DO CABLES REALLY MATTER?

@cleeds 
Good call on the "borrowing."  My current dealer won't, so I shall endeavor to expand my horizons.

chemman

I understand the test very well.

Statements such as:

... confirmation bias is not ordinarily found in an experiment that focuses on empirical data ...

and:

... You can’t quantify listening skills ...

show you don’t understand scientific listening tests well at all.

"ranking listener acuity" is not empirical per se. You are assigning numbers to a qualitative result. You are attempting to control for variability by using a double-blind method of testing. The key is the word attempting. You are in no way controlling for human variability.

Actually, you are very much controlling for human variability. That’s the purpose of the testing. Those who have used scientific, carefully controlled double-blind listening tests to design things such as audio codecs have done this with considerable success. You simply don’t know what you are talking about. You also seem rather obsessed with the word "empirical" without actually knowing what it means. It means something based on observation. That’s as opposed to based on theory, which is the basis of your argument.

Can knowledge be gleaned from such tests? Yes. Is it definitive? No.

Oh, I agree absolutely. There are limits to the value of double-blind listening tests. But to understand those limits, it’s important to understand what they actually can do. That’s where you’re confused or, perhaps, just misinformed.

No singular test is absolutely definitive, by the way, so you raising that issue is a bit of a red herring.

chemman
@geoffkait

But I will agree that not everyone, in the whole world, is susceptible to confirmation bias in regard to a purchase.

>>>>That’s mighty decent of you. So, I take you still don’t see what’s wrong with your argument.

then chemman wrote,

There have to be a few people out there that would be unaffected. Not me mind you, if I bought a cable, for virtually any amount of money, that was supposed to improve the sonic capabilities and did not, I would be disappointed. Because I would have been super hopeful and probably could have even talked myself into the belief the sound was better. I will try it some day soon, probably, but not now. I am too busy enjoying the music. Enjoy it yourself. I imagine you have a nice set up!

>>>>>Whatever.

glupson
Lifelong learning.

Definition of knowledge - What’s left after you subtract out all the crap you learned in school.

An ordinary man has no means of deliverance. - audiophile expression

If I could explain it to the ordinary person they wouldn’t have given me the Nobel prize. - Richard Feynman 

glupson
chemman,

I wish I could write about my views of this topic in a short and simple way. 

>>>>>Me, too.