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
"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. _______________________________________ BINGO and hundreds of other designers! thank you Nonoise |
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Oh shoot Kosst, too late :) http://www.michaelgreenaudio.com/thetunebroadband/index-4.html I think that was of 2004, but I can call them if you would like. Now that I look at it maybe older. The picture looks like around 1989. I think that was a thing MTV did for closing credits on a show I did with them. Wow was I young. Then I think we copied it for an old site. Those were fun times. That was when I was going from pro to HEA. I think I was standing in one of my stereo stores. pretty cool ha Kosst Why are you so uptight about me anyway? Michael Green www.michaelgreenaudio.net |
No, Michael. No. People who call out your voodoo do so on a firmer understanding of empiricism than you seem to have. You only use words like "empiricism" and "science" to pay lip-service, to give some reputable gloss on your claims, but without actually "walking the walk" of truly responsible empiricism. The whole point of science has been to come up with a more reliable, empirically responsible method of inquiry. "Experience + Testing" does NOT automatically yield science, or reliable results. We can misinterpret experience in all manner of ways, and we can have unreliable methods of "testing" that yield incorrect results. So just invoking THOSE aspects do little to justify your "method." Because mere experiencing/testing is used to "confirm" virtually every crackpot theory in existence. It’s what the Flat Earthers are claiming as well. They "experience" that the world is flat - hey, just use your eyes! You can see it’s flat so that’s the right conclusion! - and they "test" their idea in all manner of ways. But it is of course the faulty nature of their tests, and bad assumptions, and ignoring of any data inconvenient to their beliefs, that continue to...what a surprise!...support their belief system! And yet actually reliable empirical methods show their conclusions are ludicrously off-base. A good hypothesis will usually build on already robust and reliable bodies of knowledge. If for instance you proposed that shifting the angle of X speaker in Y room will alter the sound in X manner, then there would be mountains of firmly established theory and evidence - based on carefully scientifically controlled variables! - suggesting the plausibility of this hypothesis. I’m unaware of any such evidence, mountain or otherwise, for your claim that tie wraps cause capacitors to alter the sound in the ways you claim. Which is why I keep asking for that evidence. But of course...never get it. And when one is being a truly responsible empiricist, you try to acknowledge the reality of variables - e.g. data on listener/experimenter bias - and incorporate that into your method of testing. I’ve been asking about your method; to what degree you control for variables and how (including listener/experimenter bias). But of course from you...silence. Someone who understands science scales his beliefs to the evidence, and doesn’t simply IGNORE counter evidence, and doesn’t ignore skeptical challenges from others. In fact, it IS skeptical challenges from others that makes science WORK. Skepticism is GOOD for you, Michael, if you actually care about the truth (or warranted confidence level) of your beliefs. People who understand this have no problem when someone asks them hard or skeptical questions about their claims. Casting skeptical questions as "negativity" is what you get from PSEUDO-SCIENTISTS. What you get in pseudo-science is lip service to terms like empiricism and science and method and testing....but no actual principled adherence to the virtues of science. People doing pseudo-science embrace any support for their belief, embrace only "positive" feedback, but reject skeptical feedback. Hence they can keep whatever beliefs they have going, unsullied by skeptics or a truly honest empirical method that seeks to prove themselves "wrong" as much as "correct" (that’s what you are seeking, if you are seeking truth). Michael, your every bit of behavior here, especially to my queries, have fit the very model of pseudo-science. It’s really no mystery why you won’t and can’t answer the substance of my questions. So go ahead of course, and keep on Tuning. More power to you. But please don’t try to keep claiming some empirical high ground with lip service to science. You’ll be called on it, unlike back in your forum where people apparently don’t know better. And please don’t pretend you are taking the high ground here, given the ways your pseudo-scientific evasions lower the level of discourse. It’s easy to play The Nice Guy when people just lap up your wisdom and thank you for it. But this is a public forum so you have to also Play Nice, that is show good faith replies and intellectual honesty, to the people who DON’T automatically greet you with open arms, and who exercise their right to critical thinking, asking your harder, more skeptical questions. Evading those questions, while casting those people as negative people or trolls...is pernicious to healthy, open discourse. And you will be called on this here, as well. |
