Talk but not walk?

geoff,

I may sometimes comment on someone's posting style - especially if they are being disingenuous.  But I *do not* use comments on someone’s posting style to *avoid* people’s questions or arguments. I directly address them (as I did yet again when you brought forth your pseudo skeptic defintion and tried to pin it on me).

Whereas you, taking the baton from MG, are carrying on the tradition of evasion when you can’t actually reply to the actual argument or stance someone has actually presented.

Clearly you aren’t going to acknowledge you were so obviously wrong.

Suit yourself; it’s your persona.

geoff,

It’s one thing to look for a way out when your bluff has been called.

But to do it on the pretence that someone is calling you names?

Geoffkait...complaining about anyone name-calling?

That is a priceless ploy coming from you. I admire the chutzpah.
Though you may have a class action lawsuit from Audiogon members coming at you, for damage done to their collective Irony Meters ;-)

(And LOL at trying to find "name calling" in my last two posts.)

Anyway, buh-bye! I’ve spent more time than I should have battling your imagination.

jf47t,

It’s odd to read this thread that is mostly about Michael’s character instead of the OP.

You seem to have missed that Michael’s OP was an attack on the character of others - calling them out as "fakes." (And he continued to imply people on this thread - e.g. me - are faking it).

Why is your tolerance so high when Michael does this, and so low if anyone challenges Michael to back up his arguments, I wonder?

No one is chasing MG around on the forum attacking his character (I notice he managed to recently turn a speaker thread into yet another bunch of self-promotion...)

But since THIS thread is one started by MG, and he did not behave very well to people who didn’t just accept his claims, then it’s not a surprise that his posts have been scrutinized for their character.

I don’t doubt at all that any number of people can report wonderful interactions with MG. I’m sure - if you he sees you as open to conversion - he can be a great guy. But of course it’s easy to be nice to people who are thanking you for your help and pearl’s of wisdom.

It’s another test of character, for anyone not just MG, to be able to discuss differences of opinion in an intellectually honest manner and not dismiss anyone voicing disagreement or skepticism as "negative" people or trolls.

Which Michael continually implied (and sometime explicitly).

I see and listen with Michael almost every day. We live 5 doors away from each other.

And I’m sure you get along great. But none of that speaks to MG’s actual posts in this thread, which were evasive, dismissive if not outright insulting.

(written to uberwaltz)

There aren’t any questions here Mr. Green avoided. He didn’t give the answers Prof or whomever wanted

Holy cow. I asked for clarifications, and asked specific questions. Michael Green admitted he wasn’t even answering them, didn’t even feel it incumbent on him to do so at all. If you asked me specific questions and I respond with the equivalent of "I'm not going to answer your questions, you don’t get it, and btw you exemplify the problem" you wouldn’t accept my characterization "well, I just didn’t give the answers you wanted." No, that’s disingenuous - as if to put the onus on you, like YOU are in the wrong to not accept those as answers. The fact is I just wouldn’t be answering the questions AT ALL. Michael was not answering my questions AT ALL. Either early on, or when I asked about capacitors. Everyone noticed. Why don’t you?

You are taking pages right out of Michael’s playbook here. Spin something in a disingenuous manner - always imply blame to the respondent.

Prof I have indeed read this whole thread and you and kosst ARE trolling MG. You can twist and turn as much as you wish but you ARE INDEED TROLLING Mr. Green.

Here is what your post shares in common with Mr. Green’s posts: You can cast such aspersions, but you can’t - don’t even bother - to back it up. Calling people names like "troll" without actually showing how their arguments - what they have actually written - deserves that name, is rather undignified. (Whereas I only applied that term to Michael’s post insofar as I showed exactly why the *content* of his post justified that term).

Do you care to back up your name-calling and actually show how my questions to Michael was "trolling?" Point to any argument I’ve made here to be unreasonable?

It would only be intellectually honest to do so, don’t you think?

Or are you set in following MG’s example of just brushing people off with disparaging comments, rather than engaging their questions and arguments?

BTW, anyone notice there has been an influx in the thread of MG acolytes to castigate nay-sayers?

It gives the feeling a siren call went out at some point, does it not?

Prof, when Michael is up on a forum somewhere in the home hobby or professional a post is made on TuneLand and his facebook page. No sirens needed.

Well, that is essentially a siren of the type I was thinking - it seemed that somehow Tuneland people are getting alerted elsewhere about this thread, as opposed to just "stumbling upon it" while perusing audiogon. And that is what you’ve just described: when Michael posts here he alerts his followers.

This serves as a good example of trolling by you.

And that serves as a good example of your misapplication of that term.
My comment was not trolling:

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Trolling

It was an honest impression that Michael’s followers and friends were being alerted about this thread from outside this forum. Nothing - as per the definition of trolling - was meant to deceive, and my general impression was essentially vindicated by the information you just posted.

And MG most certainly did engage in your question. If you read MG’s response to you he asked a very straight forward question.

He asked a question to AVOID ANSWERING my question.

I was asking the question first, remember?

Here was my question (which I had to ask twice because he kept avoiding it):

PROF WROTE: "Can you tell us exactly what measurable performance parameters change when a cap is tied down with a tie wrap? And explain why one would expect those measurable changes would be audible, especially with the character you describe?

Can you supply any such measurements for us to see, so we don’t have to just take your word on it?"

Do you actually think those are unreasonable questions to ask, if someone is claiming there is an audible performance difference between a tied and an untied capacitor? I’d hope not!

Yet, instead of answering the question, Green wanted to turn the tables and ask me about the difference between two specific capacitors. That is NOT answering my questions and I’m sure you know it. He only sought a way to try and show me as inexperienced, and use that as an excuse to not answer those completely reasonable questions.

But be my guest - show me how the above questions were, in fact, answered by Michael.

Your answer set the stage for where you wanted to go with this thread.

Yes...I tried to keep Michael actually focused on giving some answers to explain the evidence for his claims, instead of his ignoring them and finding new ways to imply I’m a fake. How impertinent of me!

Michael was talking about people who want to try things instead of talking about them.

And do you think it is unreasonable to first ask the basis on why one would try something in the first place?

Do you just try anything anyone ever suggests? Or, if their suggestion doesn’t seem to make immediate sense to you, would you not ask follow up questions, asking for a better explanation and evidence?

Tell me: what exactly is wrong with that? Because that’s what I was doing with Michael’s claims about crowding components, tied capacitors etc, but he wouldn’t answer.

But Michael and his acolytes tend to imply that if you question the claims before running out and trying them, well, that’s just not right, it’s like a bad character trait and you aren’t playing by the rules they want people to play. "If you haven’t tried it; you are in no position to question it.’

And that is a type of b.s. that deserves to be called what it is.

Another thing I can tell you about Michael is he doesn’t like to do anger.

Yes I did notice he tended toward the passive-aggressive - sprinkling assertions and implied insults (e.g. implying questions like mine made me part of the problem, implying people who were skeptical are trolls oe negative nellies, etc), and doing the passive-aggressive "Oh, if you took THAT from what I said, that’s on you!"

Once again, as I’ve said many times: I am not arguing at all that Michael Green has nothing to offer. Far from it, his tunable speakers and some of his room tuning implementations are intriguing even to me. And I am not declaring that all his tweaks are fake and don’t work. All I’m doing is, when a claim seems ever more outside anything I’ve seen good evidence or explanation for - to ask questions about what type of evidence and methods of testing are being used to vet the ideas. And I’ve also been pointing out that starting a thread implying people are being fakes who don’t go along with Green’s claims and run out to try them, is not a good way to start a civil discussion with people who may not simply accept your claims on face value, and want some reasonable questions answered first.

Anyway...

I have indeed been a dog-on-a-bone in this thread, I certainly admit that.

However, the whole thing really touches issues I find of interest and importance - the role of empiricism, science and skepticism in high end audio, and the approach to discussing differences of opinion or debating the issues. Like I’ve said, it does no one any good to be dismissive of someone’s skepticism, to imply it is only a form of defective negativity, to ignore good questions and arguments, and only embrace those who believe exactly as we do. That’s why I bristled at the lack of honest interaction in the thread and have felt it important to identify and critique.

But I don’t plan on adding any more.

Unless...of course...other people show up and continue to insist on mischaracterizing my posts and arguments. ;-) .

(Though actually, even then, whatever.  People will mischaracterize them if that's what they are after, no matter what I do.  That's obvious at this point.  But my views, arguments and clarifications are all there for anyone to make an honest assessment). 

Why don’t you talk to Michael about music or his product or tuning.

I did. Remember?

I asked honest questions that he refused to answer.

As I said: I’m not trying to get you to change your opinion of the Michael you know. He may be a great fellow. But I certainly am trying to get across why this thread went to crap, and it started with the character of Michael’s original post. I know Michael’s followers think he can do no wrong...so yes, it’s a bit quixotic to think you will recognize this thread didn’t have the best efforts of MG.

Or better yet why don’t you post your thoughts on TuneLand.

Because I have seen that this would be useless - both Michael and his followers here have all shown that skeptical questions are not welcome, that they are seen as bad vibes and trolling. I’ve also seen someone else dismissed before from the Tuneland forum simply for asking skeptical questions, daring to bring up measurements, blind testing etc, so it doesn’t seem worth the time to go there unless I’m just going to embrace anything Michael presents with "geeze, thanks!."

Your posts are repeated ramblings at this point.

They are "repeated" because no Tuner answers them.

I’m hardly following him around the forum - this is the only MG thread I’ve ever entered.

But MG tuners keep showing up to defend him and while doing so, cast me and others as the bad guys. And since you came in and called out my (among others) posts as off-the-mark, even trolling, of course I’m going to respond and explain where you are wrong.

uberwaltz,

I've told you once.

Facts can be very boring. That’s a fact.

No it isn't.





;-)

Wait...I thought we were doing more Monty Python....: (

jf47t,

I am truly glad for you, that you are having great experiences in this hobby! Sounds like a fun night! I really believe in "to each his own" and though I may not be doing what you guys are, specifically speaking in terms of tweaking, I do my own stuff. So I lift a glass of spirits to you.

But I wonder if the sentiment is the same "from your side of the fence" because posts like you just made does continue to imply others are not "doing" this hobby, and if not by implication "doing it wrong."

Like this:

He said when people are not "doing" the hobby it turns into talking aimlessly.

What do you think Michael meant by not "doing" the hobby?

Because I’m not sure what that could even mean. As far as I can see, everyone here "does" the hobby. On their own terms.

I may not, for instance, be "tuning" wood in my listening room, but I certainly fire up the system, sit back and enjoy music to no end!

Isn’t that "doing" the hobby at all?

Or do we have to be tweaking to do the hobby? Well, I certainly do that sometimes (though I try not to let it take precedence over mostly just listening to music). I like playing with speaker positioning, and acoustics in my room (I’ve made it really easy to do that). I enjoy changing up my amplification, or speakers (I own many speakers because I like how speakers sound different from one another). I spent a good two months setting up and testing all sorts of methods and materials to re-build my equipment rack and make an isolation base for my new turntable.
And I’m just really learning more about VTA adjustment etc.

So do I get to be included in the "doing the hobby" club?

Or does "doing the hobby" mean doing it on MG’s terms, and using his tuning methods?

And if what Michael meant to refer to was ending up posting and discussing the hobby on a forum like this, maybe "instead of" actively listening to our systems or something...then I’m unclear about that as well. After all, we can all walk and chew gum at the same time. I can post this...and soon after listen to a bunch of records, which I plan to do. Posting in this thread has never stopped me from my music listening time. Or from discussing with friends how to achieve something I want in my system. Or research other steps (for instance dialing in my new subwoofers...lots to be done).

And certainly, MG himself spends a lot of time posting on forums, writing evangelically about his method. So there can’t be anything wrong with that.

Just wondering if you can clear these questions up, because I truly am trying to make sense of such statements.

Because I wouldn't go claiming you, or Michael, or anyone else on this thread "isn't doing the hobby" and I'm wondering on what grounds you feel you/Michael can claim that about other audio enthusiasts. 

Thanks!

@jf47t

Any thoughts in reply to my previous post?  Thanks.

jf47t,

Ha, you are up having fun. I’m up working! (Just peeking into the forum for a mental break here and there).

Sounds great. I’d loved to have heard what you heard.

Though I’m still left in the dark about the question I asked. I know Michael’s thoughts about getting the best out of different recordings.

But what I was asking about is Michael saying people aren’t "doing the hobby" ...or "faking it" as he has put it earlier.

I don’t think Michael believes in right or wrong, only growth vs settling for.

But that still leaves me unenlightened as to who would be not "doing the hobby" or "faking it."  Since those are the terms in which Michael has been putting things - and they obviously sound negative - I'm trying to figure out what that actually means in practice.

Again, I wouldn’t want to disparage anyone else in terms of what they enjoy doing - or not doing - in the hobby, so I’m unsure why Michael is describing people’s involvement in such negative terms. Is the person who is actually happy with his system...."not doing the hobby" or....faking it? (Because...he has settled for something he finds pleasing and doesn’t feel the need to keep tweaking? Whereas Michael thinks this is stopping "growth"? What exactly is the purpose of "growing" if not to reach the point most people want to reach, which is when they are satisfied in mostly listening to the music?)

I mean, I get if one wants to point out that some people settle sooner along the way in setting up a high end system, whereas others will keep looking for every possible way to keep improving and tweaking. But what I don’t get is disparaging either one, putting one in a camp of "not doing/faking."

Given what I described in my previous post about how I approach my system, would you describe me as "not doing" the hobby? Or "faking it?"

Hookay...

It seems my very first reply to you in this thread remains as pertinent as ever.

Not doing the hobby is when someone speaks as if they have some knowledge on something yet they personally have never done it.

But you are casting a wide, disparaging net there. It’s one thing to say of a single subject being discussed "you haven’t personal experience with X." It’s another to cast this as "the hobby." People can be doing high end audio, doing "the hobby" just as much as you are, yet disagree on a subject. Someone could say "Well, Michael, I don’t put tuned wood blocks under my cables because I’m not convinced by your reasoning that it is efficacious." But simply voicing skepticism is NOT tantamount to "not doing the HOBBY." That person can, it should be obvious, still be quite engaged in the hobby of high end audio and their own system.

But your way with words doesn’t even allow for the idea that two audiophiles can be in "the hobby," yet disagree on some specific subject. This is the type of careless way with wording that, yet again, is problematic for good discourse.

Faking it is the same thing. They will make comments about a subject and yet have never really explored it.

Same problem here that I highlighted in my first post to you.

First...commenting on a proposed tweak (or whatever) IS a way of exploring it. If you suggest a tweak, and I ask "How does that work, exactly, and on what evidence are you basing this?" then that IS part of exploring the subject. A tweak first has to make some sense to someone in order to motivate putting money...or just time and effort...in to it.

Further, there are often times when someone can reasonably comment on a claim that they have not personally experimented with. I don’t have to have gone to the moon personally to argue it’s unreasonable to claim it’s made of cheese, and I don’t have to have tried using homeopathy to point to very good reasons that the claim is based on bunk. Quite a number of high end audio tweaks fall into a similar category, where one can point out the claims are suspect in nature, if not technically, and the vetting process unreliable.

So one way to be more clear on where you stand is to answer: Would YOU put me in the category of "not doing the hobby" or being a Faker?

Answering this would go a long way to clarifying your stance, and also showing how reasonable it is or not. (Your first reply to me suggested you put me in the "not doing/faking it" camp...but I’m looking for clarification).

The reason I asked you if you knew the difference between those two caps is so I could see how experienced you were with the sonic differences between audio pieces.

Again...you seem to extrapolate from isolated examples to imply an unjustified wider conclusion.

That I haven’t experience comparing those caps does not equate to my not being experienced "with the sonic differences between audio pieces." I’ve been in to high end audio, heavily, since the early 1990’s, and have been comparing audio devices with great fervor for decades.
So who are you to try to extrapolate from some simple capacitor example that this disqualifies me from be worthy of discussing with you audio differences?

Prof some people swear they can’t hear the differences between caps. That to me is a disqualifier for me to want to talk to them about the sound differences.

I didn’t make any such claim that they don’t sound different, right? But you went on to ignore my reply with just "thank you" and no reasoning or clarification beyond that.

Same goes for the ties snipped from the caps.

I haven’t declared that snipped caps don’t sound different. I’ve given reasons why I don’t just accept the claim at face value, and asked for more details explaining the purported phenomenon. That’s reasonable isn’t it? You see that’s different from declaring they don’t make a difference, right? And yet everything you write keeps implying my concerns are just trolling, and are not serious questions, and even though I keep explaining "I’m not saying it’s impossible" over and over, your replies keep referring to people who say "it’s impossible." I’ve simply been asking for you to interact with what I actually say, vs what seems to be some other version you have in your head that you keep responding to.

Fact is, the change did take place and Jay and others here who have gone and done this experiment while this thread was going on heard the difference and reported it to me. I’ve taken my time responding to you because I wanted to heard from folks who actually "Did" the experiment.

So this is a problem I keep pointing toward. Your OP made quite a deal about being empirical, and you referenced being scientific. ("why....do people claim they know something without ever experimenting or being part of a team of empirical science folks.")

But what I’ve seen from you isn’t very scientific at all. I’ve been asking the very questions someone thinking scientifically would ask:
What is your explanation, what makes your hypothesis plausible as a starting point for investigation. Have you measurable results to show?
And then, have you tested your hypothesis that the results are actually audible in ways that account for the relevant variables (e.g. bias, human imagination, etc)?

See there is a whole world of difference between simply "empirical experience" and being scientific. Flat earthers are basing their beliefs on their experience. But they aren’t being scientific.

If you were familiar with scientific empiricism, you’d recognize my questions as pertinent and in fact welcome them - scientists know they gain strength in their hypotheses insofar as they can stand up to skeptical scrutiny.

But you keep reacting like skepticism is a bad thing. More like it’s a buzz-kill when you just want to discuss your claims, and only talk of positive results unchallenged. Skepticism is just, apparently, a way to troll you.

Such an attitude is much more aligned with pseudo-science, or new age magical thinking or faith, rather than empirical rigor. So you should be able to see the grounds for skepticism here.

If you feel it’s fair to call people out for not "walking the walk" isn’t it fair to call you out for giving lip-service to science and empiricism, while not "walking the walk" by actually taking scientific rigor seriously in your methods, and in your responses?

Where the talk would come in is all these posts on this thread meant to derail or be a distraction. I would call all those with the intent to derail, troll or just old farts needing attention "fakes".

This just sounds like someone who won’t put up with any challenge to his claims.

Michael, please look again at your OP.

You did not make a thread about your tuning methods.

You made a thread specifically calling out some group of people for being fakes in this hobby. Not just that; people you claim are part of this forum. That’s what your entire OP is concerned with, from thread title to the last challenge to these people "why fake it?"

Did you honestly think you could just devote a thread to disparaging some group of people...and not have anyone challenge you on your claim? Like you can just gripe all you want about some subsection of people in this hobby and you expect only pats on the back and no pushback? Surely you can’t be that naive. And you even started with the understanding you would be raising hay by saying "you didn’t want to start a fight." But again, that’s like saying "I don’t want to cause any ill will - but some of you are fakes. Just don’t challenge me on that."

Numerous people have pointed out this problem in your OP, and in your follow up posts, so I don’t know why you refuse to listen to any criticism and keep blowing it all off, assuming the only reason anyone could pushback is if they are fakers or trolls.

Far from "de-railing" from the topic, I’ve been in fact KEEPING this thread on topic by asking you to back up and clarify the various claims in your OP. Trying to see whether I, or anyone else at all here, warrants your disparaging remarks. And probing your claims on empirical testing and it’s implications.

It seems you will only countenance on-topic remarks IF they support your claim and pat you on the back for calling out these purported fakes. But if someone challenges your claim...well they are of course the fakes and trolls you referred to. A perfectly circular type of response, more suited to religion than to someone truly empirically open or scientific.

For me this is a successful thread because listeners are "doing".

Which apparently means "doing your tuning stuff" and that’s "the hobby."

This smacks of self-important elitism, evangelism, not of egalitarian respect for other people to have their own approach.

I’m "doing" stuff all the time in the audio hobby. And I’d suggest literally everyone on and probably reading this thread is "doing" as well. But your stance continually suggests someone not doing your thing, or who voices any skepticism, isn’t "doing the hobby" or isn’t being empirically consistent, or is a faker or troll.

And that’s...to put it more politely than it deserves....not true or reasonable.

I didn’t come on this thread to "derail it" but rather appeal to you to clarify and substantiate your claims, and to helpfully suggest - being explicit that I was not accusing you of being malicious! - that creating a thread to disparage unnamed people was likely to be problematic.
And...it was. (And it’s not just me...many others have been trying to tell you this).

@grannyring 

However, why continue to derail the thread and waste our precious time as some of us would like to expand our knowledge here.

I believe you may have lost some perspective on the subject of this thread, grannyring.

Look at Michael's OP.   He did not start a thread along the lines of "ask me about my tuning methods" or "let's discuss tweaks and tuning.'

No.

It was a thread explicitly devoted to castigating certain audiophiles.  From the thread title, through the body of the text, to the last line challenging these people - "why fake it?" - it was a call out, to talk about fakers and a challenge to those "fakers."  

How could you reasonably expect this thread would not breed any acrimony, given the negative assessment of other people contained in the OP?

Anyone showing up to challenge Michael's claim IS keeping the thread on topic.  I've been asking Michael for examples to support his claim.  I've been asking if I fit the profile he's talking about.  I've been asking questions about the empiricism and science Michael appealed to in his OP.  I don't think anyone has been MORE on topic of the OP than I have.

Turning the thread in to a Michael Green tuning techniques thread would be making it off topic - he could start any other thread about that specifically.  And if that was in fact the motivation for Michael to make this thread, to evangelize again about his tuning methods, then the thread title and OP would have been deceptive on his part - a bait and switch, "trolling" with a negative post about other people in order to gain eyes to turn the subject to his tuning methods again.

I've at least done Michael the respect of trying to keep this on the topic he started, if that in fact was his motivation for this topic.

Constantly trying to put a negative spin on someone’s motive and methods is just not what these threads are meant for.

Again...did you even read Michael's OP?

He STARTED this thread via a NEGATIVE assessment of other people's motives and methods!   If someone isn't trying out his methods, and is calling upon other experience or resources other than simply trying his tweaks, then he's calling such people fakes.

But no one has to be a fake to voice reasonable skepticism about a claim.

It's fascinating that you so easily see negativity and suspect motivations in others, but everything MG posts is all roses and sunshine.

@theaudiotweak

The following applies to all material surfaces especially 2 or more
dissimilar materials of varied shapes. Adjusting the surface tension
changes the surface shear speed of the materials ..becoming either
separate,combined or somewhere in between. The result is more or less
interfering energy being transferred back and forth between these
surfaces in intimate contact or from the compressive world onto a
solid then becoming shear. So in many examples of using gucci caps
tied down to horrid materials made of sawdust and glue you will have
the sound of that cap altered for sure by the larger mass of the
material it is forced upon. The size and mass of the same substrate
will also give you a different result.The tie down material will also
become part of the sound of the cap. As we know vibration is all
around and cannot be isolated. We can make vibration a useful tool and
most pleasant. Just need to know the why and how..Tom ..
Star Sound Technologies and Tone Acoustics

Even if I take your explanation of resonance at face value...your follow up claims about the audibility of untied caps is very wanting. You make rather large, unsubstantiated leaps of logic.

The question remains: how much vibration is *actually* occurring in any component in question, or in the case of any cap, and then; does it have *audible* consequences.

Your whole explanation just begs the question by presuming what I’ve been asking you to argue for.

A common theme I find in the audiophile tweak world is that the tweaks - be they high end AC cables or whatever - come with a bunch of technospeak giving the air of technical respectability. But suddenly the technical claims are dropped when it actually comes to demonstrating the claims.

So for instance, there will be claims by a boutique AC cable manufacture based on technical claims about impedance, various types of noise to reduce, etc. Now, these are not phenomena they are pulling out of a hat. These things are measurable; that’s how the phenomena was detected and understood in the first place.

And then they talk about how their product addresses the technical issues (e.g. maintaining desirable impedance, rejecting undesirable noise etc). So it’s a technical hypothesis. But in high end audio products, it’s not JUST a hypothesis that the phenomena in question exists; it’s the hypothesis that the tweak, or product, under consideration produces AUDIBLE CHANGES in the output of a stereo system.

And the funny thing is, after all the techno speak by the manufacturer when you ask "Ok, can you show us measurements indicating the audio signal output has been altered in any way by the introduction of your product?" The answer typically boils down to "Why would we do that?"

It’s bizarre.

The claims are technical RIGHT UP to the point where the hypothesis should be validated...and then suddenly technical/engineering problems that can be measured...and then claimed to be fixed by the product...suddenly can't be measured, or don't need measured validation!   Such considerations suddenly disappear and it’s "don’t you hear the difference??"

This is the Big Red Flag in high end audio claims. Appeal to science and engineering all the way up to the point where you ask for measured results, and then suddenly it’s handed off to marketing.

So...bringing these concerns back to your explanation....

My questions would be:

In the case of an average electronic component - say a CD player sitting in my rack or whatever - how much vibration would the unit actually be undergoing? Have you measured this? I can tell you that, at least with my ipad seismometer app (obviously more crude than a professional device) it can easily measure vibration levels I can’t even feel. It registers no detectable vibration when simply sat on any of my components. Zero. And that’s a device *looking* to register vibration.

So right off the bat, this implies that components such as those in my house are, if they are undergoing any vibration, it is very, very low (or below the threshold of what I can feel and measure with my app).

Why should I expect such a low level of vibration to excite resonances, or to cause such havoc on capacitor tied to a circuit board, that this would alter the signal to an audible degree? (I have other reasons to be skeptical of your claims, which I’ll leave out for now).


Do you have measurements showing the average ambient vibration on a component? Do you have measurements showing this ambient vibration actually alters the values or performance of a tied vs untied cap? Those are pretty obvious questions, right?

Then do you have measurements from any output of an audio device that uses capacitors that indicates the audio signal would have changed? How did you measure, how did you test?

If only via listening tests, did you account for listener bias?

glupson,

I think you are right to smell a fish with the use of "empirical testing" in this thread, especially as it seems to be used by MG and his followers.

As I have pointed out several times: broadly speaking virtually any inferences we derive from from our experience is "empirical."

The problem is, because words like "empirical" and "testing" are so often associated with science, you see those words being adduced by any number of pseudo sciences, or fringe idea claims, in a way that elides and obscures between good methodology and simply "trying it out for yourself."

There is a world of difference between any number of empirical inferences and good methodology that yields reliable results; that’s why the scientific method arose.

Flat earthers are being "empirical" in their inferences from experience: "You can use your sense of sight to easily see the world is flat!" And they are performing all sorts of "tests" and "experiments" to confirm their flat earth theory. But the problem is their assumptions are poor, and do not build on the back of gained knowledge through reliable methods, and their tests are poorly designed, and they draw bad inferences that ignore all sorts of other interpretations and contra-indicative evidence to their belief.

We always get the common refrain around here: "Just try it for yourself and if it works it works - and if you haven’t done your own test, you have no grounds on which to speak about it."

What this misses is that the very same response is given by virtually every single fringe claim in existence - whether it’s a religion, cult, a new age healing method, psychics, astrology, flat earth, faith healers, you name it. EVERYONE thinks they are being empirical and they think you can test their claims personally. That is, after all, how all those people come to their beliefs in the first place.

The fact that "trying it for yourself" can lead to virtually ANY belief, no matter how outlandish, ought to be a clue about it’s inherent unreliability - that there is something fundamentally not addressed in such an idea.
That is, of course, human imagination.

People rarely accept the power of human imagination when it comes to their own beliefs. Sure, all those other wacky beliefs - those are delusions, bias etc. But not MINE! You see...I have Personal Experience so I can’t be wrong!

The scientific method was a long, extremely hard-won struggle because we are all so easy to fool, and as Feynman said: The first principle is that you must not fool yourself — and you are the easiest person to fool.

The tiniest slip up in experimental rigour and...you’ve "discovered" cold fusion or faster than light particles (see the "Opera experiment" debacle).

Does this mean it’s my view that we all have to be scientists in everything we are doing and claiming? Of course not; it’s not practical to demand that of everything we do. But I believe we should at least scale our beliefs and claims to the quality of the evidence we have.

And one doesn’t need direct experience with a tweak to point out when someone is making claims that don’t scale with the quality of the evidence, and theory, they are espousing. Lots and lots of people saying the same thing, if based on recognizably unreliable methods of inference, don’t add up to a good argument.

amg56,

I certainly agree you are asking the right questions.

And those questions are being evaded.  Which is fishy.

Robert,

I have less time thus far to post today, but I just want to drop in to say: 
Now THAT is a good response!  You clearly took the questions seriously and took care to understand the relevance and reply to the points I was raising. 

Thank you, much appreciated.

I'll try to get back with a more worthwhile reply.

glupson,

It seems that for every thing that gets mentioned as a tweak/tuning there are two sides. One claims it is non-sense and cannot be true noticeable difference and the other side claims that the difference is noticeable.

That’s actually the false dichotomy that I’ve been at pains to reject.

As I keep arguing here, one doesn’t have to take a single side "it makes an audible difference/it doesn’t make an audible difference" position.

One can simply take the position "I don’t know if there is an audible difference, so let’s discuss the reasons and evidence for why there might be an audible difference, or not."

Being a long time audio-nut myself, and always liking the idea of further enhancing the sound of my system, I'm very attracted to the idea of "tweaking" my system.   So it's not something I reject on some weird a priori grounds - in my more tweaky moments I WANT things to make a difference.  But I also realize this is also when I'm most likely to fool myself that there is a difference.

This is causing you to troll tuning and myself.

No, Michael, if anyone has trolled, you have trolled this forum.  And that is why it truly is worth trying to make sure this kind of stuff is called out.

And unlike you who just throws that word out in a knee-jerk fashion at anyone who asks you clarifying or skeptical questions, one can actually point to your actual posts and behaviour on this thread to show how troll-like it has actually been.

You started a thread that was about castigating some members as fakers. When challenged on your claim, all you’ve done is reply without actual interaction with the challenges, instead using passive-agressive "Oh, what lil’ ol me? I’d never be negative; that’s on you...YOU must be a negative person or a troll."

That is the behaviour of a troll. Make a post you KNOW will rankle feathers, never own up to it or directly address arguments against your claim, and instead pretend the onus for negativity is on whoever challenges your claim. Keep characterizing the person asking you to back up your claims with versions of "you must be one of the people I’m talking about."

That’s trolling 101 behaviour, and it’s worth calling out when a manufacturer comes here and engages the forum this way. And then this is accompanied by an utterly transparent motive of self-promotion, to get the subject to your tuning, and your forum. (Which you as much as explicitly admitted at one point, saying this thread was a door to Tuning).

As I said, there could be nothing LESS helpful to open, honest, civil dialogue than to simply cast people who bring challenging questions as "trolls" which is the card you play constantly to evade, evade, evade giving direct substantive responses. Again...I’m far from the only one who has noticed this modus operandi.

Perfect example, after my continued questions to you ON TOPIC - "what do you mean by testing? What do you mean by empirical? What methods are you using? Can you clarify exactly what you mean and what would fit your claim of "faking it?" and can you give some more explanation or evidence for the other claims you’ve now made (e.g. tied caps)....

.....you again avoid answering any substance of my argument or questions to you, and instead reply only with baiting insults like this:

In other words your smelling of something fishy is probably because you have been wiping your nose with your freshly fish covered hands.

You see, this is the behaviour that keeps the negative thread you started going along the wrong rail. You didn’t have to act this way.

As an example, look at the recent reply to my skeptical questions from
"audiopoint." He acted like someone engaged in honest dialogue: saw the questions were reasonable, and did his best to directly answer them. Even if someone doesn’t accept everything in his answers, that’s no biggie, we can disagree but at least show each other the respect of ENGAGING one another’s ideas, instead of evading anything that doesn’t support one’s own marketing goals and trying to cast challenges in a negative light.

We’ll end with this:

Prof, your not going to win here because listeners are tuning as we speak in real time which is the proof of and for the hobby of listening.

This is just more vaguely self-aggrandizing gobbledygook.

Again, you are carelessly (or...carefully!) mixing up terms to serve your own agenda. What the heck does it mean to say people Tuning (the name for your method and claims) are "proof of and for the HOBBY OF LISTENING"????

That’s absurd. I’m engaged in the "hobby" of listening and so is EVERYONE on this forum, even though most of us are not one of your disciples "tuning" by taking apart our gear, putting it on wood blocks etc.

You seem so blinkered and driven by your own marketing concerns - sorry..."spreading the world about tuning"...that you conflate the most basic universal terms like "Hobby" and "listening" with "Tuning" (which just happens to be your self-marketed term for your methods and services).

It’s a disingenuous move because, hey, who could put down "listening" right? And if you are tuning you are doing the hobby of listening!

No. We have to be able to be conceptually clear and separate these things. You make certain technical and perceptual claims that people who are in the hobby of high end audio, and who LISTEN, can disagree about.

And if you want to say "Oh, gee, whoever would take my claim to be that other people not tuning aren’t listening? I didn’t mean THAT" then don’t bother with that bait and switch. If you DID NOT MEAN to conflate our Hobby or "Listening" with your tuning methods, then DON’T WRITE IN A WAY THAT CONFLATES THOSE THINGS. Don’t shove off your own responsibility for your careless, or self-serving, confusion of terms and twist it into the negative motives of other people.

And note: every further reply you may want to make that avoids my questions and arguments, to say I’m just being a meanie, only re-enforces that you will take the easy, trolling route of "calling names" over "replying to the arguments."

Over ’n out.

(Whether Michael reads this response or not, I still think it’s worthwhile to point out modes of interaction that are pernicious to honest discussion, and Michael seems intent on supplying a never ending stream of examples).

jf471,

MG is obviously free to make any other thread, or contribute in any other thread, as he in fact has already.

Nobody is following him around this forum, and I have not directly interacted with him on any other thread.

I have only stuck around in this thread insofar as Michael started a thread to claim some people are fakes, and has refused to answer honest questions trying to understand and/or challenge that claim.

My very first reply explicitly gave Michael the benefit of the doubt, pointing out I was not impugning his intentions, only pointing out that I would like to to see clarification, and some actual defence, of what he meant and the basis for putting some people in the "faker" category.
And of course to explore the role his constant appeal to empiricism played in all this. Not only that, I have consistently given Michael’s claims more benefit of the doubt than he has ever given me. I’ve consistently said that I’m totally open to the idea that Michael’s methods can produce great results, and that I’d even be excited to hear them. I’ve explicitly said I am not claiming to disprove even his methods I find less compelling, but that I’m simply asking reasonable questions about the basis for their effectiveness and the methods of confirming them as such.

In contrast to my side, continually voicing openness to Michael Green’s legitimacy, he has done virtually nothing but disparage my character as negative and trolling.

It’s rather amazing that this imbalance in intellectual honesty goes completely unnoticed by you.

The FIRST thing Michael did was to brush off these honest, relevant questions and instead put ME in the category of people he was disparaging! (Suggesting he didn’t have to explain anything to me, as I had just exemplified the negative category he’d made up).
And he did this to others as well. And just continued to do it all through the thread; every time I’ve tried to keep on the topic of what Michael actually wrote - he evaded, and just cast aspersions on motivations instead of answering questions or counter arguments.

If you wish to follow Michael’s lead and leave calling people trolls instead of engaging reasonable questions, so be it, but that type of response shouldn’t be missed with many tears.

Why not just engage in honest conversation instead?

I just have to infer that you have swallowed Michael’s anti-scientific attitude that challenging questions equate to "bad vibes" "being negative" "trolling" and must arise out of some personality defect in the questioner. As I’ve said, that’s actually more in line with cult-thinking, not open mindedness.

The way to judge integrity is not by the ones speaking the loudest but instead by the ones who have peace within themselves.

Yup, that sounds more like what a cult leader would say to his disciples. "Ignore the arguments against what I say; if I can make you feel good, you can ignore those skeptics, and castigate their motives for challenging me!"

Perhaps you should consider that problem. It’s one thing to be happy with what you and Michael are doing. As I already said, cheers to you and have fun! It’s entirely another to disparage as trolls anyone who gives voice to reasons why we haven’t followed your hallowed path.

(And, I'm sure I need to point this out: saying your and Michael's response shares characteristics with a cult is NOT the claim it "is" the same as a cult; it's pointing out that it shares the same dubious reasoning used by cults, or any number of different dubious belief systems, which should alert you to a defect in the mode of your replies).

grannyring,

The confrontational posts continue to derail any hopes of this and others threads ever amounting to anything of real value.

It’s already been pointed out to you: the topic, started by Michael, concerned people he claimed were faking it. Discussing the basis for those claims - about people faking it, about empirical methods etc - IS keeping the topic on the rail. Michael’s thread explicitly (well, as explicitly as he is capable of writing) challenges skeptics, so it’s ridiculous to complain when any skeptics answer the call to defend their view against Michael’s critique.

Not every subject matter and thread is about debate and arguing.

Then why would Michael make an inherently argumentative thread?? Why doesn’t THAT bother you at all?
Can’t you see the blindspot you seem to have for MG’s behaviour here?

You don’t walk in to a room and say "Some people here are faking it! Why are you faking it?" and expect nobody to question this or object...right?

Is it intellectually honest to make an inherently disparaging claim about other people, and when challenged on it simply respond: "Look, I’m not going to argue about it."

Hey grannyring, you are insincere. Don’t bother replying with any defence of yourself; i don’t want to hear it, I’m here to make that claim, and I’ll hear from anyone who just agrees with my assessment of your character, but I’m not going to argue about it so save your breath!

You can immediately see that is a jerk move should anyone make it.

And yet you seem oblivious when people seem to accept that very move as being "nice" and "diplomatic" - when MG uses this tactic. I’m asking you to think more fairly on this. Is that so bad?

Can we hear about what tuning measures, devices, stands, platforms, modifications, gear etc.., was used to bring about such engaging music?

If you want THAT to be the topic of a thread, why not ask Michael to make a thread on THAT topic. E.g. "Let’s discuss tuning our systems."

But please, it doesn’t do anyone any good to keep implying that anyone actually keeping on topic is "derailing" the topic. And to continually disparage the motivations and character of people for keeping the thread on the topic. (As others have joined MG in doing).

There you go again jf47t,

Taking a page out of MG's book - instead of answering my posts or admitting I may have any point at all, you come in to toss another version of "you mad bruh?"

MG teaches his disciples well, it seems.

Who cares if Michael is off enjoying Mingus?  I was just listening to Bernard Herrmann.  And some Kiss records.  What in the world does that have to do with anything?  

Why try to imply MG is some enlightened figure, above causing any acrimony "because he's off listening to music."

He left another post here dangling in public, avoiding any point I have made, and simply characterizing me as trolling.  

But on your view, that's ok - hey, as long as Michael does that and goes off to listen to sweet music - "why so mad bruh"?

Insofar as you keep this up, you are literally helping MG troll in this thread. 

(And btw, neither you nor Michael can actually support your characterizations as if I'm just some troll.  For instance, I have a thread going in the speaker forum with thousands of views as I report my experience auditioning various speakers, with quite a bit of appreciation voiced for my efforts.  And you can see in this very thread that I express thanks to a manufacturer who ACTUALLY takes the effort to acknowledge the type of questions I've asked MG, and answer them.
Every time you feel yourself wanting to once again, simply think of me - or other people voicing skepticism in this thread - as just meanies and trolls WITHOUT coming up with an actual response to our points...this should ring a tiny bell that this isn't really the best way forward to converse with someone who may not believe what you believe). 

Prof, in my world, being able to condense complex ideas into simple language is a sign of knowledge and experience.

More than that; it’s the sign of someone with the talent to do so. Plenty of knowledgeable people don’t condense complex ideas into simple language as well as others. I agree, that’s a very valuable and welcome talent, and I admire those who have it.

Sometimes I can pull that off. In fact, I’ve been told routinely over the years that I’m able to do this so I don’t feel too wounded by your insult. (Actually, right now people have said so about my reports of speakers I’ve auditioned - that I have admirably condensed in writing the character of the speakers I’ve auditioned).

Other times I go all blowhard and write too much. I gratefully accept criticism on that count, and I think it applies to a bunch of my posts in this thread.

And no, I don’t think the lengths of my posts makes me special. (You aren’t a fan of strawmen, are you? I hope not). But they are often long because I always, as much as possible, wish to avoid simply making an assertion without supporting argument. If they were much shorter and more concise, that would be more special IMO.

But, again, if someone is making reasonable points or asking reasonable questions even IF you think they could be shorter, addressing even one of those points is better than only characterizing someone’s posts, especially negatively, don’t you agree?

Have you anything to say about any points I’ve made - agree or disagree?

Thanks for the insult...though ;-)

amg56, glupson and others.


To the question "Why keep engaging MG and his followers on this thread?" my response is: because I think it’s an important subject.
And while many think "why bother, you won’t change anyone’s mind" that is often not the case. We may not change the mind of the person we are engaging (though that can happen - and my mind can be changed), but many others read public forums and they can weigh both sides, and minds can be changed.

Why change anyone’s mind?

Because, as I’ve argued, the nature of Michael Green’s - and many of his follower’s - posts exhibit features that are inherently dysfunctional for honest discourse between people who may have different views. And they actually exemplify a very common problem in public forums, and certainly in high end audio.

The issue is that anyone can act with good will in conversation with people who agree; but we need to act with good will, a major component being Intellectual Honesty, with people who don’t agree with us, or who bring a different perspective.

But it’s really hard to get this to happen because people are not good at getting underneath their own bias.

So let me use a dramatic example, just to make a point: consider being a minority among a racist majority community. To the majority, everything is just swell, because there is enough people agreeing with them and supporting their view that the boat isn’t being rocked.
But the minority person notices how differently he is treated, how attitudes change, the hospitable and welcoming, open nature of the majority suddenly seems to drain away. The minority is rejected not on what he has to say, but on other factors that make the majority uncomfortable: different look, skin color, even different perspective.

Now, to pull that back from the drama of racism and how it relates to my point: I have often found myself among a "minority" in the high end audio hobby. High End Audio is rife with the supposition that subjectivity rules the day, and is the indisputable bedrock for evaluating audio.
Some of us feel much more cautious about this, and recognize that this is far shakier ground than many audiophiles believe. But this is generally unwelcome by the majority.

So what happens is that, when the talk turns to the tweakier side in any way - cables, "tuning," etc - if you go along with the prevailing sentiment that "everything makes a difference" your comments will tend to be greeted warmly as welcome input. But if you offer a different view "Well, here’s why I don’t go along with that, and I’d like to see better evidence in the way of X or Y..." then suddenly the Good Will tends to dry up.

What happens, a lot, is that the actual substance and argument present is not addressed - or if so barely substantially - and instead the replies turn to attacking the skeptic’s character. The person who isn’t just accepting the claim or status quo is depicted as "negative" or "argumentative" or "angry" or "trolling" etc. And these comments on the CHARACTER of the skeptic’s post - usually based on strawmen ideas about the person’s motivations and arguments - are used to dismiss and not bother interacting with the arguments.

This is such a prevalent fallacy and phenomenon that it has a name:

Tone Trolling.

And much of what Michael and his followers have posted here are in exactly this mode of discourse. From the very first reply, Michael dismissed the content of my argument, to make negative implications about my character as an excuse not to answer my questions and concerns. This has continued this whole thread. (Whereas I have done my best to understand, ask for clarification, and address what I can infer to be the content of Michael’s claims and arguments).

And as I said, as this is emblematic of a wider problem in such discourse.

One of the things cults are known for (and other fringe belief systems) is isolating their beliefs - creating a "safe space" where the beliefs will only find support, and discouraging dissenting opinions by appeals to the sinful motivations of those who would dissent.

But that of course isn’t going to work when you have to present your case to the wider world. In fact, it is an inherently dysfunctional mode of thinking, a bad bias to have, when you export it to public discussion where you will absolutely be dealing with some people who disagree, or who bring different perspectives and arguments. Then...all you have is either your actual arguments and evidence....or you retreat back to Tone Trolling "you’re a meanie so I’m not going to answer your arguments" strategies. And then...even going back to the safe space. (Hello Tuneland!)

So, again, in a nutshell, it’s my aim to highlight this pernicious, inherently dysfunctional mode of discourse where people are "open" to ideas and friendly discourse - but only insofar as it supports their own beliefs.
Whereas they will react to challenges to what they have said by turning to character assessments and trolling "why you so angry?" "why are you so dogmatic?" etc replies. And then wondering why they are engendering acrimony.

It would be so much better if we can just address each other’s points, and ask for clarification if needed, provide clarification, really try understanding and addressing arguments. Even if someone has presented a case, and you have taken their emotional state to be "angry," it’s still a sign of intellectual honesty to not avoid a question or point if it’s pertinent. Or even clarify one’s position "no, this is what I meant." I don’t give a darn for instance when Geoff K makes another angry sounding rant about my arguments. Whatever. But if he ever makes an interesting point, or yet again misrepresents my view, I’ve responded to make my position as clear as possible.

BTW, the difference from mere tone trolling/evasion of the type I’ve talked about and, say, my first post in the thread is this: I did indeed point to the problematic nature of Michael’s post - it’s negativity. But I did this in order to INCREASE the possibility of honest discussion - explaining why the content of his post was likely to cause more heat then light, and I went on to ask him to explain his position more clearly, and I gave my own thoughts on the subject. So far from dismissing Michael’s post, I did my very best to engage it!  Further, I have remained supportive that the idea some of his techniques and products may be excellent, and open to other claims pending actual good answers to my questions. 

Cheers,

jf47t,

Those of you reading this pay attention to what Michael says and what the internet trolls are saying.

You just can’t help yourself, can you? This reflexive need to call someone a "troll" instead of take a counter-argument to your beliefs seriously has been imbued very strongly into your mode of thinking, it seems.

Ok, jf47t, I believe I’ve made the reasons I’ve gone this long on the thread as clear as I can.

So in this case I figure this will be my last interaction. I’d like to see if it’s possible, at all, for you to examine your own assumptions and notice the bias you are bringing to calling people trolls and seeing MG as a sweet guru.

Here’s my question:

Why are you faking it?

To expand:

Imagine that I - or anyone else! - started a thread in Michael’s Tuneland forum. The thread is titled "Talk but not walk?"

And the thread follows exactly this tenor: "Where I come from we test don’t just talk, we test our ideas. I’ve been around labs and testing since I was a kid.

But right now there are about 20 threads going on in this forum (Tuneland) where there’s no doubt people are talking about things about which they have no experience.

My question is why? Why are they claiming to know something without testing it? Isn’t this hobby supposed to be about doing? Isn’t it supposed to be empirically based? Why are so many people not being empirical and propounding myths here? Why not walk the walk instead of just talking the talk?

So my question is: why fake it?



Now, jf47t, as honestly as you can think about this:

1. How could this be received? Would that likely be warmly welcomed? or would the accusations contained in such a thread be likely to engender some suspicion and skepticism toward someone who would use such an opening thread, calling out people as fakes? And might someone - even a mod - point out this is not necessarily the best way to start a good natured, civil discussion in the forum?

Think about it. Be honest with yourself.

Then answer:

2. What would some REASONABLE responses be, in the tuneland forum, to the accusations in such a post? If you folks wanted to give it the benefit of the doubt, engage this critique, vs just dismiss it as trolling, wouldn’t questions arise along the lines of:

"Well, hold on, from our perspective you don’t seem to actually be describing people here. We DO test our ideas empirically. So we are confused about what you are actually criticizing. Can you support your criticism with any actual examples of members being un-empirical or faking it? What kind of tests count to you as being "empirical" and what counts to you as "walking the walk?" We need to understand what you mean before we go agreeing that anyone here at all, fits the description you’ve given and deserves the critique you’ve made.  Because we think we have reasons to give you as to why people here don't fit the role you are depicting in your post.

Again...please contemplate whether those would be reasonable questions people could ask of anyone creating such a thread.

Now, if you find yourself agreeing that...yeah...that thread *might* just have the character of rankling feathers and really *would* naturally bring forth probing questions about the assumptions of the thread starter....then imagine the thread starter immediately dismissing these concerns and questions saying "Well, sorry, what I just wrote was perfectly clear. My friends get it; if you don’t, then you don’t and I don’t have to explain myself further to you. And btw, the people asking all those questions, you exemplify my post."

Now, ask yourself: what would be your, or the Tuneland’s, appraisal of this type of response. Would it be "Well, gee, you are right. Thanks SO MUCH for dropping your wisdom on us!" Or would it perhaps be more along the lines of "this person is not here to engage in real conversation or respond to any counter idea that he is wrong."

jf47t,

So, are you able to answer my question about how tuneland would react to such a thread as I described?

Can you find it in yourself, just for a moment, to honestly answer questions?


(And...out of curiosity....do you live with Michael or something?  Because your posts are getting kind of weird in the access you continually seem to have to whatever Michael is doing and what is going on at his house. )

Does anyone else here think it unreasonable to ask a Michael Green devotee how the Tuneland forum would react to a post with the character of the one Michael made here?

I doubt it.

Is anyone here, at this point, surprised that a Michael Green devotee evaded, evaded and evaded again answering this reasonable question?

I doubt it.

glulpson,

Agreed on all counts.

The idea of "tuning" my system continually per song, or even per album, is a complete turn off to me. I don’t want listening to music to become that much work! To me, that isn’t to enhance the listening experience; it’s to detract from letting the music take over.

Earlier, I finished listening to Goblin’s Tenebrae soundtrack (followed by some Fever Ray) on vinyl and it was bloody GLORIOUS. Not only did it sound incredible - full, gutsy, organic, spacious, palpable, toe-tapping - but the music gave me a plastered on grin for the full album. It was heaven for a soundtrack fanatic like myself. (The Fever Ray LP also: incredible!)

I didn’t feel the need for a moment to tweak anything and I’m glad I didn’t! Everything sounded wonderful. Could I have made some of it sound different? Sure. But I wanted to listen to music, not continually think about how I can "tune" my system to make things sound different.

But...well...gee...since I wasn’t "tuning" I guess I don’t get to say, like MG does, that I was engaged "in the hobby of listening!"

Drat. Not in that rarified club.

Oh wait...maybe I am, because MG actually told everyone earlier that EVERYTHING we do with our system is performing a tweak, even choosing a component or turning it on.

Well then. I guess I AM in the club of listeners. I’m "walking the walk."

But then, wait, if EVERYONE is engaged in tweaking....who is it again who actually ISN’T engaged in "the hobby." If we take MG seriously that we are all tweaking when listening to our system....how can any of us not be "doing it" vs just "talking about it?" If we are all tweaking, then everyone on this forum is "walking the walk" of empirical experience. So...who are the fakes again?

Puzzling questions to be sure. But you have to wait until the Guru is in the right mood before being graced with the answers. And be sure not to be too uppity and question the answers. That gets The Guru mad - no more answers for you! ;-)

BTW, this idea of recordings have a "code" to unlock and tune for - aside from being what seems to be just semantic flourishes on the unremarkable idea that you can do things to make many recordings sound better (hell, mastering itself is predicated on this), it may be desirable to some audiophiles, but it’s also anethema to many aspects of music and sound production (I work in post production sound - and have my work mixed in many varied, millions-of-dollars mixing theaters).

In this case you really do have to have some concept of "accuracy" where you aren’t "tuning" your system to the defects of any track, or particular sound etc. You really NEED to control variables - that is have a consistent and unvarying sound in your playback system (hence most are professionally constructed for accuracy, rooms pinked by acousticians etc)  because you NEED to hear the differences, and deficiencies that actually ARE characteristic of a recording. If dialogue for instance is thin - on the recording! - you WANT to know it, and have it sound thin on your reference system, so you can correct that problem. You won’t want to re-tune your system to make it sound better - leaving the recording itself unchanged - as if changing your system has "revealed" the code in the recording. That is a recipe for disaster! And the FACT it’s a recipe for disaster actually calls in to question the very claim of there being this "code" to unlock, as if every recording is potentially a good one, in the first place.

The other thing is that the Tuners continually depict themselves as "listeners" and just off listening to music all the time...you know..unlike those "audiophiles" who spend all their time thinking about their equipment.

Except...whoa...have you seen the systems of some of these tuners?
Components all taken apart, strewn around sitting on wood blocks between the speakers etc? And we think some of OUR systems are a wife’s nightmare! ;-) . And of course...they are tuning, tuning, tuning.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that ;)

Anyway, if people want to continuously "tune" their system via MG’s methods and find it gratifying I say MORE POWER TO YOU. I’m not about calling any other audiophile’s pleasure "not walking the walk" or "not doing the hobby" or whatever. No, that would be arrogant on my part. And I don’t go in for the common audiophile tit for tat "you aren’t really into the music, I’M just in it for the music!" Because you know what? Most of us have to admit we don’t just love music, but have an interest in sound quality and high fidelity equipment and getting the best sound we can manage. If some people tilt more towards tweaking and being really in to playing with the equipment side of things there’s nothing wrong with that! Whatever floats our boats. But it’s disingenuous for some people to try to pretend they are more "into the music listening" - as if it’s some audiophile version of being more pious - than other people, all the while clearly spending much time and thought on the hardware and set-up side of their hobby.

Ok, I’m outta here. Said all I’ve wanted to say (to say the least!)

I do hope Michal considers more carefully how he wants to promote his ideas here in the future, and re-considers his mode of discourse with people who ask questions that challenge his arguments and claims.
Don’t be so ready to cast honest inquiry into the role of "troll." That’s never going to be a good strategy for conversation.

And just as important at least, I hope some people reading the thread have found some merit in my concern about how we approach discussing our beliefs with others who don’t share those beliefs. That we shouldn’t automatically infer negative motivations, give a good go at giving someone the benefit of the doubt, and as much as possible at least give the effort to understand the other person, and clarify our own position when asked, and respond to arguments, not simply characterize the other person.

Once again: Not my intention to "debunk" Michael Green’s products. Even though I may withhold belief in some of the claims (because I haven’t see good evidence for them), other products seem very interesting - tunable speakers, room tuning, etc, are intriguing.

I wish success for Michael (would never wish otherwise for most people).

As for "Tuners" here, I hope you will not look down on others who have different priorities or approaches in this hobby, or who even may be skeptical of some of MG’s claims, as "not walking the walk" or "not doing the hobby" or that someone asking questions of a skeptical nature are therefore "faking it." If you are super happy with your own process, that’s wonderful. Want to tell others about it? Great! But wishing to share these ideas needn’t require evangelizing to the detriment of how other people are finding satisfaction. No need to tell other people they are not "walking the walk" or "doing the hobby of listening" or whatever. Someone may voice skepticism, while still having his/her own deep relationship with high end audio, and lots of their own experiences to draw upon.  And if you follow their other posts you will often see they are not "bad/trolls" but are actually helpful contributors to this site. 

If YOU enjoy tuning via the MG method, more power to you! Sounds like you are having fun and are really satisfied and that’s great for you. Happy Listening!

Over ’n out,

Prof

Whoa, took a peek in here. I’m not back to engage in any extended debate (there isn’t any to be had), but...

...I see audiopoint isn’t falling for the passive-aggressive marketing act going on in this thread. ;-)

Perfectly exemplified by these kind of words from our Guru:

MG wrote:

I’m pretty happy reading through this thread as the OP is playing itself out perfectly.

Yep, that’s exactly the sentiment someone trolling with this thread would express.

1. Drops in with a contentious thread calling out some people as faking it.

2. It’s pointed out that calling people fakes isn’t a promising way to start to a civil discourse, and what do you mean exactly so we can discuss this?

3. Immediately implies the respondent represents the fakers.

4. Continues to drop passive-aggressive baiting replies, suggesting people asking critical questions is a troll, while never addressing the content of posts asking for clarification and posing questions.

5. Watches as thread ignites and becomes contentious. Helps along with more baiting replies negatively commenting on some people’s personalities without addressing the content of their posts.

6. Re-appears to declare himself satisfied and happy with the result - things went "perfectly."

If that isn’t the sentiment of a troll, happy with the scent of a thread on fire, it’s hard to say what else is.

And naturally one of his fawning followers posts support:

jf47t wrote:

Michael Green

Your a genius! You knew exactly how this thread would develop. You know this hobby’s personality better than any of us.

Only you could have made this OP I am convinced.

Actually lauding MG for his brilliance in trolling audiogon! (Which it appears from his disciples that MG does in his spare time, when not walking on water..)

Excellent work helping MG troll the forum, fj47t! You were clearly made for each other.

But if you pay a bit more attention to some of the replies here, it may be time to re-think your marketing strategy.

geoffkait: 

My degree is Aerospace Engineering with mathematics a specialty. I had the most credits ever accumulated for an undergraduate at Virginia. Ever. Now, if he studied dynamic programming as I have then maybe I will say that is real engineering.

geoffkait: 

Appeal to Authority alert!

;-)

^^^^ Yet another in a long string of "why you mad, bruh?" posts, that simply ascribe a negative emotion or motivation to someone, while claiming "why not be cheery like me?" rather than address the issues under debate. (There is a frankly eerie consistency in the method of passive-aggressive discourse among MG and his followers).

I just went for a wonderful walk in our neighbourhood with my son, and returned to listen happily to some Curtis Mayfield on vinyl.

Well then, I guess these cheery facts mean I don’t have to address the content of anyone’s argument - including anyone raising skeptical questions about my claims.  

That’s convenient!

BTW, I felt no need at all to re-tune my system per song or album. It sounds quite wonderful and satisfying to me on almost everything I listen to.

I guess we who are extremely happy with our systems have moved "beyond tuning" to a state of satisfaction that tuners haven’t arrived at. (Because they feel the need to keep changing the sound of their system to make different recordings sound the way they want).

Perhaps Tuners will get there someday.

Hooboy...

It looks like even more people have had enough of the passive-aggressive marketing act.

Why am I returning with this post? Because Michael decided to return to imply more nonsense about me and others.

Michael Green wrote:

Can I be straight up with you.

I think some of us know where to place our bets on that one.

No one I know, including myself in this, has ever said they can’t hear the difference between the sounds of capacitors. If someone claims to be a HEA audiophile and makes these types of claims, there’s no point for someone like me to talk to them.

Of course, neither I, nor amg56, nor anyone else that I remember seeing in this thread, ever made such a claim. In fact I said clearly that I was NOT claiming capacitors sound different, and amg56 simply was asking Michael for evidence for his claims; he wasn’t declaring the claims false. Just "why don’t you answer these obvious questions??"

And yet here is Michael suggesting the people he won’t interact with have claimed capacitors don’t sound different, in order to not answer their questions.

This is so indicative of the level of intellectual integrity shown by MG on this thread.

Contrast that with the response by another manufacturer on the thread, e.g. audiopoints, who simply took questions seriously and answered them. Even if it didn’t remove all the reasons for skepticism, no problems ensued because this was how honest interaction works and they received kudos.

This shows the difference between the way Michael portrays people - the people asking skeptical questions must be angry trolls - and the way they are: people here asking legitimate, honest questions who respond quite happily to being treated with some respect and honest interaction.

And that’s why many people here are being turned off by MG’s posts.

Do you honestly think I should be spending my time talking to them?

No. Because because that would be how someone familiar with, and respectful of, actual empirical science would act: they would welcome challenging questions. Anyone who actually spent time much of his life in "empirical labs" and hanging with "empirical science folks" would know this.

It’s also what good engineers do. They explain things to each other, and are happy to educate anyone asking good, relevant questions.

But that is not how MG has behaved in this thread.

It is the salesmen, not the hard nosed empiricist, who seeks the easy sell - looking to anyone who "already believes" or who can be readily made to believe a claim.

Why would someone who doesn’t "do" even post on a thread talking about doing?

Micheal didn’t make a thread about "doing it" (he has made a thread about that already: the method of tuning). He made a thread on the topic of NOT DOING it - critiquing people for not "doing" and asking people WHY they are NOT doing it. It’s in the very title, down to his very last sentence!

Imagine being this confused about your own authorship of a thread:

You enter a forum devoted to car enthusiasts with a post suggesting that some members of the forum were not being honest or consistent in their approach. For instance, they profess to be loyal Americans who talk about American cars, but their actual activity doesn’t support this: they are buying foreign cars. Your whole post calls these people out for hypocrisy or being fakers. And you end with the challenge, for those engaging in this behaviour, "Why buy foreign?"

Naturally the very people your thread is addressing, and who you have just challenged to explain themselves - show up to challenge the assumptions in your thread and explain themselves.

And then you wonder: "Wait...why would anyone buying foreign cars even post in this thread? This thread is about being a loyal American and buying American cars, it’s not about the people buying foreign cars!"

Just imagine how bizarre that is. To make a thread whose content ACTUALLY concerned criticizing the people who buy foreign cars, and in which you addressed questions to those people, and then acting confused why anyone you are criticizing would respond to the thread!

The obvious inference is that such a person is either being clueless...or disingenuous.

MG’s behaviour demonstrates that he didn’t want any real conversation with the people he was criticising - this thread only appeared to serve his purpose to the degree he could turn the attention to his tuning and gaining more exposure for his website. As numerous others in the thread have pointed out.

And people notice how condescending and blinkered it is to keep implying, as Michael has done continuously from the OP, that people
who are not doing Michael Green Room Tuning are not "walking the walk" or "doing the hobby" or are only "talkers not doers."

EVERYONE here is "doing the hobby."

We’ve all put plenty of time into carefully selecting and dialing in our systems. I myself put years into my room, working with acousticians, doing my own work, playing with acoustic treatments (which I will still do from time to time), speaker placement, trying various components, (including using many different cables over the years!) etc. I recently spent months re-constructing my own equipment rack for my new turntable to isolate it - even testing using measurements to see the results of various materials on absorbing vibration. I’m learning about and altering VTA, impedance, and all the turntable tweaking goodies, etc. I’m seeking advice on and learning about good subwoofer integration - buying the right components, measuring devices and have already spent effort "doing" in initial testing with the subwoofers.

Yet Michael Green continually implies that I, and others like me who have our own ideas and experience, are not being "empirical" like he is, and he places us in the category of "talking" and "not doing."  This happens when we dare challenge Michael to provide explanations or good evidence for his own claims.

We are "doing" - we just aren’t "doing" the specific methods - and/or using the products - that Michael evangelizes and self-promotes.

And this level of B.S. richly deserves to be called out whenever it is pushed around here. Not to mention, using this to barely conceal self-marketing.

@grannyring

If you are looking specifically for talk on "Tuning," why would you be coming to this thread? There is already an A-gon thread Michael G created specifically devoted to his method of tuning:

The Method Of Tuning:

https://forum.audiogon.com/discussions/the-method-of-tuning

You refer to "off topic" posts or comments in this thread...but what do you actually think IS the topic described in the thread title and OP?

Do you see the word "Tuning" mentioned?

Nope.

The topic was this:

MG: One question I am almost always asked while I am visiting other forums, from some of my members and also members of the forum I am visiting is, why do so many HEA hobbyist talk theory without any, or very limited, empirical testing or experience?

reiterated at the end of the OP:

I’m also not asking you guys to defend HEA, we’ve all heard it been there done it. What I’m asking is a very simple question in a hobby that is suppose to be based on "doing", why fake it?

So, as communicated by the words MG actually used in his OP, the topic wasn’t directly about tuning, but was concerned the hobby of High End Audio - which of course is what you and I and everyone else is doing here. And then he was saying some people are faking it in high end audio, only talking (e.g. talking theory) but not in fact testing empirically what they are talking about.

I don’t see how you could ignore that this was the subject of the OP.

Now, given that was actually the subject he raised...how is it not on topic to ask questions like:

How might that critique actually apply and to whom? How is one to know when one is, on this account, "doing the hobby" and not faking it? And hence what do you mean exactly by empirical testing - do you mean simply trying anything? Or being more rigorous in the method of testing, since you mentioned engineering and science? And is it actually illegitimate, or even not part of the hobby, to talk about theory, and whether a theory actually seems cogent, explanatory or realistic? Why is talking about audio theory "faking it?" And is someone faking it simply by questioning the basis for some other audiophile’s claim? Why wouldn’t it make sense to FIRST want to see good reasons for why a tweak or product is likely to be efficacious, when deciding whether it’s worth one’s time or money to try it out? Does one HAVE to have experience with X in order to ask legitimate questions about X? And as to the division between questioning a claimed phenomenon via theory or personal experience: Why can’t one point to empirical evidence gathered by other people? If to speak about a phenomenon, or to have a belief about it without direct experience was illegitimate, then we could never avail ourselves of all the scientific evidence and knowledge that WE ourselves didn’t gather.

Why aren’t any or all of those questions legitimate and applicable to ask someone who made an OP like Michael’s?

Isn't it fair to inquire further about whether Michael’s appeal to empiricism, science, experience and why someone might, or might not, deserve to have their own methods, or interaction with the hobby characterized with the derogatory phase "faking it."

And those are the right-on-topic questions I was raising from the beginning, that MG decided were irrelevant.

They could only be irrelevant if MG’s motivation wasn’t to discuss with any depth the topic he raised, or engaged replies that at all challenged him to clarify or even support what he was claiming, but only wanted to use the thread for yet more evangelizing about his Tuning methods (and services). And that would be an obvious bait and switch to do so, especially when he already made a thread dedicated to discussing his tuning method.

So which is it grannyring? Is the topic of the thread not, in fact, what Michael wrote, and which I have identified?

Or is the topic actually yet another stealth move for Michael to get people asking him about his Tuning method, get people to his website/forum, etc. when he already has threads going devoted to that topic?

I find it odd the free reign Audiogon seems to be giving *certain* manufacturers to promote their business on the forums, especially given A-gon's own stated policies.

But a post which suggested a web site makes claims that seem to be less than substantiated with evidence...gets deleted.

?

(I will re-iterate: I'm all for participation by dealers and manufacturers.  So long as it of course is done in good faith, is actually informative and conducive to open discussion, vs being overt advertisement or deceptive versions of advertisement where the discussions are channeled to promoting mainly the manufacturer's methods and points of view)

What an absolute shock that MG made yet another "angry people" post instead of one with content relevant to what people have written, or even content relevant to his own thread subject. 

But, I doubt any of us can get enough about what a cheery, nice guy he is...and how much music he listens to!  

Michael, how can I learn more about your products?

Oh, there it is, right under your name again.

Thanks for thinking of us!

prof, get a hobby

Sorry, what were you saying?  I was busy just listening to some Neil Young, followed by some Prog Rock by Goblin, some Electronic dance music on Tidal, and then some Bernard Herrmann symphonic music on vinyl.  

Each genre sounded wonderful on my sound system requiring no effort or desire to alter the sound for each one.

Which means I have time for other hobbies.

Whoops, sorry, I think you've copyrighted "The Hobby" so I'd best not use that word.

I mean..not having to constantly fiddle with my system leaves time for other activities...

I hope you manage to get there, some day....:-)

Cheers.

Wait wasn't this thread finally dead?

Hookay....

jf47t,

Thank you for that response!

e) The topic is directly about "Talk but no walk" Making adjustments to your system is walking.

And yet his OP was mostly about "talking" and "faking it." His very last question summing up the OP was "why fake it?" Hence the topic is as much or more about people "faking" as it would be about those who are "doing." If you want to make a post about Golfing, you don’t make a post referring mostly to, and addressing, non-golfers. You could make a thread "let’s talk about golfing" and people will talk about golfing.
If you make a thread "why don’t people golf?" you will naturally invite discussion about, and from, non-golfers.

This is basic communication 101.

If Michael only really wanted to talk about Tuning, then as I pointed out in my first reply, addressing his post to the subject of the "fakers" is not going to be a good trajectory to set your thread on. I’m trying to make you, and Michael, unbaffled about what went on here, so you hopefully learn from it and don’t end up confused again if you keep doing this.

c) Tuning is a form of walking, just as tweaking or any other form of adjusting your system (already covered several times in this thread)

Excellent.

So, as I’ve said, on such a view virtually everyone here is "walking." Including myself.

No, I don’t "tune" my system to every single song or album. But like everyone on this site, I have spent a lot of time putting together my system and dialing it in, tweaking it along the way to achieve what I want.

So, as I wrote in my very first reply to Michael, that begs the question of "who would he be talking about?" If as you just said, "walking" is tweaking or any form of adjusting your system" then I and pretty much everyone else here are "walking." Therefore it make sense to ask "Well...since I think I’m walking, and everyone else would seem to be walking....who ISN’T actually ’walking?"

Do you not see the logic of this question, why someone might ask for more detail and clarification from Michael?

And yet when I raised this question to get Michael to clarify, he didn’t seem to recognize it’s pertinence and immediately, in his first reply to me, suggested he was already clear, that it wasn’t worth any more of a response to me, except to imply I was indicative of those only "talking " or "faking" that he was thinking of.

Do you get why this was problematic, yet?

i) The definition of empirical testing is covered in depth on the internet.

Then you *should* know how wide-ranging the term "empirical" is. Which is the very problem I raised in my first post.

At it’s most basic, empirical means "based on experience." And most of what we infer is based on experience. And to add the word "testing" to "empirical" doesn’t help much because there is a huge gulf between "empirically testing" an idea...and "empirical testing" in the scientific sense.

Virtually EVERY fringe belief system, every alternative medicine, or every new age healer, or every psychic, or astrologer, flat earth believers etc believe they are "testing" their beliefs empirically. They ALL give the same talk of "try it FOR YOURSELF and see if it works!" And for every claim, no matter how nutty it is, you get people saying "I tried it, tested it myself, and IT WORKS!"

Most people it seems don’t contemplate the true magnitude of our powers of imagination, or the more subtle influences of our bias, and how they lead us to cherry-pick "evidence" for something we are beginning to believe in and ignore evidence and theory against it. People can literally end up believing virtually anything because of this. And we always think we are the rational ones; but we can see the bias and cherry picking when others do it.

So simply "testing" says nothing about how good or reliable your testing method is. That’s why there is such a huge gap between mere "empirical testing" in the sense of experience, to "empirical testing" in the scientific sense. You can engage in empirical testing in a way that does not challenge your intuitions or biases or that doesn’t account for variables - and that’s how you get virtually every dubious and contradictory belief system in the world. OR you can avail yourself of the scientific method, and the knowledge gained by that method, where you look for more objective verification that takes our error-prone cognition seriously- e.g. developing coherent hypotheses that build from existing reliably documented phenomena, measuring phenomena that can be repeated by others, being skeptical of where your own or other people’s bias could be operating, controlling for this in your experiments, etc.

So, I asked, did Michael mean "empirical testing" in the first, general sense of simply "trying it for yourself?" Well, then that is clearly full of problems and isn’t very rigorous.

Or did he mean it in the scientific sense. After all, he referred to scientific testing in his OP. This is why for instance it was relevant to ask what type of methods he was using to establish things like "untied caps change the sound of a system." Is he measuring as a careful empiricist (toward the scientific/engineering side) would do, so his data can be seen by others, or repeated by others measuring the same claims? If he’s using listening tests, is he controlling for bias? Which is what one who takes scientific skepticism seriously would likely want to do.

Or...just "trying it and if he thinks he perceives a difference, that’s good enough to ratify his ideas about what is happening, and why, and that it is in fact happening?"

Everything Michael, and Tuners like yourself have posted - including Michael endorsing a post in which one of his followers stated he’s not even interested in technical explanations or mapping theory to experience, has suggested Michael appeals to the most basic and unreliable sense of "empirical testing" and not the scientific sense.

If someone is going to come on here and call other people out for being "fakers" and not being empirical, then he should expect if he actually cares about this subject to answer these questions, not just ignore them.

Summing up, I have said from the beginning:

IF by "empirical" and "walking" Michael only means a basic sense of people having ideas about setting up and dialing in their system, and trying them out...then EVERYONE HERE is walking and no one - certainly not me - deserves to be put in the category of "not walking/faking." And if Michael can actually point to someone here "not walking" then he should do so as an example to clarify and justify his talk of "fakers," - or stop implying there are people faking it.

But IF by empirical Michael actually meant empiricism in the careful methods of testing compatible with science, then by that definition even Michael doesn’t seem to be "walking the walk." He’s not demonstrating, or even explaining his claims in any credible fashion, and unlike a scientific mindset, he pushes challenging questions off as a negative thing, instead of embracing them. Thus he is being hypocritical making a thread calling out other people for not being sufficiently empirical.

k) Theory covers a wide range of talking. Some are close to walking and some are more imaginative what ifs.

l) It isn’t. Faking it is faking it.

m) Faking it is faking it. It’s when an event is made to appear like it is happening yet it is not really being done.

Unfortunately, nothing in those replies clarifies anything. You may have some idea of "faking it," but you are not communicating it clearly. For instance, do I fit this definition of "faking it? in this "hobby?" Certainly this is what Michael and his followers have kept indicating.   If so, please clarify exactly how I am "not walking the walk" of the HEA hobby. It’s ok, I’m a big boy, you can be as clear and direct as possible. This is what I want.

Thank you for giving a go at engaging my post.

Cheers,

Thank you jf47t,  take care.

jf47t,

Perhaps this gig isn’t for you; might you be a bit too delicate to be MG’s spokesman here, if you are going to be freaked out so easily?

No one here has to be convinced that Michael would "blow our minds" if we just were able to observe him, or that he’s a Focused Machine. None of that answers any of the questions we are discussing so, as passionate as you may be, actually *getting answers to some questions* would go much further for MG’s credibility than having someone continually come on just to tell us He’s So Great And He’ll Answer In His Own Time. When you (or he) go on and on about Michael’s experience, his genius, how much he loves music and has lots of friends...that’s just spending time finding ways to not engage the substance of our questions and ideas. Bragging that he *could* answer, and does elsewhere...but not actually doing it here...is "talking" not "walking."

I don’t need to share your love for Michael to consider his ideas. They may be valid.

And I don’t need to Hate him should I decide I don’t buy in to any particular thing he does.

It doesn’t need to be so emotional. Most o this "angry" stuff has been projection on your part.

Just try direct, clear, honest conversation - on the topic. It’s good for the soul.

glupson,

Yes, as earnest as jf47t is, as you say I think the breathless praise of The Great Important Man is sort of creepin' us out. 

Descriptions like jf47t's, especially his last post, immediately bring to mind Dennis Hopper's part in Apocalypse now:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/film-news/7787054/Dennis-Hopper-memorable-film-quotes.html

So I think your advice for jf47t to think about reeling back a bit on trying to convince everyone that Michael Green is a Great Man would go a long way in keeping people's minds open.

And I would also add support to your taking exception to the "you are either going to love him or hate him." 

I don't hate Michael Green at all.  I've said more than once he may be a great guy outside this thread.

If MG or jf47t have diagnosed that I hate Michael, they are not the keen judges of human character that it seems they think they are.

All I'm looking for is sincere conversation.
(*scribbles phone number on bathroom wall....*)

18 pages, we weren't ever going to get a real dialogue going.  It was doomed from the OP on.  I don't know if it will ever sink in that MG and his followers can "walk" all they want with their tuning hobby, and that's cool, but there's no need to do it at the expense of telling others they only "talk."  Which unfortunately was the direction MG took from the OP onward.

It surely is time to let this thread pass on.

It's ok jf47t, no need to go any further. Enjoy your Tuning, I'm sure you hear some great stuff.   Take care.

@mitch2 

In the words of Madeleine Albright:

I must have been crazy; I should have answered the question by reframing it and pointing out the inherent flaws in the premise behind it.

Albright's advice is exactly what I did in my very first reply in this thread, see page 3.

The OP was so vague it was the only way to approach even starting a coherent dialogue.   But unfortunately you can't get there if one side isn't committed to conceptual clarity. 

jf47t,

Some of you get it (I think), but the majority of posters still haven’t a clue

.

Y’know....

If I had tried to communicate an idea and the majority of people reading it didn’t have a clue about what I was saying, if I was honest with myself the first thing I’d ask is: Hmm...maybe some of the problem lies with me. It looks like I probably didn’t communicate my idea clearly enough.

That seems like a more intellectually honest way to evaluate the problem, rather than to always presume the problem lies in most other people, and to find ways to cast aspersions at those who didn’t understand (as negative, trolls, etc), instead of go back to the drawing board and try to clarify the meaning for those who are asking.

I wonder why MG and the rest of the tuners seem unable to take any responsibility for the pages of confusion that have resulted from their method of discourse.

MG said this is exactly what would happen (watch) on this thread. Here’s the OP

Wait...Michael Green created an obviously contentious thread, knowing it would be contentious???!!!

That’s it, you’ve convinced all of us! Michael is BRILLIANT!!!!!!

Thanks so much for repeating the OP. It worked so well the first time (and the second and third), I can see why you want to keep reposting it.

BTW jf47t, if I implied you were lying about something, wouldn’t it be incumbent upon me to explain exactly what you are lying about...rather than just throw out the accusation? Isn’t that bit of decency what integrity demands?

On that note: Is there any reason you can’t bring yourself to answer the question I asked: If I am"faking it"(as Michael and other tuners have continually implied) in this audio hobby...what am I faking? 

What, for instance, have I claimed to do or know, that you know to be false or a deception?

mitch,

Indeed.  And if we think this style of blind repetition and rhetorical emptiness is bad enough here...imagine the Tuneland forum! 

Though perhaps everyone there employs their Third Eye to communicate on a higher level than us mere mortals. 

glupson

Yes your points are well taken.

I did find the mini-biography MG gave us certainly did go quite a way to explaining the character of his posts and belief system.

It’s weird interacting with the Tuners here; no alternative views seem to get "in" from the outside, it’s mostly blithely ignored, we only see things coming outward. Especially from you know who ^^^^^. If you aren’t going to just take what they are out to evangelize, well skeptics aren’t much good to them because they aren’t interested in defending their claims so much as gaining converts. So skepticism is cast as negativity, and off they go looking for whoever will eat the stuff up and say "more."

I’ve had a long fascination with cults, fringe belief systems etc, and the similarities are quite remarkable to some of the behaviour I’ve seen in this thread. That of course is *not* to say Tuneland is a cult, but rather that some Tuners here seem to give off a similar vibe because there seem to be some shared characteristics.    It’s sort of like the Jehovah’s Witnesses who come to your door to proselytize. They will happily engage you for hours if you seem open to their evangelizing. But if challenged, they will quickly say: "We see your viewpoint, thank you for taking the time to speak with us" and on to the next house. They are taught to not engage other critical views at length - both because it cuts down on proselytizing time, and because it can lead to doubts. People who operate in these protective bubbles tend to come off as a bit odd when they leave the bubble and try to interact with alternative viewpoints.

BTW, I’ve said numerous times before I don’t go around "being scientific" in everything I do. Far from it. I buy things that tickle my fancy - which no doubt involves a healthy dose of my own biases - like anyone else. (I just try to be cautious in what conclusions I reach and what claims I’d make to other people).

hmm, a lotta deleted posts going on.  Wonder what I'm missing!?