Audio Science Review = "The better the measurement, the better the sound" philosophy

@prof appreciate the thoughtful reply. to your point about studies re: general preferences, there is a massive, ongoing replication crisis in the soft sciences to contend with. this doesn’t mean that all studies are bad - far from it - only that "there is research which shows that..." is not a silver bullet. i hasten to add that (much of) physics does not appear to have this problem. but there are a great many studies which have been proven impossible to reproduce, so i approach this sort of "studies show that more people prefer strawberries to peaches" reasoning with caution. human motivation is enormously complex and the factors which lead person x to prefer A over B can (and very often does) vary at the individual level.

I do not comprehend the analogy of listening loud and shouting at low volume levels. I am certainly not a genius but have 2 BAs, JD, MPA etc and took physics courses at UCLA. My wife was a bio-chem major at Stoneybrook and has very deep comprehension of mathematics. We are not uneducated "noobs."

I have not claimed to be an arbiter of all things audio, or for almost anything audio. You have assigned that job to yourself.  That you don't understand the analogy of listening to loud music and not being able to hear regular conversation, in the context of your post, is not surprising. Being educated does not mean that you are applying your intelligence all the time. You made two comments about the dynamic range of hearing. One from my knowledge is accurate, maybe even a low estimate. The other was ludicrous. That you do not understand my comment means you do not know how to temper the information you believe you know about hearing with the act of listening to music.

I previously commented there are two paths to take with information. I said when that information conflicts with what we believe, but it also applies when that information supports what we believe. We can reject that information without consideration, even becoming angry, we can accept that information, even without knowing if accurate or valid, or we can research and learn further and try to understand the nature of that data. If the data supports what you already believe, you may tend towards confirmation sources that believe the same thing, however unqualified.

You put down Amir because he is saying things you do not want to believe, meanwhile lauding Darko who is saying what you want to believe. There is no doubt at all in my mind, that where this topic is concerned, Amir is far more knowledgeable and would be far more recognized as an expert by others with real expertise. 

There are a lot of put downs of engineers on audio forums. My background is medicine/medical research. I am very familiar with this mindset from lay people. Curiously, I almost never ran into that mindset from people who worked in unrelated science fields. It was unique to those who worked outside the sciences. Not exclusively, but the majority. Perhaps those who work in the sciences have better training to identify likely correct information from likely incorrect information? They are absolutely skeptical people, but they temper that skepticism with research.

Change a few pronouns, descriptors and names to the above post and all of a sudden it's a diatribe against what he's saying.

All the best,
Nonoise

@td_dayton ,

My background is medicine/medical research. Fortunately, or unfortunately, at a biological level we are all rather similar. If we were not, medicine, disease, injuries, would be an even harsher problem to attack. Our preferences will obviously have a combination of genetic, environmental, and experience aspect. That is not controversial. That genetic aspect is driven by evolution and while there are variances, there also strong underlying similarities. We see that in all aspects of sensory stimulus, whether sound, site, smell, or taste.  That is why companies like Walmart pick their color schemes as they are, why food products with multiple flavors always have favorites, why we prefer yellowy light when it is dim, why we like the feeling of soft/plush textures.

Our similarities are even more similar at the hardware level. It is surprising how little variation, when we are young and everything is in tip top condition, there is. That applies to site, hearing, taste, even touch. The resolution, sensitivity, and dynamic range of all our senses varies only by small amounts within a population. Some are gifted with better processing capability and the ability to extract more useful information, but they have similar underlying limitations.