When are people going to wake up and realize listening is a skill?


Thirty years ago I realized my lifelong dream of owning a 911. This is a fast car and so first thing I did was join PCA to get some track experience in order to be able to drive safely at speed. Of course I already knew how to drive. I was a "good driver" much better than most, etc, etc. 

PCA Driver Ed begins with several hours of classroom study. Track rules, safety, and some car control skills- braking, steering, throttle control. Yeah, yeah, whatever let's go!    

Then at the track they put you in your car with an instructor and you head out onto the track driving so freaking slow, actually normal freeway driving speed but it seems slow because, race track. So we play follow the leader with the instructor pointing out cones. Braking cones, turn-in cone, apex cone, track out cone. Each turn is numbered 1 thru 9, and there's turn worker stations, and they have flags, and you need to be watching and know what they mean, because you screw up and that is it your day is done. One full 20 min session, all the excitement of a tour bus.  

Bear with me. There's a connection here. Trust me. 

It goes on like this all day until finally we are signed off to drive solo but then there is an accident, flat bed, that's it for the day. 

Next time out I am so super confident instead of novice I sign up for Intermediate. Same cars, only the Intermediate drivers are supposed to somehow be better. Whatever.   

So out I go and Holy Crap everyone is passing me! I am driving as fast as I possibly can and being passed by everyone! Not only that, if you have ever driven as fast as you possibly can then you know this means braking as late as you possibly can, cornering as fast as you can, all of it. Which without fear of police is pretty damn fast! So fast I am not at all used to it, and so by the end of 20 min am literally sweating and exhausted!  

But I keep at it. Turns out all that classroom talk is about driving skills that are absolutely essential, not only to know but to be able to do. Threshold braking is braking right at the edge of lockup. Right at the very edge. Those cones are there for reference, to help you delay braking as long as possible. The turn-in cones are where you start turning, apex cone where you are right at the inside edge of the turn, track-out where you come out the other side. Do all this while at the very limit of traction and you are going very fast indeed. Without- and this is the essential part- without really trying to go fast.  

Learn the skills, practice the techniques until you are able to execute smoothly, efficiently, and consistently, and you will be fast. Without ever really trying to go fast.   

The connection here is, everyone thinks they hear just fine. Just like they think they drive just fine. In the classroom they talk about threshold braking, the late apex line, and controlling weight transfer with throttle. Just like here we talk about grain, glare, imaging and sound stage.   

I left one part out. All the track rats, they all start out talking about horsepower, springs and spoilers, thinking these are what makes the car fast. They are, sort of. But really it is the driver. By the time I was an instructor myself it was easy to go out with those same Intermediate drivers and it was like the commute to work it was so easy. My car was the same. Only my skills were greater.  

So when are people gonna wake up and realize listening is just like this? Nobody expects to become a really good golfer, tennis player or rock climber just by going out and doing it. Why are so many stuck talking watts? When are they gonna realize that is just like track rats talking hp?


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Just stop and think for a moment why this thread exists at all.

It's sole purpose is to try to counteract the other currently running thread with a similar title.

Why anyone, ever, gets so invested in one brand to go to these lengths, beats me.  Especially one that's clearly mediocre.

But let's also remember that the OP, thanks to his sixth and seventh senses, knew beforehand that the speakers he'd ordered were going to sound fabulous.  And guess what, they did!

But not so supercalifragilisticexpialidociously fabulous that they didn't benefit from a multitude of after-market home-made tweaks, which incontestably turned them up to 11. 
this discussion, if you remove some of the arrogance and criticism, is actually quite thought provoking.  Some good points have been made, but some of the analogy falls a bit short.  In  most sports(and I guess car racing is a sport, to a degree), there are absolute measurements, objective, of who wins, who is the fastest/strongest, etc.  A participant can  have fine shoes, a fine racket, the best suspension/engine, and even the most beautiful /perfect technique, but not be a winner or the best.
The perception on home reproduced sound certainly does have objective things that can be described, and experience does garner our ability to pick those things out and have the vocabulary to describe them, but at the end of the day, the experience still is subjective, and one individual can enjoy one type of "sound" that differs from another listeners preference.  Perhaps oenophilia is a better analogy....Perhaps this all goes back to Harry Pearson's "absolute sound", the truly live experience.  Some recordings and systems approach this, and those are limited, IMHO, to certain types of music and venues.  Otherwise, our systems do well to "remind us" of the live experience.....Some of our participants are more or less confident/arrogant/opinionated than others...that is what you call "personality"
Getting back to Porsche. I wanted one for many years and finally at age 70 I was "allowed" to buy one and I acquired a brand new 911 in GT Silver. It is now three years old and I still love it.....!
And how do you suggest you go about doing this? As a musician, I can tell you how and it's not just by listening, it's by training your ears at a piano or an ear training app in most of your cases.  Ya wanna be a better listener? Get Earpeggio or Functional Ear Trainer for your phone and stick with it.  You can play any note or a chord and I can tell you what it is.  Try doing that and it'll make you an ultimate listener.
I just want to know what part of MC's Jedi Listening Skills Training Program allowed him to know that Tekton speakers and Raven amps would be the best audio products he had ever heard WITHOUT having ever listened to them first????