I'm not doing anything personally. However, there are many people who are altruistic and want to further the knowledge of a community. Perhaps you don't think this is worthwhile, but they do.
I'll give you an example. If I wanted to demonstrate that DrugA works better than DrugB for treating depression, I'm not going to "use oratory or marketing" to convince physicians to prescribe DrugA. I'm going to conduct a controlled, clinical study and submit it for publication in a reputable medical journal. Physicians are trained to read and interpret medical evidence and are accustomed to making medical decisions based on it. How would you like it if your doctor prescribed you a drug based on "oratory, marketing, and reading internet forums?" Because that's exactly the way the typical audiophile makes equipment purchasing decisions!
Okay, so now you're saying that tape recorders don't record sound? Or are you going to say that tape recorders record sound if and only if a human being is present to hear the sound too?
Well whether they further knowledge depends a lot on their experimental rigour. Like you, I don't see much around these days but there are a few (very few) notable exceptions.
For myself, altruism begins at home. I find it interesting to further my own knowledge but in my experience as a teacher I've found others will only learn if they're hungry. Then , if they're hungry they'll learn anyway whether or not I teach them.
Why do you think drug companies actually do use marketing though? Don't you think that if science was sufficient they'd save money and just use science? After all, they have a duty to shareholders.
Me I keep away from the guys. I suggest you get out a bit more and explore the role that marketing has to play in the prescription of drugs. When I was a kid my uncle used to work for ICI. Me and my siblings benefitted from countless notepads with all kinds of proprietary drug names on them, this was going back to the 1960s and early 70s. Marketing has honed its talons since then.
I suggest its how the vast majority of the human race in the so called 'developed world' makes its purchasing decisions. Myself included.
Sure that's been my line all along. Sounds exist only in the mind - does a tape recorder have one?
Nowadays, marketing is primarily to patients, through TV commercials and other media. Pharmaceutical reps are no longer welcome in most hospitals, and many centers have strict rules restricting "gifts" to physicians, especially those making purchasing decisions.
And I suggest that before you spout off knowledge about a topic you clearly are not knowledgeable about (again), you might want to consider that as far as you know, you could be actually be talking to a physician who clearly knows more about marketing of prescription drugs than you do...you might also want to ask yourself if your experience as a child 40 years ago really makes you competent enough to engage in a discussion on this very topic.
But you didn't answer my question. How would you like to know that your doctor was prescribing you a medication based on "oratory and marketing" rather than the very types of controlled scientific studies that I am advocating for evaluation of audio equipment? And if not you, what if it was your family members?
Hey, millions of people worldwide also smoke cigarettes, it doesn't mean that it's something you should be doing too.
If you don't think blind listening tests are worthwhile, that's fine. You can keep thinking you're hearing amazing differences in your equipment that may actually just be the placebo effect. You can continue to spend extra money on tweaks that make no audible difference. Personally, I can appreciate when others perform work that can lead to more educated equipment purchases. In some ways, this is good. The more consumers spend on audio, the more money that can be reinvested back into R&D and move the industry and our hobby forward.
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Since this has gone way off topic, I'll bow out now. Just a parting remark - you've devalued the word 'clearly' so as to be practically worthless here so I'd definitely not want you as my opthalmologist thank you very much.
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Abrax, you know better than that. Moderators participating in a thread do so as members, unless they post the SY is stating an oppinion and it should be viewed as such. Pano has asked for a return to topic. his directive should be respected or infractions will more than likely be forthcoming (note that this comment is directed at all).
Tony.
Also, science in itself has a fundamental belief: that the laws they discover are repeatable and immutable. In fact, they use repeatability to prove that the law is true. What if reality is not like that?
There is an assumption that there are laws of nature that are true forever. This goes all the way back to Aristotle.
For example, let's take the law of gravity. If you throw a stone up in the air over and over again, it comes back down. What if one time it doesn't? There may be stories out there of events like that, I don't know, but what if? If these stories are told to scientists, they will, if they are honestly curious instead of rejecting it out of hand, try to repeat the event to no avail. Then they will conclude someone is lying, or find some other flaw in the story. They will disregard the one time event that disproves their theory or law. There are many such stories out there but they are disregarded as "crackpot" or whatever.
As for audio, the comparison with wine tasting is the best I can think of for an analogy. There was an article recently where they found that professional wine tasters can in fact sense flavors and aromas that most other people cannot. I believe the same goes for audio. There are people who can hear things that others cannot. Considering the poor state of my hearing, I'm not surprised. So, the upshot of the wine tasting, they said you're wasting your money on the expensive wine unless you can actually taste the difference.
Likewise with audio. If you can't hear it, then there's no point in buying or making super duper gear. Most older people know this. Likewise, it is basically a waste of time doing listening tests (unless you are a gifted listener) with ordinary people because, as RS found out, half of them can't tell a difference.
Applying double blind listening tests is as absurd to me as doing double blind wine tasting.
Even further, the fact that women in general can hear and taste better than men has not been a factor in the results that I've seen anyway. Did you know that women can see colors better than men? They have an extra rod in their retinas that men don't have so they can discern green-blue better. Likewise, women have generally better hearing than men, even into late age. I know that my wife can hear better than me.
Finally, the whole of idea of listening tests being repeatable is silly to me as well. I may be able to hear better on one particular day than on another. It depends on a lot of variables that I don't even understand.
So, no offense intended. Just my
Unfortunately for your argument, that's EXACTLY what those professional wine tasters do. If you can't demonstrate that you can correctly identify wine characteristics in a DBT, you will not get any certifications nor be able to sit on judging panels. In audio, by contrast, anyone can say any stupid or incorrect thing and people will strain themselves to justify it.
OK, I didn't know that about professional wine tasters.
The same should be applied to "professional" listeners, of course.
But, there's probably more money to be made in obfuscation than in discernment when it comes to audio. Nobody in this hobby wants to admit that they can't hear a damn thing. I'll admit it right out. My hearing response curve looks like that frowny clown face with the peak at 1kHz. So, CD's sound really good to me... <g> I'm 52 yrs old and I have tinnitus and HF hearing loss. It's mostly genetic unfortunately.
So, one thing that RS could do to improve his results is to precede it with a "minimum standards" hearing test to select those that have better hearing. I don't know how that would be done, but there are probably several tests that could be performed. Then with those selected listeners, repeat the DAC listening test.
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One other point to be made- appreciation and evaluation are two different things. People use controlled methods for the latter, which are inappropriate for the former.
Soapbox: When I was being qualified for judging at one of the major California wine competitions, I was given samples with deliberate spiking to test my sensitivity level to things like volatility, pH and total acidity, TCA, and the like. I will not hold my breath waiting for the day when Stereophile (for example) requires reviewers to be able to distinguish between (say) a cheap Pioneer receiver and an expensive Ayre amp under DBT and level-matched conditions. They just need to be able to churn out prose which will attract eyeballs and hence advertisers.
Soapbox: When I was being qualified for judging at one of the major California wine competitions, I was given samples with deliberate spiking to test my sensitivity level to things like volatility, pH and total acidity, TCA, and the like. I will not hold my breath waiting for the day when Stereophile (for example) requires reviewers to be able to distinguish between (say) a cheap Pioneer receiver and an expensive Ayre amp under DBT and level-matched conditions. They just need to be able to churn out prose which will attract eyeballs and hence advertisers.
I certainly appreciate music, which makes it twice as sad that my hearing is going. I play djembe and other hand drums for fun. I suppose I'll always hear those. There's a deaf woman who plays kettle drums to great effect.
Oh wow, that's cool that you're a certified wine taster. I drink wine daily now. I've mostly given up on beer for other reasons.
We can devise a standard for hearing testing right here if we want to. Maybe RS can come up with a battery of tests? I propose that we have something like a spoken passage at some some -dB point buried in pink noise. The listener has to correctly write down the written passage. There are many other tests that could be performed.
Oh wow, that's cool that you're a certified wine taster. I drink wine daily now. I've mostly given up on beer for other reasons.
We can devise a standard for hearing testing right here if we want to. Maybe RS can come up with a battery of tests? I propose that we have something like a spoken passage at some some -dB point buried in pink noise. The listener has to correctly write down the written passage. There are many other tests that could be performed.
I doubt I could pass that test, but have not tried and don't know where to look for it.
I'm sure it's like most things: wine tasting is fun whereas management thereof is a pain, which is why I'm not in management!
So, I think RS has merely shown in this test that at least half of the people who took his test can't hear a dang thing. I hope he's open to some improvements in his testing. I am certainly pleased with this O2 headphone amp, but then again, I can't hear very well. I guess everything depends on if he wants to design things for the average listener or for those few who can really hear a difference. The O2 amp was for the former I think, and it was to be affordable. Horses for courses.
I'm sure it's like most things: wine tasting is fun whereas management thereof is a pain, which is why I'm not in management!
So, I think RS has merely shown in this test that at least half of the people who took his test can't hear a dang thing. I hope he's open to some improvements in his testing. I am certainly pleased with this O2 headphone amp, but then again, I can't hear very well. I guess everything depends on if he wants to design things for the average listener or for those few who can really hear a difference. The O2 amp was for the former I think, and it was to be affordable. Horses for courses.
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But, as far as i know, nobody would throw some tasters, who had no experience with controlled testing, into a double blind, and conclude, if the null hypothesis couldn´t be rejected, that no difference between the WUT does exist.
Otoh, if in the audio business somebody (like Michael Fremer) takes the challenge and succeeded, he gets no appreciation.
As said before- Michael Fremer did (well of course not exactly, but...), and it didn´t change anything.
As we know (for wine tasting see for example the article of Hodgson), blind testing does not produce more correct results per se.
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