Marky-Mark
pfm Member
If stating truth is gloomy I'll take it over perversity any day of the week. And you're very likely 'The' free because of what I pointed out in the gloomy post.
placebo and its relation to 'hearing better'
- Thread starter Rockmeister
- Start date
Magical thinking vs scientific thinking has always existed and no doubt always will. The issue seems to be that scientific thinking is not natural or instinctive for the vast majority of people and has had to be taught and learnt. The motivation in the past has been a need to learn how to achieve things in order to get on in society plus to a fair extent a discomfort in being ignorant about important matters. As society has become more and more comfortable a need to understand has become less important for most because it no longer has significant negative or positive consequences. The high regard for knowledge and low regard for ignorance has changed remarkably in the last few decades. It has not disappeared completely but has reduced greatly.
If we take home audio as an example very few enthusiasts now make any effort to accumulate technical knowledge about the subject even though the subject is important to them. Those that do possess technical knowledge are far more likely to have acquired it primarily from work activity rather than study in support of a hobby interest. It was different 50 years ago.
Another example is the oft cited requirement to hear home audio hardware in order to know how it will perform rather than deducing how it will perform from technical knowledge. The whole point of science is to avoid this need to perform experiments. People making this type of assertion are firmly declaring against science but are usually baffled when this is pointed out.
As far as I can see the key is getting people to highly value being knowledgeable rather than ignorant. I don't mean perceived as being knowledgeable rather than ignorant which almost everyone wants and can be seen everywhere and in almost every post on the forum. I mean valuing being knowledgeable to the extent the OP, for example, would spend his time learning about sound perception rather than chatting socially on the internet about nonsense. Clearly the cost of the former is significant and the reward in terms of knowledge too little for it to be worthwhile.
I agree in the short term the knowledge/ignorance balance isn't going to change and may even get slightly worse but after we have picked ourselves up after the crash that increasingly looks unavoidable I wouldn't be so sure. Reality is always gently pushing in the direction of truth and knowledge and it will never stop doing so. It requires continual and significant effort on the part of those pushing against it to achieve personal advantage. Things are going to swing back in favour of knowledge at some point.
pjdowns
Living the Hifi dream
So my point would be this.
If someone tries a cable and it makes a difference to them. They then spend either £1 a metre or £500,000 a metre on said cable from their available budget and are happy, what on gods earth do you care?
If they want to then tell people that it made a huge difference on an open forum, why again do you care?
I am not doubting for one minute that the brain is very powerful, but whether it is science or the brain tell them that they are hearing said improvements, again why do you care?
Julf
Facts are our friends
Because it is useful to know if the user experience should/could be improved by engineering or marketing.
pjdowns
Living the Hifi dream
Good answer, well you would just have try it and then find out, Julf.
Marky-Mark
pfm Member
I used to care enough to argue, so I'll provide an answer, but with the caveat that I can only speak for myself. Having said that, the odds others feel the same is high. Also, I agree with what you're written above.
I argued against cable foo because I felt the claims being made were patently ridiculous and that infuriated me on a fundamentally emotional level and therefore blinded my common sense. And so under a cover of relative anonymity my goal was to expose the people espousing those claims as idiots. Eventually, I came to realize that doing that did nothing more than make me look like an idiot, at a minimum for not realizing just how masturbatory it was to continually engage in what amounted to an uninteresting pissing match in the first place.
And so now my battle is more a meta thing, as it has become the entirety of the foo argument I find repulsive to a point that compels me to rail against it. As is in evidence right this second. Hopefully this is the last stage and soon none of it will faze me in the least. That's my new goal.
adamdea
You are not a sound quality evaluation device
It's interesting that that's what you take from the "I tried it and heard nothing" comments. My interpretation is that people are mainly just trying to make the point that they didn't hear it. The significance of this is that there is a huge selection bias if only people who "hear a difference" report their findings. That is how hifi magazines work (pretty much admitted by Alan Sircom.)
It was in fact picking up on this effect by inference* which set me off on my damned route to hifi scepticism. It really does create a false impression for hobbyists who are conditioned to believe that all ( or even most or even really some) experts think cable/supports/whatever make an audible difference.
Probably not. I agree that things can get out of hand, but I'm inclined to think that a lot of offence is taken because a mismatch in in people's expectations about the sort of discussion they are having. In real life one usually relies on social contextual cues which are not available online, and one tends to avoid continuing a discussion which one is not finding useful.
For those with real life claims to expertise (not me), questioning what they are saying, or even talking about their topic for any purpose other than earnestly seeking to learn, can be regarded as lacking humility.
A good rule of thumb in this area is that if you think that everyone else is the problem, then you are definitely part of the problem.
**eg noticing that in speaker reviews people sometimes used to say
- Of course speakers make a huge difference unlike cd players,
when they never said it in cd players reviews
pjdowns
Living the Hifi dream
Well yes, if they felt there was a difference and they had the disposable income to afford it. Why does it matter to you so much?
Rockmeister
pfm Member
Why is it odd that some people care about others? A basic requirement for civilisation surely? And if you spend 500,000 on something that doesn’t perform it’s function and you don’t notice, you might benefit from advice, and if you spend it ‘because you can’, then you’re a hideous over paid show off, and get the **** out of my life. Now That is caring! 
onlyconnect
pfm Member
For me, it is not about caring how others spend their money, that is up to them. But on an audio forum it doesn't seem surprising to me that people care about audio and how to get the best sound at home. Isn't that what you would expect?
Tim
Julf
Facts are our friends
As far as I know, this is an audio forum. Audio is about the technology (applied science) of reproducing recorded sound.
If someone claimed in a car forum that furry dice hanging from the rear view mirror makes cars go 20 mph faster, would you expect everyone to just accept that as a fact?
herb
brain's right hemisphere
Back in 1970 when I started this hobby the techs were very much in charge. For turntables all that mattered were the measurable wow flutter and rumble. Arms were the lightest possible and cartridges had to track faultlessly. Amps all sounded the same and nobody mentioned cables. Simpler times, but by 1975 people started to listen and found that much of this was not true people could hear differences. Then began the marketing and flat earth, some of these systems sounded most enjoyable and contrasted with the 1970 items.
Funk
pfm Member
You may joke, but someone on a car forum actually stated once that putting the rear seat-backs down made a car handle better!
This was the article which made me realise how much of the audio industry is smoke, mirrors and outright bullsh*t: https://www.highdefforum.com/blu-ra...5-oppo-inside-lexicon-outside.html#post991854
A $500 Oppo literally dropped inside a fancy machined chassis and the price bumped to $3000 with a Lexicon badge on it. The review by Ken Taraszka was a masterclass in doublethink - eg. apparently the Lexicon's performance was better than the Oppo's ("Black levels were close, but the Lexicon had a more natural contrast and colour palette than the Oppo.") which is really remarkable given that the only difference is the lump of metal round the outside. Then there was the issue that the Lexicon was THX-certified whereas the Oppo wasn't as it didn't meet the requirements...
If that's not a classic example of price-confirmation bias then I don't know what is. The stupid thing is that most people will see more benefit from a decent ear-cleaning every couple of months and moving some furniture around than they ever will from a "£1500 directional ethernet cable" or believing that their treble is 'less splashy' since their new smart meter was installed...
darrenyeats
pfm Member
That's an interesting one, because if it lowers the centre of gravity, it may literally handle better. But (probably) not to a degree someone could notice just by driving it.
Analogous situations exist in audio.
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onlyconnect
pfm Member
I have a "flat earth" system and enjoy it a lot. I'm pretty sure all its characteristics are measurable though. In fact we measured the Roksan Xerxes the other day and it came out pretty well
Tim
pjdowns
Living the Hifi dream
You may think they are being ripped off, but in reality, nobody really gets ripped off. They chose to spend the money on whatever it is. Yes companies take the mick with the prices they pay, but whilst ever people are willing to pay the money, why on earth would they reduce the price?
pjdowns
Living the Hifi dream
Why is it odd that some people care about others? A basic requirement for civilisation surely? And if you spend 500,000 on something that doesn’t perform it’s function and you don’t notice, you might benefit from advice, and if you spend it ‘because you can’, then you’re a hideous over paid show off, and get the **** out of my life. Now That is caring!
Ok.