DO CABLES REALLY MATTER?
teo_audio, You already tried that shtick: https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/beware-the-audio-guru?page=4 (I’m neither new to philosophy, nor to the philosophy of science. So please try to do better than the throwing-philosophical-spaghetti-at-the-wall approach). |
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Yes, you are born breathing. Unfortunately, you cannot learn to breathe better. You can learn how to control your breathing pattern to some very limited extent, but it will not be better in any way, as far as gas exchange is considered which is the purpose of breathing. EDIT: Along with that, breathing is also an activity. It is not a purely receptive event. Comparing senses with muscle activity is not the best example |
Physiology of oxygen use does change, points of switch from aerobic to anaerobic etc., but breathing is there in much simpler and less exercisable level. Breathing pattern will change based on the exercise tolerance, but gas exchange will not change without some V/Q mismatches and so on. Breathing pattern will follow the cell-level physiology, not the opposite (unless there is a pathologic condition involved). |
If we are talking about milliseconds or something else very short, yes, V/Q mismatch changes. It will change depending on the point in the breath cycle and depend on many factors including the depth of that particular breath, pulmonary pressures, and what not. That is a very theoretical discussion with no practical, except for academic purposes, implementation. In reality, V/Q match/mismatch is looked at as an average over some time. Time being anything, but from inhalation to exhalation would be an extreme. Even proning does not yield result within seconds, if it eventually even does. You could, temporarily, make a person breath outside of their current breathing pattern needs. A person can do it voluntarily, hyper or hypoventilate for a period of time, but not for any significant time unless cellular metabolism of oxygen changes rapidly, which it is unlikely to. Hyperventilating will end up with lightheadedness (initially), up to unconsciousness. Then, it will go back to the needed pattern. Attempting to hold a breath will be successful only until the brainstem triggers over the voluntary action which will probably be with pCO2 somewhere over 60. In a pathologic state example, which may not be the best case to discuss this but is descriptive enough, severely acidotic person will have a Kussmaul’s breathing pattern and it will be practically impossible to voluntarily override it. Breathing pattern in exercise can be changed for the longer term by adjusting cell physiology. Eventually, just like it happens in the heart, well-trained athlete will likely have lower rate at rest. However, that particular change will be the consequence of "training" the end-organ cells and not necessarily "trained" and better breathing. Those patterns are easier to get a more vivid grip on with a sedated mechanically-ventilated person and changing parameters in real time. That is a completely different topic, far removed from cables that do or do not change the sound. EDIT: I just realized that I did not answer clearly about the importance of V/Q mismatch. Changes that do happen throughout the cycle are physiologic variation and not to pathologic levels. All of the above, except for acidotic example, assumes normal healthy subject with no cardiac or metabolic abnormality breathing sea level FiO2 0.21. I also, for simplicity, excluded mentioning pCO2 influence which, in fact, is easily the most important factor influencing breathing patterns above. |
nonoise, Aeration of the head would have a lot to do with skewing perceptions during cable testing, or any other sound challenge. If I remember it correctly, high frequencies would be affected more. Don't buy expensive tickets for the opera just after the sinus surgery. The point is to breathe normally and not to attempt to breathe "better". It is on you to join the discussion on who would be considered a "skilled listener". |
Q: Do cables really matter? A: Yes. Q: Are they worth the cost: A: Rarely. I’ve had enough experience with cables to note some differences between brands and construction. Can I justify more than $100 for any pair? No. I can’t. Honestly if you obsess over thousands of dollars of cables you need to go build your own speaker pair. You’ll learn a lot, and have a much better way to tweak the performance of the finished sound than cable auditioning. If you want really IC good cables at an affordable price, you can’t do better than buidling using solid silver interconnect wire from Parts Connexion. Use Cardas solder, and high end connectors and you’ll be ahead of the game by several thousand dollars. https://www.partsconnexion.com/CONNEX-66070.html Given that most solid silver IC's run $300 a pair at least, you can make them for a steal. Best, E |
@ glupson Hmmmm, now when you asked.... 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. |
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@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.html Now 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 Hearing Definition of ListeningAnd to summarize.
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. |
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. |
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. |
taras22, The word "tractate" was more of me making fun of myself for writing a simplified, albeit too long, answer to your question about V/Q mismatch and body movements. I cannot agree more that it was misdirected and a waste of time and electrons. I do not mind learning so I learned about existence of the field of respirology. I will try to research more on that.to find out what exactly it would encompass. It may be my fault that I have never come across a respirology expert. For some reason, I constantly feel it must be something like pulmonology but, given the responses of your partner, I find it hard to believe. For now, I can only wholeheartedly recommend those two well-known books by Dr. John B. West to your respirology partner. I know she is surely very familiar with them, they are as basic as it gets, but we all need a simple refresher from time to time. That all brought me to your earlier suggestion I speak to exercise physiology folks about control of breathing. Very simplified, but still interesting, thoughts may be found at 46:08... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xjXnz2kYcXE&list=PLE69608EC343F5691&index=11&feature=plpp If nothing else, it may be interesting for your partner to see how Dr. West, with whose work she is certainly well-acquainted, looks like. |
"She also suggested I ask you for a plain english explanation of your point " "And don’t V/Q mismatches occur every time we move and that does affect gas exchange does it not.?" Well, the answer was the first paragraph. It was very simple and in plain English. However, to simplify it further to the point of bordering with insufficient explanation......yes they do, but it does not matter in a normal subject. |
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@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 Skill 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 ). |
taras22, I changed my mind and would now agree it was not a complete waste of time. I, accidentally, found an interesting lecture by that same Dr. West about respiration at the limit. You may not be interested in it, but your partner may. There are some results from actual respiratory measurements on Mount Everest. It is very informative and thought-provoking. On the other hand, she may be familiar with that already. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QRN124iuqZ8&list=PLE69608EC343F5691&index=14 I also googled "gobbledygook", the word I had never encountered before. The first definition that shows up (I did not dig deeper, I admit) puts it as "excessive use of abstruse technical terms". I read my earlier post again and found maybe three, let’s say four, terms that are not simple English words and I used them sparingly (each one once, except V/Q maybe twice). V/Q, pCO2, FiO2, brainstem. Although they are not your everyday grocery store language, they are as basic and well-known in anything that even remotely discusses breathing. They are far from being complicated or abstruse, much less used excessively. I have a hard time accepting that anyone familiar with these issues finds them too technical. Not to clog this thread, but is there a way your partner could point out parts in that earlier post that she found incorrect or objectionable? I would really appreciate it as I would like to improve my understanding of things and would surely enjoy finding out I was wrong and learning how. I am not sure how to do it outside of this thread, though. As far as painting goes, I was not thinking deep enough to dissect painters into categories, but it does seem reasonable. In my mind it was not some famous painter, but pretty much your average neighbor, so to say. My point was that for painting you do need to put an effort into learning, even if it is just how to hold the brush, and it will altogether require a lots of practice and muscle coordination (throwing-paint on-the-canvas-from-the-distance kind of paintings do not qualify for this purpose) while hearing is inborn. Now, I am not sure I can fully agree with those differences between hearing and listening, but I can see room for a reasonable debate there. |
taras22, I am not sure what affidavit she was talking about, but it seems that it makes two of us. When it comes to math, there are lots of equations and calculations that could be involved, should one wanted to dig deeper into pressures and physiology, but that does become too technical and I never considered mentioning it. It helps understanding, but it gets complicated, too. Definitely does not end up in "plain English". As I said, that gobbledygook was, indeed, simplified to extremes and in as plain of English as it could ever get. Now, when I think about it, maybe it was too simple for her usual approach. |
glupson said, ”I also googled "gobbledygook", the word I had never encountered before.” >>>>>That in itself is cause for worry, perhaps even doubt. Could it be a cultural or language thing. No wonder glupson oft appears to be a clean slate. Maybe I’ve been unfair. Oh, yeah, I forgot, you’re Scandinavian. Factoid of the day: All Scandinavian countries are very high up the list of World’s happiest. |
My point about listening remains accurate...I'm a professional listener as a live sound mixer and musician, which doesn't mean I have better hearing, it simply means that after decades of experience I know how and what to listen for. Not everybody can do this (or they haven't tried), which is good for me I suppose since I'm paid well for this stuff...a hifi geek who participates in "active" listening, meaning they spend the time to really focus their attention on music, develops a strong sense of what's right from the accumulated listening experience and simply messing around with the gear to produce personally quantifiable differences. That experience, tempered by personal taste, is what gives people expertise and separates them from the more casual listener...or another human with ears. |
Wow....I never seen the Teo guys so active on a given thread. You others must have stirred the pot sufficiently to keep them engaged for so long. Anywho....back to cables making a difference. I am not the greatest listener, nor do I have perfect hearing. But I do know when a particular cable makes my audio reproduction more musically lifelike to me when installed into my system in place of something else. And bringing a smile to my face in the realization of that greater sense of musical reproduction experience wrought with a different cable in system is why I would keep the cable in the system. And I freely admit and respect another person’s opinion when listening to my system might come to a different conclusion, based upon his/her own subjective perceptions of listening and hearing. |
geoffkait, I will repeat to you, I am not Scandinavian, but you can think of me in that way if it makes your day. taras22, I admit, I did not get the joke about math. It is neither cultural, nor language problem. It just did not appear as a joke. I could easily see how someone, in that field, could start responding with equations so I gave it benefit of the doubt. Makes me wonder if that respirology partner is also a joke. Does she exist? |
glupson....they know who they are and I know who they are. I directed my comment to them. You need to know their posting habits to get my comment, which is made out of playful respect to them. There is sufficient info here on the forum threads and on the main Audiogon (and internet) to figure out the identities of these mysterious contributors. Lol |
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