I’m just saying it’s an issue, esp. for testing If you see what I mean? It needs to be in the test plan/procedures.
This however does not give anyone a carte blanche to pull theories out of thin air.
Should also be noted Earl has said on this forum that an Onkyo receiver is all the amplifier you need...
Hi Bill,
Will say I don't agree with Earl on everything.
I do more or less agree with the time he said that we don't know what maybe roughly 5% of the population can hear. That new tests would
have to be developed, and cost of a preliminary study could be in the thousands or tens of thousands of dollars.
That said, I do get his point about the shortcomings of the current practices of measuring nonlinear distortion in sorta-LTI devices such as amplifiers.
Also, don't know about pulling theories out of thin air. Which theories do you have in mind?
Mark
Will say I don't agree with Earl on everything.
I do more or less agree with the time he said that we don't know what maybe roughly 5% of the population can hear. That new tests would
have to be developed, and cost of a preliminary study could be in the thousands or tens of thousands of dollars.
That said, I do get his point about the shortcomings of the current practices of measuring nonlinear distortion in sorta-LTI devices such as amplifiers.
Also, don't know about pulling theories out of thin air. Which theories do you have in mind?
Mark
well I feel that was a throwaway comment he made that you have quoted at least 5 times that I have spotted. What is clear is that neither of us are in that 5%.
I wasn't thinking FR especially, nor threshold levels. Maybe more like Howie Hoyt described learning how to do...
I think @Joachim Gerhard has devised this test
http://www.libinst.com/distortion_isolation_in_the_time.htm
http://libinst.com/PRAXIS.htm
George
Well from my reading that is NOT what Earl was talking about. He was talking about individuals with particularly high natural hearing acuity.
If so, what about perfect pitch? Is that not a natural form of hearing acuity? Any why should hearing acuity have to be non-acquired? Or, it can only be acquired genetically?
Also, part of the reason I will disagree is that Earl said new tests would have to be developed. Don't we already know how to measure hearing FR and thresholds?
Also, part of the reason I will disagree is that Earl said new tests would have to be developed. Don't we already know how to measure hearing FR and thresholds?
Listening skill is a lot like tennis, your game will improve a lot when you play with players much better than you.
“An ordinary man has no means of deliverance.” - old audiophile axiom
“An ordinary man has no means of deliverance.” - old audiophile axiom
One can’t help wondering where Earl stands on equipment and cable burn in and wire directionality. 🤔
Much to my surprise, because of my age related dimished frequency span, I can still easily outperform a youngster when comparing sound between alternatives in indicating the differences.
Like improving any skill, this must, at least for a large part, be the result of lots of training the hearing system and partly by genetic causes.
On the other hand my sister, a professional harpist, only uses reproduced sound to trigger the music in her head.
She doesn’t give a damn about the SQ of the reproduction system.
No idea how that works 🤣
Hans
we have numbers for perfect pitch though (0.01% general population) we also know that perfect pitch is affected by temperature. I don't get your point.
Any test design when humans are involved needs a lot of thought and planning. Also what are you trying to measure. Sensitivity to mythical grain in music?
@Hans Polak I have read that quite a few professional musicians listen on a cheap radio/boombox. I am not sure why, maybe they think hifi is too removed from the real thing or just that they can't enjoy listening anymore as they are dissecting minutiae of the performance. Hmm anyone know how many violinists listen to heavy metal in their downtime ? 🙂
Much higher in China
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/speaking-tonal-languages/
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/05/090519172202.htm
Deutsch and her colleagues found that students who spoke an East Asian tone language very fluently scored nearly 100 percent on the test...
My comment: Illustrates how trying to study humans can be subject to error if samples of a population (say, that of the Earth) are not truly random.
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Bill, I guess not that many, but what about Nigel Kennedy and here’s is a link to others,
https://www.last.fm/tag/violin+rock/artists
Hans
https://www.last.fm/tag/violin+rock/artists
Hans
Maybe Papa John Creech?
https://www.google.com/search?q=Pap...AQc2MjJqMGoxqAIAsAIA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
https://www.google.com/search?q=Pap...AQc2MjJqMGoxqAIAsAIA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Hi Bill,
Maybe something with more science and measurements would give some more insight:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41...nguages, such as,is used to convey intonation.
Maybe something with more science and measurements would give some more insight:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41...nguages, such as,is used to convey intonation.
I'm sure the number of people who have passed PMA's distortion test with flying colors is less than 0.00000001% of the population.
What I was interested in when I talked to Earl was how many people can hear very low levels if nonlinear distortion. IIRC this followed one of PMA's listening tests where I thought there was some suggestion more multiple people could hear some difference in recordings of audio opamp buffer circuits. Also IIRC, PMA dismissed that idea because a number of people had some tendency to vote backwards, as though they perceived more distortion as less. However, given people were working from recordings on their own playback system I suspect there may be a simple explanation for the reason. Its that very low level of HD can be misinterpreted as more 'clarity' if the system or recording is muddy sounding at all. Therefore I felt a more serious study should be done with trained listeners using standardized reproduction gear.
Another factor to possibly consider is that people in bell curve tails are considered to be very rare. Thus only small numbers of test subjects are used to estimate the bell curve somewhere in the middle. Then tails are deduced from that assuming a Gaussian bell curve. However, we now know that many bell curves that match real world data turn out to be the thick-tail type. It means what was assumed to be rare may not be nearly so rare in reality.
That said, I don't see why other natural and or acquired listening acuity should not be studied. If might show that some people actually do hear thing other people have assumed to be imaginary. And I say 'assumed' meaning that not a lot of physical factors were seriously evaluated as possible explanations. That fact that some people make errors of listening was assumed to be the one and only explanation for all people under all conditions.
Another factor to possibly consider is that people in bell curve tails are considered to be very rare. Thus only small numbers of test subjects are used to estimate the bell curve somewhere in the middle. Then tails are deduced from that assuming a Gaussian bell curve. However, we now know that many bell curves that match real world data turn out to be the thick-tail type. It means what was assumed to be rare may not be nearly so rare in reality.
That said, I don't see why other natural and or acquired listening acuity should not be studied. If might show that some people actually do hear thing other people have assumed to be imaginary. And I say 'assumed' meaning that not a lot of physical factors were seriously evaluated as possible explanations. That fact that some people make errors of listening was assumed to be the one and only explanation for all people under all conditions.
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