there's even been best selling books about it - and there's no reason to keep tediously plodding along this same path again and again.

Yes, and quoting the blurb for the book you mention: "Now imagine that the same doctor, the same judge, the same interviewer, or the same customer service agent makes different decisions depending on whether it is morning or afternoon, or Monday rather than Wednesday. These are examples of noise: variability in judgments that should be identical."

Yet we have recent claims from ASR members that they, personally, are consistent in their sighted listening opinions, that it never changes in the manner described above. That they are immune to it.

They simply don't get it. Isn't it time that they did?

 

[Galliardist]

Yes, we can, and do.

Except you didn't. You said that the product does nothing.
Of course, both statements are correct, depending on the object of concern. I refer you to my long post you didn't like either.

"user's belief system" encompasses both conscious and unconscious biases.

Again, definition. In the context of what I've read over many years, a belief system is about conscious expression of a set of beliefs, and an unconscious bias affects the belief system rather than being a part of it.

I'll accept your definition of belief system as what's in use here and move on.

and there's no reason to keep tediously plodding along this same path again and again.

This is a place for learning. And there are lots of new people joining all the time.

If this is a place for learning, that means that people also have to teach. Unfortunately, teaching when the students come along, one at a time, day after day, is going to involve a lot of repetition, a lot of patience, and a fair amount of precision.