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Power cord replacement

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#341
audio-kraut said:
I, and I take it Sy, were talking about presentation to AES, work on forums i.e. various German forums, hydrogene audio, secrets of home theatre, various other forums, were none of the tests were able to confirm the claims of audibility of the in most cases "cable conscious" testees.
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For me, yes. Also tests conducted by a superior local scientific body (as in Canada the CSIRO).


I still contend: if someone claims that cable have any audible influence, it is not up to those skeptical to verify this claim, it is up to those making the statement as to the existence of such phenom.

If they cannot do that - their claims are equal as to the existence of the supernatural. No evidence, therefore not interesting.
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Here I personally would be lenient. Those with honest experiences often do not have the wherewithall to be able to do that - that, to me (a seasoned researcher) would be an acceptable excuse.

What is not acceptable (sorry to repeat previous post) is a blank disagreement, sometimes bordering on arrogance, with opposing results (i.e. proof of the opposite, which is not the same as proof of their 'belief').
 
#342
I still contend: if someone claims that cable have any audible influence, it is not up to those skeptical to verify this claim, it is up to those making the statement as to the existence of such phenom.

If they cannot do that - their claims are equal as to the existence of the supernatural. No evidence, therefore not interesting.
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Amen!
 
#343
You got it backward once again. Congratulations!
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I don't know why you think I don't understand anything about evolutionary psychology or psychoacoustics or logic. I merely thought the statement that you made about humans being wired to make errors in the direction of sensing things that aren't there as if it were a fact was a little farfetched. Surely you must have read such a hypothesis somewhere and are willing to share your source, unless of course you made it up yourself. I would tend to believe that hearing a noise that was never there is simply a result of imperfect brain function, and not a result of evolutionary selection. However, a study of audiophoolery in the context evolutionary psychology might make for interesting reading (as if academics don't waste enough time as it is).

John
 
#344
Surely you must have read such a hypothesis somewhere and are willing to share your source, unless of course you made it up yourself.
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Pinker on the aspects of brain function and Ernst Mayr on the details of the relevant evolutionary processes are two sources that you'll find useful. The late Robert Solso wrote a very interesting book on the subject ("The Psychology of Art and the Evolution of the Conscious Brain") which is also quite accessible and directly bears on your specific concern. I'd also highly recommend Solso's "Mind and Brain Sciences in the 21st Century."
 
#345
BTW, I was remiss in not also pointing you toward Daniel Levetin's review book ("This is Your Brain on Music") with lots of cites to the primary literature, with some strong disagreements with Pinker, and the very rich output of Diana Deutsch on the nature of auditory illusion and how they illuminate the understanding of the evolution of the brain.
 
#349
jlsem said:

Evolution is not served by running away from noises inside the head but by analysis of a real threat.
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Looking at the whole well-expressed contents of that post, this final remark seems a bit exclusive - as said, no being existed which did not experience all three: Real threats, life-threatening noises but from non-threats (a twig breaking because of 'ordinary' reasons) and imagined noises. Evolution often progressed via unlogical routes down the 'grey area' of apparent chaos (like the lightning bolt never following the logic predictable straight path), including all stimulae on the brain according to their respective powers

What has all this to do with ostensible 'imagination' regarding preference of power cords? Only that even if accepted that a stimulus did exist and was processed in the brain to mean 'danger', the final reality of such can only really be arrived at by including other relevant factors - a.o. relevant laws of nature.

Well, argued, Jlsem
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#352
Well, of course all of this is only educated speculation and whatever we had evolved into through predatory threats has long since been diluted by the advent of large, protective societies. I was trying to think of a situation where a modern human might be confronted by a very slight sound that recognition of which would prove life-saving. The one that came to mind would be the WWII German soldier who could recognize the sound of a clip ejected from an M1 Garand hitting the ground above the din of a fire fight and know that the G.I. who was shooting at him had emptied his weapon. Of course this wouldn't save him from an artillery barrage, so once again evolution is not served and Darwinism is reduced to survival of the luckiest. What is my point? I am only arguing that the theory of evolution has little to do with the ongoing and endless cable debate.

John
 
#353
My hairdresser's husband jumps from his bed on the floor in the middle of the night when hears some particular military jets' sound approaching, he served in Vietnam long time ago.

Once I put a DVD when people were sitting in my living room before switching on a projector. All of them were scared when a lion roared on the MGM's logo title.

I myself jumped and turned around once before I realized that the waterfall started running on a CD record, but not in my living room.
 
#355
I am only arguing that the theory of evolution has little to do with the ongoing and endless cable debate.
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I would disagree. Evolution is what made us pattern-recognizing animals. If one understands that evolution does NOT arrive at optimum engineering solutions, but only the best solutions available from the starting point (many, many constraints) for a given environment, then it's easy to see why the choice between a brain system that sometimes sees patterns that aren't there (occasional running away from ghosts) and a brain system that always analyzes before acting (lion food) results in species that tends toward the former.

This human tendency to perceive patterns in their absence is responsible for a wide range of phenomena.

At the risk of sounding even more like an Amazon shill, anyone who is interested in the concept of evolution as an algorithm driving toward optimal solutions but in the presence of distinct constraints and contingency could do no better than to read Dan Dennett's delightful "Darwin's Dangerous Idea."
 
#360
Unfair because:1) It is almost like calling us liars,and I don't think we gave anyone any reason to believe such a thing.
2)What you've said today in conjunction with your post #105,IMO shows that you have deliberately described the preconditions you needed to back-up your preconception for what we were about to do,trying to preconceive the outcome.I can only tell you this.At least George and I,are in MUSIC not just audio for a long enough time so as to be able to hear differences and similarities in a very successful way.And if you like the term super-hearing people,and provided you cannot thing of any other less sarcastic word,then,yes you may consider us as super-hearing people.But liars no.That's why I feel you are unfair.
 
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