Talk but not walk?
Hi Guys
This isn't meant to start a fight, but it is important to on lookers. As a qualifier, I have my own audio forum where we report on audio issues as we empirically test them. It helps us short cut on theories and developing methods of listening. We have a wide range of systems and they are all over the world adding their experiences to the mix. Some are engineers, some are artist and others are audiophiles both new and old. One question I am almost always asked while I am visiting other forums, from some of my members and also members of the forum I am visiting is, why do so many HEA hobbyist talk theory without any, or very limited, empirical testing or experience?
I have been around empirical testing labs since I was a kid, and one thing that is certain is, you can always tell if someone is talking without walking. Right now on this forum there are easily 20 threads going on where folks are talking theory and there is absolutely no doubt to any of us who have actually done the testing needed, that the guy talking has never done the actual empirical testing themselves. I've seen this happen with HEA reviewers and designers and a ton of hobbyist. My question is this, why?
You would think that this hobby would be about listening and experience, so why are there so many myths created and why, in this hobby in particular, do people claim they know something without ever experimenting or being part of a team of empirical science folks. It's not that hard to setup a real empirical testing ground, so why don't we see this happen?
I'm not asking for peoples credentials, and I'm not asking to be trolled, I'm simply asking why talk and not walk? In many ways HEA is on pause while the rest of audio innovation is moving forward. I'm also not asking you guys to defend HEA, we've all heard it been there done it. What I'm asking is a very simple question in a hobby that is suppose to be based on "doing", why fake it?
thanks, be polite
Michael Green
www.michaelgreenaudio.net
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For those who don't think that metal cases can't be detrimental to the sound, there's a very old audio site called Mother of Tone that believes one should build amps and DACs on blocks of wood. This is nothing new. And, +1 for @bill333 All the best, Nonoise |
audionuttoo, First of all, remember that we have all been born with the world’s best and most sensitive listening devices ever conceived - our own ears! That’s clearly wrong, and it should be obvious why it’s so wrong. We are building instruments all the time for detection because of the LIMITATIONS of our perception and senses. For instance: You know there is sound in a frequency range called "Ultrasonic," right? Do you know why it’s even called "Ultrasonic?" Because you can’t hear it. Your ears, if you have fantastic hearing, would top off at approximately 20K. But depending on your age and exposure to noise, it likely caps well below that point. But you can buy, or even build an SPL meter that is FAR more sensitive and can detect frequencies up to 100K, e.g: http://logosfoundation.org/elektron/US_SPL_Meter/US_SPL_Meter.html And when scientists detected the "sound" of black holes emerging far away in the universe...do you think it’s because someone woke up hearing it? Of course not. Instruments vastly more sensitive were used to detect these, and countless other phenomena that our limited hearing permits. So right off the bat, you are starting with a false premise. Trust them - they are the one truth in music! (Putting aside the inscrutable second phrase...) Your ears are part of a perceptual system; that system can and often enough does get things wrong. Just like your eyes. This is well known and demonstrable. At this very moment there is a viral meme going around the internet showing how people’s audible perception varies. Google "yanny vs laurel." Also look here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbzL9PxtFf0 And then there are all the well documented cases of perceptual bias that will cause you to "hear" things that aren’t there, or perceive changes in sound when there is no external cause. So you are off with TWO fallacious assumptions.
Whoops. Intuitions are often unreliable. In fact much of the fallacious explanations for natural phenomena through history was based on erroneous extrapolations from "intuition." (In fact, right now the Flat Earth Society is based on just that: it’s intuitively obvious the world is flat...forget any contradictory scientific evidence against this! Intuition is the most reliable thing we have!)
Drat. Another fallacy. One can have sufficient reasons to doubt a claim without having direct experience. If I tell you the moon is made of cheese, do you have to have traveled to the moon in order to marshal reasonable doubts about my claim? Similarly, if someone is presenting a claim that is laced with naive understandings of human perception, that already raises doubt about the claim (even if it’s not conclusive against the claim). You are not actually making a good case for your claims. That said, although you have laced your post with some faulty ideas, I did not get enough detail from your post as to what you were actually adjusting. It could still be the case you were adjusting something that could plausibly alter the sound, in a way you found desirable. And that could be really cool. But we shouldn’t have to buoy our claims with fallacious ideas about the reliability of our perception. |
