@prof
"Your comment suggests you misunderstand the relationship between altering acoustic energy levels and our perception of loudness.While increasing a sound by 3dB doubles the acoustic energy, we do not perceive a doubling of volume. "
You can suggest and infer and implicate all you want but that is simply not in what I wrote. And yes I do know a 3db drop is defined as half power and is not related to half acoustic power. That being said, I would contend that we here are not the "average" listeners used in your quote and 3db is not slight as would like us to believe and which btw was the bone of contention ( who knows maybe you were simply projecting and that may go a long way to explaining your problem with cables ) ( btw slight can be defined as " inappreciable, negligible, insignificant" and frankly 3db ain’t none of those eh....and "distinctly" just doesn’t fit well with "inappreciable" or "negligible" or "insignificant" does it )
As for the turning on the light bit, that was just an admittedly silly dig at your obsession with double bind tests, whoops, blind tests. And I did preface it with "sorta the equivalent". Was just trying to get your goat, or more correctly, your herd of goats. |
@ prof
"and very slightly tweaked it, say increasing volume by 3dB"
Slightly!? That is simply hilarious. Its sorta the equivalent of saying one should go into a dark room and turn the light on and off to test your sight.
Well, at the very least, this certainly helps explain your position in this discussion.
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Oh calm down....was just poking some fun at you....So please accept my apologies , I simply didn’t realize you were so thin skinned ( though the smell of burning martyr should have been a clue, can't believe I didn't notice ).
And btw not really a pro in the audiophile cable side, it’s more of a fun side project ( though it does produce a cash flow so I suppose a pro technically ). Actually I’m a pro in the same sausage making machine as you, and coincidentally, more or less in the same department.
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@ cd318
" Same for electronics from a minimum quality level up."
Gee, minimum is by definition the least quantity or amount possible ....like are we talking BOSE Wave here or something even further down the food chain? Cause least possible is pretty much least, like bottom of the pile. Or are we talking wind-up Victrola and would that be with a new or used cactus stylus ( I only ask because the used one would be more minimum ) ?
Ok, seriously now, I thought this idea had died a long time ago, and had a stake driven through its heart just to be sure, but I guess not. Even more seriously, I’m sensing some weird Julian Hirsch zombie presence here, anybody else getting that vibe, or is that just the pizza I had last night talking ( note to self, you really gotta lay off the hot peppers, especially late at night ) ? |
Speaking of the clash of titans, which is of course the age old battle btwn believers of cables and naysayers, there was once a wee skirmish. It begins with an article by Malcolm Omar Hawksford who is a pretty smart guy who knows his way around communication electronics and the theory it is based, https://www.stereophile.com/reference/1095cableBut then I saw the following comment to this article from a naysayer and busted a gut . You see the naysayers are prone to ask for science/engineering to prove cable difference, and here was, what seemed like a pretty nice short and sweet examination of cable theory which covers a lot of the bases. So after given what was asked for here is the response I mentioned above ( the counter-attack after the initial Hawksford salvo ).... "Those who state that the "laws of physics" don’t allow > > for differences in cable performance at audio frequencies > > might be surprised to learn that the laws of physics > > predict the opposite. > > > Publishing such an unecessarily math-intensive article in a > consumer publication has an obvious subtext - "It’s all so > complex that you can’t possibly understand it, so believe > whatever we say". > > That seems to be the plan: the article will "dazzle ’em with science", than Atkinson, his minions and the snake oil merchants will swoop in and baffle them." . IOW, a typical $tereopile ploy. " What can I say. but that words fail me, and that I have no idea how to get the coffee spray off my screen ( anybody got any ideas ? ). |
@ cd318
" The fact remains that a scrape the barrel $50 system with some decent speakers from any of the following - Audio Note, ATC, B&W, DeVore, Eclipse TDs, Harbeths, Classic JBLs, KEF, Klipsch, Linkwitz, Magnepans, Monitor Audio, Quad, Sony, Spendor, Tannoy, Vivid Audio, Wilson etc will simply blow away any $50 speaker paired up with uber-overkill electronics using the most eye wateringly expensive interconnects and cables imaginable"
Speaking of "facts" here is a "fact" you may want to consider. Way back when I worked in a stereo store we used to do a slight variation of what you were talking about ( it was a great way to show clients the importance of system matching and it was always a giggle to see the clients response when they heard entry level speakers hooked up to premium electronics and vice versa. We had the cheap speakers right beside the most expensive speakers in the house and the client always thought this great sound came from the expensive speakers...and we would also flip the system going with cheapish electronics and expensive speakers and that never worked that good eh, in fact it really sucked.)
The thing is we did this literally hundreds of times, so in study terms that was a really large n and all with the same result. Bottom line you are absolutely and positively dead wrong, in "fact" you are 180 degrees out of phase on this. But please don’t let this face-plant deter you, just keep swinging for the fences, who knows you may hit one out the park one day. |
@ prof "... in the service of convincing customers on the merits of buying the expensive gear sold by the store" For the record it generally wasn’t expensive, though admittedly, sometimes it was. And basically I didn’t say anything about pushing expensive equipment, that was strictly your wee self fluffing fabulation. And please its really bad form to fluff yourself in public to make your argument look more impressive than it is. There is a place on the interwebs for stuff like that but this is family site, so please exercise some discretion, I mean, think of the children. And you were talking about rigour and studies and double binds and stuff, so if I get your drift here, you are looking for something scientificistical ( which for those keeping score is the science version of truthiness and not a nonsensical typo ). Well this is your lucky day because here is something that may just fit your bill. It was already posted up-thread but you may have missed it, after all fluffing yourself is probably a pretty hard trick to pull off and still be aware of your immediate surroundings. https://www.stereophile.com/reference/1095cableNote it is a bit complicated and doesn’t easily reduce itself to a simple club with which to beat the opposition into submission so it may not fit your purposes here , but it does have a lot of valuable information that most people with a genuine curiosity about truth would find interesting. So now you got some science homework, so off you go, and please stop the self fluffing in public, its really embarrassing and pretty transparent. |
@prof My goodness indeed. Ooooh, gosh darn it all, I just love the sound of feigned mild surprise in the morning...... And speaking of classics here is a modern day example that quite surgically strikes to the quick.
Prof is one of those guys who just like to go on and on. and then get you tangled into their endless drivel. Usually using what they already got out of you to attack you, in order to get more out of you ,so they can get you hooked. Sorry prof, not taking the bait. Go annoy someone else. Geoff seems to be interested. Bloviate with Geoff. Sorry to stick the prof on you..But you enjoy challenges. And here is another classic " Methinks he doth protest too much " or we could also go with the ever popular " Cry me a river ". Read, as the above post shows you have made quite a special bed for yourself here, now be a man, and sleep in it, and stop complaining about the lumps.
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So too complex for you.....not a huge surprise.
And about not being taken seriously ? Heck I don't take myself too seriously and I really expect anyone else to either. |
@ cd318
Wow a product that had 100x more profit than the rest put together eh. Most excellent point..... though I'm really at a loss to figure out which product in a stereo store would have that kind of profit margin. Maybe you could help me with that eh.
And we are supposed to actually take you seriously after that most excellent point. Like did you actually give that statement some small scintilla of thought before you blew it out the door or is there a special on hyperbole somewhere that I'm not aware of and you bought too much and just had to use it up because its going to go rancid ( most people don't know this but hyperbole is like fish you leave the sun, after a while it becomes pretty stinky ). And if there is maybe you should get together with prof and make a bulk buy, I mean you guys put your minds to it you could probably go through a train load in a week.
Bottom line conclusions....its a complex solution set that is very much system dependent. |
So how is it that we can recognize voices that we haven’t heard for a while, say even decades....and even on lowest common denominator transducers like telephones, and in noisy environments where voice articulation is several notches below ideal.
And the reality is we do this all the time without thinking of how great our hearing is and how well our auditory memory works. Yet this phenomenon, supported by an n of literally billions, is oft very conveniently forgotten when one takes a particular side discussing double bind tests.
So here is a thought, consider for moment that The Most Esteemed Mr Kait is absolutely correct, and that there is something fundamentally wrong about testing in the double bind manner. 'Cause, reality, you know, that thingee that science is trying to map, is voicing, nay shouting, a much different tune. |
No real need to feel defensive, really. |
Like whether the sofa is covered with leather, or cloth ? And whether the cloth on that sofa is wool or synthetic ? And whether the stuffing in that sofa is wool or synthetic or down ? It all defines the diffuser/absorber you are sitting in. |
Yup, and they are not cheap, which is probably why they aren't in common usage. My parents had both, and they were sooooo comfortable, especially the down one ( and yeah they would go a bit flat but then you kinda tumbled it a bit and voila, tres fluffy ), and they do heat management really well ( which is something that became quite apparent when an upholsterer redid the down one and replaced the down with synthetic...and gawd was my dad pissed cause the boob had just totaled his Sunday afternoon nap spot ) |
A couple of things.
First, have to agree with calvinj that Clarity Cable is a very fine cable that on performance should have much greater place in the audio world, and very sadly it doesn’t.
Second, agree with dorkwad about the Schroeder Method, in my humble opinion it is one of those procedures that absolutely and conclusively shows how cables can have a positive effect on audio reproduction ( so obvious no double bind tests required ). Frankly, lo res, hi res, expensive, modest systems will all benefit from this upgrade. In fact, as a friend said, if you can’t hear the benefit might be a good time to find another hobby like golf, or something, anything that doesn’t require hearing acuity ( slightly paraphrased and explicates deleted )
And one more thing. Basically agree with geoffkait above about how system components in and off themselves can or cannot define how good it is at audio reproduction. At the very least until there is some discussion about the acoustic environment they are used in. Lets remember that the room is the most important audio component and which provides the largest contribution to the "sound" of a system ( some have pegged that contribution at about 50% ). Put a potentially great system in a crap room and guess what, there is an almost certainty that the great system will sound like crap ( with diminished ability to hear detail, nuance, and change, both large and small etc etc etc ). |
Well, just because you may not be new to it doesn’t mean you actually understand it.
Just sayin’ eh. |
Ahhh, hearing tests, a fave cudgel of naysaying pseudo scientists both far and wide. Granted, tests do in fact produce information but the important question is what does that information show. Well beeps, which are currency of such tests , don’t occur much in nature, and since successful evolution involves dealing with nature, hearing or not hearing beeps is really not something we have evolved to do. What we have gotten very good at doing, and this is very important, is pulling salient information out of noisy backgrounds better than anyone else ( as an example predators generally don’t announce their presence with a warning beep like a truck backing up ...so if you fail this auditory test your evolutionary line quickly becomes a dead end ). So here is a study that looks at something that I call functional hearing, the stuff that, I would suggest played a big role in getting us here as a species, and coincidentally the stuff that today helps allow some of us to routinely hear the differences that cable can make. "Standard hearing tests had shown that the musicians’ ears weren’t any more sensitive than those of the other listeners. But Kraus knew that their brains, shaped by years of training, had become very good at a similar task: "A musician will be listening to the sound of his own instrument even though many other instruments are playing," she says, a skill not unlike separating one voice from a crowd of voices. Kraus wanted to know whether this skill helps musicians pick out a particular voice the same way they pick out a particular instrument. "And resoundingly it does," she says." ....and here is some science providing some cold hard facts to explain.... "Tests show that certain sounds produce stronger electrical signals in a musician’s brain stem, Kraus says. And, she says, these signals offer a more accurate representation of pitch, timing and tone quality — three things that help us pick out a single voice in a noisy room. "
...and here in a nutshell is an interesting contrast and comparison between the beep test and room test.... "A third study by scientists from Friedrich Schiller University in Jena, Germany, found that musicians could detect harmonies that were slightly off-key even when they had lost most of their hearing. Factory workers with similar hearing loss could not. Results like these make sense if you think about the brain and the hearing system as if they were muscles, says Dr. Mark Jude Tramo, a professor of neurology at Harvard and director of the Institute for Music & Brain Science. Tennis players tend to be good arm wrestlers because they have strong forearms, Tramo says. In much the same way, he says, a musician who exercises certain parts of the brain "is going to be able to do better on any task that involves auditory concentration." Bottom line, it seems if you put some effort into active listening you are much more capable at listening than if you are a , uhhh, drive-by listener. https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113938566
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You may want to read the article posted above.
Btw you are also born breathing and you can actually learn to breath better. |
If you are talking gas exchange via the membrane you have a point, but in terms of gas exchange in and out of the lungs maybe not so much? With both being part of the breathing process, yes? And don’t V/Q mismatches occur every time we move and that does affect gas exchange does it not.? |
There are some exercise physiology folks you may want to talk to about that. |
@glupson So back to this statement you made earlier.... You are born listening . Which got me thinking, as I remembered a saying that I believe is quite germane to the discussion. The saying goes something like this " you hear with your ears, and you listen with your brain." So off I went and wandered the interwebs looking for something along the lines of that line and found the following. https://keydifferences.com/difference-between-hearing-and-listening.htmlNow it is not a tractate or anything but it does a nice job explaining the differences between listening and hearing and worth a quick look see. Someone rightly said, “Hearing is through ears, but listening is through the mind.” The two activities hearing and listening involve the use of ears, but they are different Definition of HearingThe natural ability or an inborn trait that allows us to recognize sound through ears by catching vibrations is called the hearing. In simple terms, it is one of the five senses; that makes us aware of the sound. It is an involuntary process, whereby a person receives sound vibrations, continuously. Definition of ListeningListening is defined as the learned skill, in which we can receive sounds through ears, and transform them into meaningful messages. To put simply, it is the process of diligently hearing and interpreting the meaning of words and sentences spoken by the speaker, during the conversation. Listening is a bit difficult, because it requires concentration and attention, and the human mind is easily distracted. People use it as a technique to comprehend, what is being said, through different verbal and non-verbal signs, i.e. how it is being said? What type of words is used? Tone and pitch of voice, body language and so on. Active listening is the key element; that makes the communication process effective. Further, it encompasses making sounds that show listener’s attentiveness and providing feedback. It had a greater influence in our lives and used to gain information, learn and understand things and so on. And to summarize. The hearing is an inborn ability but listening is a learned skill .
Which was one of the main points the article I posted earlier revolved around, and which, very oddly, you seemed to really miss the boat on, and which is kinda sorta critical to this discussion, read, you are not born listening but you are born hearing, and listening is a learned skill, which kinda sorta implies you can have "skilled listeners" , you know, folks like musicians and stuff. And btw the "beep" tests that naysayers love so much measure hearing, and listening, which is the thingee that allows one to make judgements about cables. not so much. So carry on. Very much looking forward to your next pile of gobbledygook, errrr, tractate. |
Thank you for your concern but not to worry, I always use the premium HAZMAT suit, the one that is armour-plated and tin-foil lined ( this is not my first encounter with a vortex....so I gots some nous eh ).....and I just dusted off my old Phaser, you know, just in case. And walls are in good order, the larder is full and the cistern is topped up so I can hold out for weeks. |
@ glupson
Hmmmm, now when you asked....
That tractate above was a response to a few posts that dealt with "skilled listener" theory/practice. It somehow evolved. I apologize.
A tractate ? You needlessly flatter yourself and are in danger of destroying your shoulder. Showed your "tractate " to my partner, who incidentally did her graduate work in respirology, and she laughed, and said " that is just gobbledygook piled high and wide" ( and funny but I looked up gobbledygook and the description is quite apt, like it fits good eh, real good ), so hardly a tracture it seems. She also suggested I ask you for a plain english explanation of your point which is apparently well hidden in a high and wide pile of gobbledygook. Then she laughed out loud and left to tend her garden. |
Nahhh, I believe the problem has been adequately solved, at least to my oh so humble satisfaction. We can now go back to our regularly scheduled programming.
Btw thanks for the warning, but I was wearing a life-jacket, a full body HAZMAT suit, a Scott Air-Pak, and our prototype anti-gravity belt, so I was good and vortex proofed eh.
And frankly, going through the process helped frame a response that will help mightily in the on-going battle between good and evil ( cable division ). So in the end all good. And have regular booster shots so good on that score too but I did done do some smartening didn’t I, my bad....will endeavour to do better. |
@glupson Actually it wasn’t a waste....got to learn something....ranted a little ( not often you get to use gobbledygook eh ).....and as a bonus at the end had a giggle or two with Geoff.... And as long as I have your undivided attention there is one more thing. When I was wandering through the wilds of the interwebs ran into something that relates to this here thing you posted earlier.... You have to develop/learn the skill of painting. Well it kinda depends eh. Like whether you are referring to painters-of-note, bored suburban house wife folk, bog standard hack painters, or house painters. Methinks youse is referring to painters-of-note and not the rest of the crowd that plays around with paint brushes and other artsy stuff. So the thingee that separates the wheat from the chaff in this particular case is talent, that bit that produces art, and not just paint slapped on a surface, and when really good, transcendent art. So here is something on talent.... Every person possesses certain skills and talent, that makes us different from others. We often use the terms talent and skill interchangeably, without knowing the fact that these are different from one another. While talent is an inborn ability or natural aptitude of a person which is often hidden and needs recognition .... Key Differences Between Talent and SkillThere are a few differences between talent and skill which is explained in the given below points: - The term talent refers to an inborn and the special ability of a person to do something. A skill is an expertise, which is acquired by the person by learning.
- Talent is God gifted ability, whereas Skill is an ability in which you put your time and efforts to develop.
- Talent is often possessed by a limited number of people. On the other hand, any person can learn a particular skill, if he has the capacity, capability, and willingness.
- Talent is hidden, that is why it needs recognition. As opposed to Skill, requires development, which can only be possible through practice
So it seems what you were talking about were basically house painters while you seemed to have been inferring painters-of-note.There is a difference, and yes, one can indeed be taught. As for the rest it gets most much more complisticated. Just sayin eh. And oh, asked head office about West, and she asked if you want a book report, maybe some in camera proof, or a signed affidavit...then there was something that I suspect is not entirely fit for this forum ( it had something to do with going forth and multiplying or something, though I can’t for the world of me figure out what math has to do with this )....it seems sometimes she just doesn’t have as well a rounded sense of humour as I do, or the same deep well of patience ( read, we are both in the dog house for some reason ). |
Must be a cultural/language thingee cause the math joke went seriously pear-shaped and may have landed in another solar system. |
