"Things that cannot be measured"

[symphara]

Everyone's ear/brain is different, who ever said measurements could optimize for everyone

Indeed, who said that? Certainly not me. Check behind you, there's a strawman patting your back. But optimisation is why we measure. It's just that some people confuse the optimisation of the measurement with the optimisation of the enjoyment, and those aren't the same things.

Since we cannot optimise for each person, as we're all different and we don't understand nor can measure how our brain works, there's no point claiming that either everything is measurable, or that optimising for measurements is indeed the path to take to maximise enjoyment.

In audio, there are unknown entities that can cannot be established through measurement alone. Like what kind of frequency response curve should a new speaker have. Flat? Bass boosted? By how much? Use paper, kevlar, aluminium, something else? Once you get to this kind of questions, measurements won't give you the answers, because you quickly get into the limits of what you can measure (perception) and how well can you measure it (effect of driver material on sound). You have to tweak, focus group, blind test etc.

Measurements can only attempt to level the playing field, such as assuring that the sound field presented to each person is the same as possible. Individual preferences no matter where they come from are always there. I think in an audio forum this tread title is like waving a red flag at a bull. Things we can not measure does not include previously unknown physics that makes two cables sound "dramatically" different.

Why would you think that "assuring that the sound field presented to each person is the same as possible" is something desirable baffles me. If you like your speakers and I don't, who's "right"?

These are engineered products built using engineering principles based on physics. There is no escaping the fact that they are built to some measurable engineering specifications. Every transistor, capacitor, resistor, piece of wire (and/or how the piece of wire is constructed), coil, diaphragm, panel, magnet, etc. is constructed based on these principles. But the end result is unmeasurable but repeatable?

Repeatable doesn't mean perfectly measurable, I have no idea where you got that from.

In software engineering the perfect measure is formally proving your code. This is extremely hard to do, basically prohibitively expensive or downright impossible for anything but trivial examples.

And yet it's fully possible to write repeatable programs, even if you just cannot know *exactly* how it works because the number of events and sequence of paths in complex software is gargantuan.

Of course we derive metrics and these give us an idea, but it's childish to think you know everything just by looking at them.

I'm surprised at the lack of scientific method and nuanced thinking, bolstered by iron-clad beliefs with no proof whatsoever on display here. The thread title makes a clear partition: (a) we can either measure everything, or non-(a). I'm in the non-(a) camp because the (a) camp provides nothing to back them up, and extraordinary claims require proof. I don't do faith in these circumstances.

 

[NTK]

Repeatable doesn't mean perfectly measurable, I have no idea where you got that from.

In software engineering the perfect measure is formally proving your code. This is extremely hard to do, basically prohibitively expensive or downright impossible for anything but trivial examples.

And yet it's fully possible to write repeatable programs, even if you just cannot know *exactly* how it works because the number of events and sequence of paths in complex software is gargantuan.

Of course we derive metrics and these give us an idea, but it's childish to think you know everything just by looking at them.

I'm surprised at the lack of scientific method and nuanced thinking, bolstered by iron-clad beliefs with no proof whatsoever on display here. The thread title makes a clear partition: (a) we can either measure everything, or non-(a). I'm in the non-(a) camp because the (a) camp provides nothing to back them up, and extraordinary claims require proof. I don't do faith in these circumstances.

Does your problem program give the same results when running on different computers? Why?

[Edit] In case of "audio", the end quality can't even be "measured". How does one even claim they are repeatable?

 

[BinkieHuckerback]

What is the 'thing' that 'cannot be measured'? Surely if a 'thing' is identified, it can be measured in some way. Otherwise how would anyone be able to identify the 'thing'?

 

[mansr]

What is the 'thing' that 'cannot be measured'? Surely if a 'thing' is identified, it can be measured in some way. Otherwise how would anyone be able to identify the 'thing'?

Dark matter.

 

[BinkieHuckerback]

Dark matter.

...so...how does one know that there's 'Dark Matter' if it can't in some way be measured?! Otherwise we could make stuff up...surely?

 

[symphara]

...so...how does one know that there's 'Dark Matter' if it can't in some way be measured?! Otherwise we could make stuff up...surely?

Well technically speaking dark matter is made up. It's just a placeholder for something observed and measured but unexplained.

And of course, once you get into quantum mechanics there are lots of things that exist but cannot be fully measured, since the very act of measurement messes up the results. Heisenberg's uncertainly principle says that you cannot know both the momentum and the position of something at the same time.

 

[dualazmak]

We need "Super-Kamiokande" to detect neutrino which filling universe...

 

[BinkieHuckerback]

Well technically speaking dark matter is made up. It's just a placeholder for something observed and measured but unexplained.

And of course, once you get into quantum mechanics there are lots of things that exist but cannot be fully measured, since the very act of measurement messes up the results. Heisenberg's uncertainly principle says that you cannot know both the momentum and the position of something at the same time.

Surely they've been 'measured' if their existence has been acknowledged? That is, they 'exist' as opposed to 'not existing'.

 

[symphara]

Surely they've been 'measured' if their existence has been acknowledged? That is, they 'exist' as opposed to 'not existing'.

exists != measured

 

[BinkieHuckerback]

exists != measured

Right. Right?

 

[Jimbob54]

Well technically speaking dark matter is made up. It's just a placeholder for something observed and measured but unexplained.

And of course, once you get into quantum mechanics there are lots of things that exist but cannot be fully measured, since the very act of measurement messes up the results. Heisenberg's uncertainly principle says that you cannot know both the momentum and the position of something at the same time.

Explains why Heisenberg couldn't cross a busy road.

 

[BinkieHuckerback]

Explains why Heisenberg couldn't cross a busy road.

...and his cat got run over

 

[Ken1951]

 

[Jimbob54]

...and his cat got run over

That was because the box didnt have eye holes in it.

 

[BinkieHuckerback]

...Sennheiser Momentum

 

[symphara]

That was because the box didnt have eye holes in it.

But did it happen 9 times?

 

[Jimbob54]

But did it happen 9 times?

Uncertain.

 

[Pennyless Audiophile]

In my very humble opinion, what cannot be measured is the individual preference.

I have a pair of RP-600M, and while I rationally know that they have bad specs, I can't help keep using them, at least for rock and pop, because I like that sound despite some of the problems that they have and that I can hear quite clearly.
On the other hand I had the opportunity to listen to various models of Neumann monitors in many occasions, and I find them flipping annoying! Completely lifeless! I understand a sound engineer may need that type of sound, but they are terrible if you listen for pleasure.

So measures will tell you how a product will sound, but you may just not like the sound.

I know Amir doesn't agree because there is research that shows how everybody tends to like the same sound in a blind test, so maybe I am 5 sigmas out.

 

[BinkieHuckerback]

That was because the box didnt have eye holes in it.

...no, transparency mode was off

 

[BinkieHuckerback]

In my very humble opinion, what cannot be measured is the individual preference.

I have a pair of RP-600M, and while I rationally know that they have bad specs, I can't help keep using them, at least for rock and pop, because I like that sound despite some of the problems that they have and that I can hear quite clearly.
On the other hand I had the opportunity to listen to various models of Neumann monitors in many occasions, and I find them flipping annoying! Completely lifeless! I understand a sound engineer may need that type of sound, but they are terrible if you listen for pleasure.

So measures will tell you how a product will sound, but you may just not like the sound.

I know Amir doesn't agree because there is research that shows how everybody tends to like the same sound in a blind test, so maybe I am 5 sigmas out.

I reckon measurements show what might be good or bad but not necessarily what one might like. I'd look at measurements to see what might be worth a listen, but ultimately I'd pick what I liked the sound of. Measurements would surely help to determine what is likely to heard by anyone. Anything outside the range of general human hearing is...irrelevant.