Indeed we each experience heard input individually. However, I / we noted a broad correlation between what individuals reported and what our lab / theoretical models supported.
Agreed, the controversial part is the hearability. Generally speaking the "scientific" camp asserts that a large portion of the authentic audio signal is undetectable by the "naked" ear. That assertion is upheld by blind A/B tests with statistical modeling. They are unarguably correct on their terms. Many also require an analytical structure to verify what they hear and absent that, are unwilling to commit to the legitimacy of an experienced phenomenon (what they heard).
On the other hand, a small set of top end recordists and self-identified audiophiles can and do hear much of what the "scientists" deem unhearable, sometimes requiring significant elapsed time to understand and believe what they are hearing. They often don't care what the statistical models say is valid; they believe their ears and may or may not care to argue, justify or prove their opinion. The science guys think they are making it up. I think they are believing their senses.
A seminal, foundational understanding that allowed Thiel Audio to be, grow and succeed on its own terms, was that we agreed to disassociate from not only the established "truths", but also what other designer / manufacturers were doing and.or claiming to do. By focusing on our own work and believing where it led us, we were able to establish our own truth, which was always correlatable with measurements, but not driven by them. Of course that process might have been better informed or more enlightened or perhaps greater resources (staff and funds) may have produced more elegant work . . . but we did manage to create a body of work with internal integrity which brought joy to scores of thousands of customers and the acclimation of many dozens of design and engineering awards.
In my own work I call my process "contemplative understanding and design". That calls on intuition and insight in addition to analytical cognition and includes leaps of imagination in its process.
