Card carrying objectivists

[Arnold Krueger]

Just to get your heart beating before the first cuppa:

"Self-proclaimed audio objectivists, like those that troll audio forums, are not scientists, or audio professionals; they have not directly experienced the giant Sound Lab speakers or the acoustic-wind of a 15A/13A Western Electric horn system. They are pathologically self-centered people who watch the hurricane on TV and then later, tell the hurricane survivor that lost their cat, "That wasn't a hurricane—it was only a tropical storm."

I regard self-proclaimed audio objectivists, ones that parlay a few quasi-imaginable cultural abstractions and a middle school smattering of Newtonian Physics, into entitlement and authority -- as the self-declared enemies of poetry, love, and humanist culture. If they simply Googled 'logic and the world' they would quickly discover the Enlightenment Paradigm (Voltaire, Locke, et al.) they cling to was rejected by scientists and philosophers—before 1930 (Einstein, Heisenberg, et al.).

Their puffed-chest-DIY-objectivism pays zero respect to any plausible relation between logic and the realms of experience (Bertrand Russell). Amateur objectivists can't imagine that numbers and counting are little more than cultural fabrications with a stronger history in banking than science.

Interestingly, objectivists like behavioral psychologists do not believe consciousness exists. They can't see it or measure therefore it is not real. I always remind them they can't see or measure that roll of c-notes in my jeans pocket—but it is there just the same.

I personally believe that the unqualified acceptance of measuring and quantification automatically rejects the reality of human awareness and denies the verity of sensory perception.

I haven't told anyone, but lately I've been rendezvousing with a cult of self-proclaimed audio objectivists. Why? Because I need them to explain: how shall I recognize a superior audio system when it is playing and I am sitting in front it? What real, irrational, or transcendental numbers must I generate to accurately predict its usefulness or pleasure-giving ability?
"

Read more at https://www.audiostream.com/content/audio-without-numbers...

 

[Cosmik]

In another comment above you argued that people can’t hear if a speaker is good (i.e. accurate, neutral) or not:

«Virtually no one has heard a neutral system, so it is not possible to say whether people prefer neutral or not».

Now, you turn around and argue for the opposite:

«...he has created speakers that some people say are the best ever».

What I mean is that these DSP-based speakers are so new that, OK, very few people have heard them and even if they have, the experiences are sighted and the speakers may not have been demonstrated optimally. I fully expect that, everything else being equal, people would prefer truly neutral speakers (as far as is possible) over the alternative.

I was disputing the idea that we already know that some people actively prefer coloured sound over neutral, because it is highly likely they have never heard neutral in the first place (neither have I - but I think my system is closer to neutral than most).

 

[Frank Dernie]

Read more at https://www.audiostream.com/content/audio-without-numbers...

Herb Reichert, ha-ha-ha!
The UK satirical magazine used to have a column called "Pseud's Corner" which quoted drivel like that.

I have read Stereophile for a long time and they have segued from looking for higher quality equipment to praising kit with substantial levels of distortion. Herb is one of the most likely to praise kit which the measurements show is broken/faulty/badly engineered. He seems to enjoy a bit of extra equipment generated sauce poured over his sound, as, it would seem do lots of others. I have no problem with him choosing to listen to coloured kit if he prefers it to accuracy but slagging off those who don't just makes him a plonker.
He is an early fake news practitioner.
OTOH I always have had a home demonstration of anything I am interested in before buying it, just in case i don't like it, so I am as bad as him in reality.

 

[Theo]

Just to get your heart beating before the first cuppa:

It worked....

As quoted in the paper : Sciences are "the intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment". Herb Reichert has centered is paper on the observation, carefull ignoring the last part of the definition : "AND experiment". IMHO, observation without experiment is worth nothing. "An experiment is a scientific test which is done in order to discover what happens to something in particular conditions". (Collins dictionary). Experiment is therefore a scientific test - which Herb does not consider at all, discarding ABX as "illusionist parlor tricks"... without any explanation. Usual trick at the basis of any fake news or oil snake sales pitch: pretend to use scientific reasoning, ignoring what does not suit your point.... End of story to me.

 

[Frank Dernie]

What I mean is that these DSP-based speakers are so new that, OK, very few people have heard them and even if they have, the experiences are sighted and the speakers may not have been demonstrated optimally. I fully expect that, everything else being equal, people would prefer truly neutral speakers (as far as is possible) over the alternative.

I was disputing the idea that we already know that some people actively prefer coloured sound over neutral, because it is highly likely they have never heard neutral in the first place (neither have I - but I think my system is closer to neutral than most).

I have mentioned this before, I was at an enthusiast event just over a years ago where Linn engineers demonstrated the effect of the various DSP corrections they could do in their Exakt system. They were offering to let DIY speaker builders have access to the software for their home brew speakers and started off with a speaker kit with a conventional passive crossover emulated in their software then added step by step various corrections demonstrating the effect on the sound as they went.
It certainly impressed me immensely, probably the biggest improvements in sound quality I have ever auditioned.
The effect was modest but noticeable on multi tracked and manipulated rock but huge on a simply miked classical (well Gilbert & Sullivan) recording. Whilst not to my musical taste it was quite astonishing.
The DIY kit that were using was this one, or a similar earlier kit using good quality Scanspeak drivers.
http://www.wilmslow-audio.co.uk/gemini-loudspeaker-1452-p.asp

I have even considered having a go at building a DSP system here, but I am too lazy and pretty satisfied listening to what I have got.

 

[FrantzM]

SUBJECTIVISM IS KEY!

Let me explain...

When psychoacoustics entered audio science, subjectivism was set on par with objectivism. If we didn’t have psychoacoustics, objectivists could argue that a flat curve is the target. Fact is, a smooth curve is objectively better in people’s ears than a bumpy curve and a somewhat declining curve as oppposed to the flat curve is preferred by most people.

In other words: Objectivism is of little value without our understanding of subjectivism, i.e. the subjects’ preferences.

Excellent and lost too often on many objectivists, myself included.

 

[SIY]

I have even considered having a go at building a DSP system here, but I am too lazy and pretty satisfied listening to what I have got.

The progress in such software is remarkable. I've had two such systems in house over the past couple of months and they both worked amazingly well. I've also reviewed some products designed with this paradigm and the results speak for themselves.

With modern DSP and cheap high-quality watts, the days of big passive crossovers and analog EQ are long past.

 

[Dialectic]

Read more at https://www.audiostream.com/content/audio-without-numbers...

Reichert, Lavorgna, and Mejias are all ignoramuses, of course, but can't we come up with a label better than "objectivist"?

"Objectivist" is not a term one will ever hear in any academic discipline (even journalism) and, in my experience, has been used consistently only by followers of Ayn Rand. There are certain analytic problems with saying that one piece of playback gear is "objectively better" than another, as many on this forum are wont to do. I think that what many of us mean by "objectively better" is "closer to what the microphones picked up" or "closer to the real thing."

Thus, "realist" is a better label for the views of most of the folks on ASR. The term also contrasts our preferences from those of Reichert et al.

Reichert et al. obviously are not interested in the sound of real instruments in real acoustic spaces. Reichert et al. prefer playback equipment that generates distortion, tweaks that do nothing, and badly recorded popular music (e.g., Serge Gainsbourg records) over classical music. These preferences betray a lack of interest in the real thing. The actual underlying interest of Reichert et al. is in the gear--not music or high-fidelity playback of it. They are gear fetishists, and they state preferences for certain music only as a means of status signaling. Their "subjectivist" reviews of playback gear are worthless to listeners who want high-fidelity playback equipment, but these reviews are valuable to Schiit, Synergistic Research, and other companies that make stuff that either does nothing or adds a lot of distortion to the music. Sadly, none of this has anything to do with reproducing the real thing.

So, maybe we can call ourselves "realists." And maybe we can call them "gear fetishists." "Objectivist" and "subjectivist" are analytically problematic, high school-ish terms for the two camps in our hobby.

 

[SIY]

I use the term "rationalist," which encompasses measurement and controlled listening.

 

[Dialectic]

I use the term "rationalist," which encompasses measurement and controlled listening.

I don't think rationalism is quite right, either. Rationalism is usually presented in opposition to empiricism. Most of what we (and by we, I mean @amirm and @BE718) are doing here is empirical.

 

[Cosmik]

I use the term "rationalist," which encompasses measurement and controlled listening.

I rather think "empiricist" would be a better term. A rationalist wouldn't use measurements or listening.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/rationalism-empiricism/

Edit: you got there first @soundArgument

 

[SIY]

Problem is, the folks who do "listening" tests with peeking call what they do "empirical."

 

[sergeauckland]

I have mentioned this before, I was at an enthusiast event just over a years ago where Linn engineers demonstrated the effect of the various DSP corrections they could do in their Exakt system. They were offering to let DIY speaker builders have access to the software for their home brew speakers and started off with a speaker kit with a conventional passive crossover emulated in their software then added step by step various corrections demonstrating the effect on the sound as they went.
It certainly impressed me immensely, probably the biggest improvements in sound quality I have ever auditioned.
The effect was modest but noticeable on multi tracked and manipulated rock but huge on a simply miked classical (well Gilbert & Sullivan) recording. Whilst not to my musical taste it was quite astonishing.
The DIY kit that were using was this one, or a similar earlier kit using good quality Scanspeak drivers.
http://www.wilmslow-audio.co.uk/gemini-loudspeaker-1452-p.asp

I have even considered having a go at building a DSP system here, but I am too lazy and pretty satisfied listening to what I have got.

I heard the same demo was was also pretty impressed. I was seriously contemplating changing my current DSP-based equaliser and crossover for an Exakt system, but I too am too lazy to do it, and prefer listening to music than playing with the kit.

Possibly one day, but the older I get the less likely. So much music and increasingly so little time........
S.

 

[svart-hvitt]

Aren't we beginning to see maybe a taste of this over at Benchmark too?

If Benchmark changes its story (balanced vs unbalanced headphones?), it may be a bad omen.

 

[Jakob1863]

@Arnold Krueger & @Frank Dernie

if Reichert defines the "troll-objectionist" in that way he can´t be incorrect (quite clever ) and of course he has a point as the kind of behaviour that he described isn´t objectivistic (as difficult a totally correct definition of objectivism might be).

It worked....

As quoted in the paper : Sciences are "the intellectual and practical activity encompassing the systematic study of the structure and behavior of the physical and natural world through observation and experiment". Herb Reichert has centered is paper on the observation, carefull ignoring the last part of the definition : "AND experiment". IMHO, observation without experiment is worth nothing. "An experiment is a scientific test which is done in order to discover what happens to something in particular conditions". (Collins dictionary). Experiment is therefore a scientific test - which Herb does not consider at all, discarding ABX as "illusionist parlor tricks"... without any explanation. Usual trick at the basis of any fake news or oil snake sales pitch: pretend to use scientific reasoning, ignoring what does not suit your point.... End of story to me.

An experiment is only a scientific experiment if it meets the scientific quality criteria (sufficiently, as perfect experiment are unlikely) and from that point of view the demand of "ABX tests" as often posted in audio forum discussions is often like a "illusionist parlor trick" if it is issued without warning that training would be needed and that it most likely will take some time before correct results were delivered. They demand "ABX tests" often from totally inexperienced listeners (wrt sound sensory experiments) and quite often don´t know much about propper sensory evaluation themselves. Overall a truly unhappy situation.

 

[svart-hvitt]

EPISTEMOLOGY

I like the way this thread has evolved into discussions of epistemology.

A scientist uses his words with care. So it’s worth spending some time discussing «objectivist», «subjectivist», «empiricists» etc.

I have always found great meaning in the story of Confucius and the rectification of names:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rectification_of_names

If audio science is to win territory and prosper, we should take great care in rectifying the names, definitions in audio.

 

[Jakob1863]

I like Bruno. His views voiced now sometimes directly contradict early things he said. Like saying making cables of silver and teflon was actually a terrible idea because it was about the most tribo-electric combination possible. Then going on a decade later to make just such cables (expensive ones too) for Grimm. He had his explanations of course, but to me they don't hold up especially for any cable costing what those did.

With your description above it´s imo the same problem as with Wombat´s summary of the Randi/Fremer challenge case, not really factually incorrect but distorting what really happened by leaving out some details.

First of all, the Grimm audio cable is not just made of silver conductors and teflon tube but uses silverplated copper and teflon tape (according to Grimm´s ínformations). In the triboelectric series it doesn´t makes much of a difference if you use copper or silver in combination with a teflon tube, but despite that it makes a difference as Putzey´s argued in that context with the mechanical properties of teflon and silver.

If you use a a solid core conductor and a stiff teflon tube for insulation it is indeed a quite problematic combination, if you use a litz construction in combination with a teflon tape (even more so if the teflon tape is of the foam type) it is a totally different situation. Again according to the Grimm literature there is in addition a semiconductive layer used beneath the braid(s).
Not to mention that Grimm audio provides some measured numbers wrt microphonics for their cable.

 

[Sal1950]

So, maybe we can call ourselves "realists." And maybe we can call them "gear fetishists."

My vote would be for "un-realist"

 

[svart-hvitt]

A title of ambiguity comes to mind: Sense and sensibility.

 

[Duckeenie]

I am. But if we are talking happiness and satisfaction well you can't argue with happy customers. Maybe they are happy for the wrong reasons. But happy they are.

Doesn't choice supportive bias apply to most brands?