You start off with two false premises, and use that to arrive at a whole litany of false conclusions:
How do you determine the TRUTH of anything? We are talking about whether a piece of equipment, even a single wire has a sound signature. Inductive reasoning starts with observation, in this case listening under controlled conditions. Most audiophiles have repeatedly heard differences in their homes. They wouldn’t spend money and keep their components if they didn’t hear differences.
False assumptions:
- Ad hoc listening in the home is not remotely controlled
- Perceiving you hear a change is not remotely the same thing as there being a change. As a doctor, you should know this. How much you slept, how much caffeine you had, how comfortable you are in that chair, none of which changes the sound, will change your perception of the sound
- They wouldn’t spend money and keep their components if they didn’t hear differences. ---- There are a ton of things that people absolutely "swear by" that are absolutely not true. Heck, some of them violate fundamental laws of physics, not just common sense. Many of these things people continue to believe in and spent money on. As a doctor, you can certainly (I hope) recognize homepathic solutions as an example of this (something diluted to where the original molecule can no longer exist beyond a slight statistic probability).
Continued false assumptions:
- However, the measurement people start from a stubborn bias that measurement tells the story.
No, engineers and scientists start with the result of listening tests done in controlled circumstances using idealized stimulus that will maximize the ability of us humans to hear differences (or not). Out of an abundance of caution, they will normally use these results as a baseline of what is potentially audible, even though tests with real music show the limits of audibility of many of the things discussed as 20, 40, even 60db higher.
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- "A good medical doctor will listen, but they will also try to understand enough about the drug to know whether the claimed side effect is remotely possible because not all side effects will be possible." This shows how little you know about clinical practice.
I specifically stated "a good doctor" and I am well aware of how and why the medical profession often fails at diagnosis. However, this was also a logic trap with two specific traps. You failed to acknowledge that some side effects are impossible, no matter what the patient claims, and by simply accepting them, you are just as bad as those other doctors you don’t like because you are ignoring their could be another as yet undiagnosed reason. That is what is called a bias trap. The other trap is your expectation that I, and we can assume others, accept your expertise with items of a medical nature as superior, while you try to tell me, who obviously has more experience in this area (including listening), that I am wrong based on ad-hoc reports and feelings.
And you finish with the Coup de grâce, this little diddy, far more indicative of your bias and mine. I could state the under pinnings of why you state something like this, but I see no point.
My conclusion is that either your listening skills are poor, OR more likely you have an agenda bias to interfere with your good hearing ability if it actually is intact.