On ''what there is''

@nandric, I have several Russian patients. They bring me Sturgeon and it is almost time for winter borsht (with sour cream and herring.)

I am also an atheist. My problem with a universal god is that he would have to have a very strange sense of humor. He would also have to be a white guy that spoke English. 

Chakster and rauliruegas have their biases but they generally have the physical science involved correct which makes their opinion valuable even if you do not agree with their bias.

For many, choices in audio are emotional. They should be practical. For me it is not "what there is" but, Why there is. 

Having knowledge is wonderful but what can you do? I am dyslexic. Philosophy was consequently, not one of my strong subjects. 

snilf, I am the class idiot. Over there is a raging fire. Stick you hand in it and tell me if it is real or not. 

snilf, yes, the sensation is a personal experience but I'm not talking about that. The damage the fire will cause to your hand will be the same regardless of who it is that is sticking their hand in the fire and regardless of what they feel. Protein starts denaturing at 106 degrees F. I find it interesting that it also does not matter what animal you stick in the fire the response will be the same. Do dogs feel the same pain we do? What about caterpillars? Same response. Pain is a very ancient sensation and virtually universal for good reason. Animals that had an aversion to destructive, life challenging forces out survived those that did not. If pain did not hurt we would all be dead by the age of 18.   

It is very much like what people think they hear. That is a personal experience that has been programmed by a variety of influences.  I can tell you what I hear in descriptive terms but will you hear the same thing?
I will argue that you will not as it is very unlikely both of us will be listening to the same aspect of any given performance at exactly the same time. Even if a solo instrument is playing you might single out the bass while I single out the treble. Does it really matter? I will tell you from experience that if you put us all blind folded in a room with a fabulous system every single one of us would agree that it was an excellent system. 

@mahgister, I must not be explaining myself very well. There is only one reality. That reality can be interpreted differently but there is only one reality. As an example, the color red is defined as light energy with a wavelength at 700 nm. That is the reality. If we are all presented with light at 700 nm we will all call the color red because we have been taught to do so even though we are all having a personal experience in viewing the color.  Same thing happens with sound in a more complicated way.
If a system comes close to emulating a live performance just like the colors we will all interpret it the same way even though we are having a personal experience. I have seen this happen on a number of occasions. I use to work with a very high end Audio store and we were setting up these systems on a regular basis. As soon as deviations from the reality start occurring personal biases start infiltrating the evaluation. Which defects can you tolerate, which defects bother you the most? The vast variety of opinions you see here are based on deviations from reality. The "reality" has to be based on acoustic or lightly amplified instruments. Large concerts represent a maze of variables you can't account for. There are great live recordings many of them superior to the actual concert experience. But, you can't hear the light show.

@nandric,  sad isn't it? I prefer to call it primitive human behavior. Will we ever learn to overcome our instincts? All those characters are the same it is only that their weapons got better as time marched on. Thank god the vast majority of us are not suicidal but the Japanese Kamikaze should serve as an important lesson. God will not help us if certain people get a bomb. In the end it will be religion that is the ruin of us.