I don't recall this "Tweakers Sanctuary", but how many "scientists" were sanctioned by the moderators for trashing the place? This looks to me more like a moderation issue...
Me, I'd rather have the Golden Ears confined in their own place, rather than spilling the beans all over (and of course, the other way around). I admit, certain discussions will lose a lot of their entertainment value without the "trust your ears" motto.
Totally 100% with you there. I often get labled as being resistant to change. The funny thing is that I have probably driven more change than any of the people putting that label on me. Change when it makes an improvement is to be welcomed. Change for the sake of Change is just wasting everyones time. I see a lot more of the latter rather than the former.
On the discussion of the like button. In and of itself whether we have one or don't have one really shouldn't make much of a difference. It is the psychological aspect of it that is potentially a problem, and that will depend on the people giving and receiving (or not recieving) them.
On a car forum I frequent they have likes. I get one every now and then and I think "that's nice" If I don't get one I never think about it. I certainly don't think about whether someone else has more likes than I do, BUT I'm sure there are some people who do get hung up on it.
When I first started posting on the Internet I used to look for some acknowledgement, some verification that what I was posting was valuable to someone. It didn't take too long to work out that you often wouldn't get it. But if you are confident in the value of what you are posting a confirmation of such is not needed, you are much more likely to find out if it is not of value
Tony.
I don't either, but I do remember a suggestion that there be a forum where demanding DBT, etc. would be forbidden. I have been asked by at least one member to not comment in their threads (IIRC re: scalar waves and Schumann resonators) and I complied.
Personally, I find the term 'Golden Ear' pretty useless and often offensive. There is no such thing as far as I know. Listening is mostly in the brain (Golden Brain?). Regarding listening, there is a wide range of abilities among the population. With training and practice such as old school mastering engineers went through listening can become a very high level skill. This is very much in contrast to what audiophiles commonly believe they hear. Thus, mastering engineers and audiophiles should not classified in the same bucket together as 'golden ears.'
From personal experience, pretty sure that learning one or more instruments and learning to listen for recording and mastering are mostly different things. Not to say that one is more 'good' than another, but they are more like learning to recognize speech in different languages even when spoken by people with very wide ranging accents. For example, learning to understand spoken Mandarin may not lead to skill understanding Navajo. Of course, it is not exactly like learning languages, and so like all analogies this one will fail at some level if picked apart.
That's a very fair comment, which leads me to suggest that learning to play a musical instrument combined with being trained in mastering techniques would be extraordinarily helpful. I would also say that listening to music and learning how to play a guitar has helped me become a better photographer. The word 'nuance' comes to mind.
I listen to birdsong a lot, and after many years of practice can pick out regional accents of individual flocks of migrating birds that visit our acre of land. I most certainly do not have golden ears
ToS
I listen to birdsong a lot, and after many years of practice can pick out regional accents of individual flocks of migrating birds that visit our acre of land. I most certainly do not have golden ears
ToS
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I'm afraid you are confused about the Golden Ear concept; to me, it's not about the capability of the organic Fourier analyzer (ear + brain) capabilities (which may or may not be trained, I have no idea) but about those self appointed individuals that claim extraordinary hearing abilities, without any certification or proof, usually claiming they need no stikin' double blind test to verify, since "I hear what I hear", anyway. If though they are subject of a blind test, then their hearing abilities are magically vanishing, and then the "stressful test conditions", "lack of training", whatever other excuses are invoked to justify the loss.
Shortly, I can show my engineering credentials, could you show me yours, as a Golden Ear/Brain/Whatever?
FWIW, I am the one that brought the "Golden Ear Brigade" (aka GEB) concept to this forum, a very long time ago, so I'm ready to take all the flak for it.
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I don't need to know Mark's credentials, I can tell by what he writes and the way he writes it, that he's got the smarts.
That's an interesting comment, did I infer anything anywhere about Mark's, yours or anybody else's credentials, jobs in technology, etc...? If you meant about the question:
this was not addressed to anybody in particular, it's just a rhetoric question addressed to all those claiming extraodinary hearing abilities. Is it offensive to ask somebody that claims "this op amp improved the low frequency response, I can clearly hear it" to justify his extraordinary (hearing) claim?
Guys, I'm under the impression that 8 years later I discovered here a dense and tense garden of Mimosa Pudica. I'm starting to think I'm in the wrong place... and I'm also starting to understand why many (like SY) have, meantime, in part or fully dropped the ball.
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syn08,
I would agree with you that there can be problems separating out not-so-extraordinary claims by skilled listeners, from mistaken claims by audiophiles. The example you gave, of an opamp changing frequency response does sound a bit dodgy. For one thing, it is a claim of specific cause and effect, not just of perceptual difference. However, some change in sound quality with changes in opamps is not so unusual or extraordinary. Usually it is related to some change in audible distortion, even if the listener describes the perceptual experience in other terms, such as "this opamp sounds brighter." Could simply be due to a difference in IMD levels, which may not be so extraordinary at all.
I would agree with you that there can be problems separating out not-so-extraordinary claims by skilled listeners, from mistaken claims by audiophiles. The example you gave, of an opamp changing frequency response does sound a bit dodgy. For one thing, it is a claim of specific cause and effect, not just of perceptual difference. However, some change in sound quality with changes in opamps is not so unusual or extraordinary. Usually it is related to some change in audible distortion, even if the listener describes the perceptual experience in other terms, such as "this opamp sounds brighter." Could simply be due to a difference in IMD levels, which may not be so extraordinary at all.
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I have no problem with Mark's comments, I gather he is wedded to the idea that if he could get any one of us in his listening space he could train us to hear the same things as he does 100% of the time. The chance of that happening (in my case) is about as probable as him teaching me to play guitar like John Fahey.
I visit a forum with both like and dislike feedback. It's set up certain way so that the number / frequency of giving either is regulated by how many are given to others before giving another feedback to one member. IOW, it's hard to abuse the feedback number.
Do I think this forum needs it? Not really. It may be helpful to new members but for those who's been around for a while, they already know who is who.
In my rigid engineering mind, there is no room for anecdotic claims, and I strongly believe that it is not my duty to verify any claim that a self appointed Golden Ear Brigade member makes. Extraodinary claims require extraordinary proof, that's that.
I am all ears though, and grant my full respect, to somebody claiming to hear something outstanding (good or bad) and then fighting (even if unsuccessful) to identify the correlation with the technical side, like you just mentioned. As much as the (IMO a universal dismissive) very common stance "we cannot measure everything we can hear" drives me nuts.
I suspect it is used specifically to drive certain people nuts. There is a passive aggressive element to it exemplified in Dave's (Planet 10) assertion that downward dynamic range (DDR) is such a thing
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