This thread is actually good for picking out the ones peddling Snake oil.
I truly hope they don't actually believe what they are saying.
I truly hope they don't actually believe what they are saying.
DF96, I sure wish you were right, but experience and study of the problem has shown me that you have never looked deeply into the subject.
About 20 years ago, I tried, really tried, by reading advanced textbooks on E&M to really understand flow of both electricity, AND individual electrons flowing through a wire. One might know that the speed of electrical signal is dependent on the INSULATOR MATERIAL, not the individual electrons, but the individual electrons have lots of problems traveling though imperfect wire conductors, and changes in resistance can happen at low levels of current flow.
If each and every one of you out there, NEVER really listens openly for wire differences, you may never hear enough difference to make any sense to you; as just like to any novice, most guitars sound essentially the same, but there are differences that become magnified from listening experience.
Maybe your just not smart enough to understand electricity and electron flow. Anyone can read the material, you won't understand it till you can do the math. So instead you pretend your ears can explain it.
More nonsense. Those differences in guitars can be measured and quantified. An experienced luthier can tell you how using a different wood for the body will change the sound. Your comparison is an insult to there craft.
Maybe I am not smart enough to understand electricity and electron flow.
For the rest of you, I find the descriptions of current flow in: 'Electronic Properties of Materials' by Rolf E. Hummel to be as clear as anything that I have seen, yet I still cannot intuitively put the QM and Maxwell's Equations together. They seem to be completely separate equations. Where is the connection?
As far as pretending my ears actually hear differences, perhaps they don't, but they certainly seem to, just like some food tastes better than something that looks somewhat similar. Perhaps that is my imagination too!
For the rest of you, I find the descriptions of current flow in: 'Electronic Properties of Materials' by Rolf E. Hummel to be as clear as anything that I have seen, yet I still cannot intuitively put the QM and Maxwell's Equations together. They seem to be completely separate equations. Where is the connection?
As far as pretending my ears actually hear differences, perhaps they don't, but they certainly seem to, just like some food tastes better than something that looks somewhat similar. Perhaps that is my imagination too!
The other night, after reading a bunch of stuff here, I thought that I would go back and try to understand how electricity, or at least an electrical signal, flows, not in general, but exactly, or at least, intuitively.
When we are young, we are taught that electricity 'flows' in a wire. Most people think of it like a garden hose and water. It has many similarities to the water hose. You can compare Voltage to water pressure, Current to water flow, Resistance to the restriction of flow in the pipe. It all makes sense to a 10 year old mind.
Later, you get the fact that water is made of atoms, but electricity is usually made of electrons that carry an electric charge, and that electrons are usually connected to atoms as well, but some are more loosely connected to each atom, and while pure water cannot pass significant electricity through it, metals, as well as salts dissolved in wire can allow electricity flow.
Later, usually in college, we learn that with a lot of math associated with it, we can predict flow of electricity in time through various configurations, including just plain wires. We learn about Maxwell's Equations, and how elegant they appear to be, and this should be all there is to it.
Yet, where do electrons come in with Maxwell's Equations? Further study shows that electrons were not discovered in Maxwell's lifetime, so how do they fit in? So here we are, we can calculate the SPEED of an electrical signal in a length of wire, but what about the electron speed? They cannot go that fast we are told. Then we guess that one electron bumping into an atom while moving will release another electron to keep the electrical signal flowing, but can it be done near the speed of light? Kind of tough. All in all, it all falls apart, intuitively, yet it works! Oh well, why not then go with what we hear, rather than only what we are taught in school? We own our ears, and we usually can depend on them, so that's what Dan and I do.
Right, throw maxwell out and use your ears. Right off the top, your missing half the picture. The photon, the EM wave carrier. Nothing falls apart but your understanding.
Did Einstien know any quantum physics when he discovered E=mc^2 ?
Sometimes the theory leads the way for the discoveries.
That may actually be a possibility (That they don't understand it).
My Father was an Engineer and a he designed everything from Church steeples
to Aircraft & Missiles, but he just could not grasp electronics. I would explain
it to him in terms of fluid flow and he could then envision it.
My Father was an Engineer and a he designed everything from Church steeples
to Aircraft & Missiles, but he just could not grasp electronics. I would explain
it to him in terms of fluid flow and he could then envision it.
It's a very good analogy. When I worked for BT I spent some time in the post office tower in Birmingham where there was a lot of microwave equipment. The waveguides and components were like pipework, even narrowing of the tubes acting like a resistor (well, that is what they told the apprentice me)I would explain
it to him in terms of fluid flow and he could then envision it.
People tend to understand fluid flow so it's a good way to show electron flow.
Electronic is one of those areas where you need to imagine it in your mind
(a bit like programming). It does take a bit if abstract thinking.
Electronic is one of those areas where you need to imagine it in your mind
(a bit like programming). It does take a bit if abstract thinking.
That may actually be a possibility (That they don't understand it).
My Father was an Engineer and a he designed everything from Church steeples
to Aircraft & Missiles, but he just could not grasp electronics. I would explain
it to him in terms of fluid flow and he could then envision it.
Current flowing in a conductor is more complicated than most people think. They only look at the electrons moving. The other half of the picture is the electric field, (photons) the part that moves near light speed, and the magnetic field that is created when the current flows. So you need an electric field to have current, and current to have a magnetic field and there all intertwined and get more complicated when it's AC. To explain these relation ships with words would take hundreds of words and be incomplete but Maxwell explains all this in 3 simple (ok maybe not simple , but short and elegant) equations. And the people who don't understand these equations fall back to the lacking words. Or worse, there ears.
Yes you are correct but, to the layman you really are only going to be explain simple circuits.
I prefer "Show me the Proof"
I don't need proof, but at least some reproducible evidence would be required.
(BTW, I have heard an amp that had Bybees installed in it -- sounded like crap, but I don't know what it would have sounded like if the Bybees hadn't been in it. Certainly no evidence there, though, to make it even remotely worth looking into).
--snip--
BTW, I have heard an amp that had Bybees installed in it -- sounded like crap,
--snip--
That leads me back to my original thoughts about the Bybees that
they actually color the sound and some like that colorization (distortion).
People tend to understand fluid flow so it's a good way to show electron flow.
Electronic is one of those areas where you need to imagine it in your mind
(a bit like programming). It does take a bit if abstract thinking.
Fluid flow analogy works but only for a very basic explanation. With fluid flow you can say the water is the electrons, the pressure is the electric field but what about the magnetic field? And with electricity the fields are outside of the "hose". Things start to fall apart quickly if you want details.
Thinking out loud. In the analogy equate the momentum of the fluid as the magnetic field. Then the mass of the water is the inductance. It keeps the fluid moving after the pressure (voltage) is gone. The elasticity of the hose is the capacitance, it holds pressure when you stop pushing current into the hose. Now use alternating current and try to wrap your head around the pressures and flow in the hose. And this is with no external fields as in the EM case.
And the people who don't understand these equations fall back to the lacking words. Or worse, there [sic] ears.
I'm always amused when someone posts this phrase or something essentially the same. I'm fascinated by the idea that someone would tell me I can't possibly like my 6BM8 SE amp, the same one I love, because it measures poorly. Can't trust my ears? Why else am I listening to music if not for my ears and my brain's interpretation of what I hear??? Sheesh!

Preferring something and it being 'better' are two completely different things. You have an amplifier you prefer and possibly an irrational view that the amplifier makes more difference than the speakers 😛.
If you were telling us that Mr Flea the low powered amp was better than anything else we might have an issue. You saying its a preference is exactly that and not controversial.
If you were telling us that Mr Flea the low powered amp was better than anything else we might have an issue. You saying its a preference is exactly that and not controversial.
But your first example does occur with some frequency in these discussions - that is, personal opinions or anecdotes expressed as if they were established facts. I'm convinced that this is a major contributor to the friction and frustration on display here.
When I talk about this stuff, I try to say things like, "I think" and "I believe," things like that, in an attempt to maintain a reference in this regard. I realize this can make me sound a bit self-centered, as in, "Well, this is what I believe, la de-da!", but I can live with that.
I also think the ones who tend to describe all this stuff as if it were already proven and settled, also seem to be the ones making the most outrageous, non-falsifiable claims. But I'm probably biased in that view.
No matter what, this thread can certainly be an interesting (if confounding) study in human nature at times.
When I talk about this stuff, I try to say things like, "I think" and "I believe," things like that, in an attempt to maintain a reference in this regard. I realize this can make me sound a bit self-centered, as in, "Well, this is what I believe, la de-da!", but I can live with that.
I also think the ones who tend to describe all this stuff as if it were already proven and settled, also seem to be the ones making the most outrageous, non-falsifiable claims. But I'm probably biased in that view.
No matter what, this thread can certainly be an interesting (if confounding) study in human nature at times.
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Undoubtedly. I have many irrational preferences. Some I can even mention without breaking forum rules 😀
By the way Bill, is that a shrimp, or a crawdaddy, or...?
(I'm supposed to be doing any number of more productive things right now.)
(I'm supposed to be doing any number of more productive things right now.)
Why else am I listening to music if not for my ears and my brain's interpretation of what I hear???
More the second of those than you appear to think. We "hear" with our eyes, nose, memory, expectations, beliefs, general mood, and lots of other things. Brains didn't evolve with much need for senses or perceptions to be isolated from each other.
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