I’m sure you’ve heard the (TRUE) story of Bill Johnson, the founder of Audio Research, being accosted by an engineer back in 1972 for introducing tubes back into audio when transistors had just shown - by Golly! - that tubes were antiquated and hopeless and didn’t produce good sound. And engineers insisted that transistors were "perfect-sound-forever" gifts from God. (This was 1966, by the way.) However, music sounded bad played thru transistors. REALLY bad. I wonder why the measurements didn’t help them. Could it be that they had completely untrained ears?
Anyway, that was then. And the engineers were wrong then, too. While measurements can do some things, they can’t do everything. They can’t discern the difference between a Yamaha flute and say, a Selmer. The measurements will be identical, nonetheless.
I find it fascinating that, in a field called AUDIO, people insist on trusting measurements instead of using their ears. I do realize they don’t trust their ears, of course. And maybe they shouldn’t! We’ve all heard that ears can be fooled, and I’m sure they can be. That said, I would STILL never mistake a Yamaha piano for a Steinway, so I guess my old, old, OLD (and) fallible ears are still good for something! People like measurements because they don’t know how to listen using their ears. I don’t blame them. With the lack of music classes or band courses in high school, many people get through 30 years of their life without ever having heard a flute, or a trumpet. Or even live drum sets. They can’t identify acoustic instruments, so measurements make them feel better. That, and it gives them license to sneer at others.