OP, 

    Great post, Ive been using a similar analogy for a long time, Books and movies also very subjective...

@thyname    Thank you for your response.  I will take your comment on my username as a compliment.  I did choose it carefully.

I certainly did NOT say that in my camp everything always sounds the same.  This is not black and white.  It is not a case of you either hear differences or you don't.  You miss my point.  Of course I often hear differences when I make modifications to my system.  I am sure I suffer from confirmation bias too.  Certainly when drinking wine.

We have all found that sometimes our system sounds different on different days, even when warmed up to the same extent, at the same temperature and humidity and listening to the same source material.  Some people say their system sounds different in the dark to with the lights on.  These are all subjective impressions we get, resulting from our mood and all sorts of other transitory personal conditions, many of which we cannot know or identify, still less quantify. 

All I am saying is that I don't know to what extent the differences I hear and taste are differences that truly exist and to what extent they are manufactured in my head, entirely unbenown to me.  There is no way of knowing.  I am afraid this truth is incontrovertible and entirely well known to psychologists.

All I am saying is that I don't know to what extent the differences I hear and taste are differences that truly exist and to what extent they are manufactured in my head, entirely unbenown to me. 

So, how do you make your purchasing decisions, if you don't trust your ears & senses?

@brianh61     Your wine shop is only trying to be helpful of course by recommending a 'similar' bottle.

Many will agree with me that as a very delicate grape Pinot Noir can present very variably.  As a Burgundy drinker of many bottles experience, I have certainly found this.  Even in a case of 12 bottles, without there being any question of a 'fault' I often find noticeable differences between bottles.  This is not a confirmation bias as all the lables are the same and all the wine was bottled at almost the same moment.  It may be that the differences between the wines you requested of your shop and those recommended were less than those I have encountered in a single case.

A more amusing example of a shop offering something different to what was requested came a long time ago from a schoolfriend of mine who has rather large feet.  He went into a shoeshop and asked for a size 12.  The server came back and said 'sorry we don't have a 12 but we do have a large size 11'.

This post resonates with me. As a wine lover, I have had many opportunities to blind taste wines and always enjoy finding that bottle that satisfies the palate at a nominal price. Especially fun when an inexpensive bottle knocks out a very high-end wine (read expensive) at a blind tasting. This is for some the holy grail of wine - finding the overperformer.

Still, when it comes to percentages, the higher the price tag on the wine, the more likely that the wine will be of high quality. Not always true, and especially in the middle tier of pricing there are some clinkers, but when you start to pay higher prices the consistency of the producer and the quality of the product generally increase.

So anyone with a fat wallet can afford to drink amazing wine every night...they just need to pay for it. Most of us are not so fortunate and therefore turn to the value proposition - is this starting to sound familiar.

There is very definitely a risk of confirmation bias, especially when you have spent an inordinate amount of money on a "special" bottle, but the beauty of wine (unlike stereo equipment) is that blind comparison of wine is super easy. Find some bottles, remove the foil, pull the corks and stick them each in paper bags. someone can mix them up and another person can do the same and attach numbers, then the fun begins. One is freed of preconceived expectations and decides which they enjoy most and least. Seldom does everyone agree completely. Sometimes to everyone's surprise (like in Paris 1976) an "underdog" wins. If only blind comparisons were so easy for stereo equipment!

After 30+ years of tasting, I have experienced enough that I don't need to blind taste anymore to decide if I like a wine or not, and if it is worth the price tag to me. I don't care too much about the alcohol, or the phenols or glycerin or residual sugar quantitation of the bottle contents. I care how it tastes. If I like it, and the value proposition works for me I purchase it. if it doesn't tickle me I keep looking.

To close the analogy, there are people who might buy wine based on technical information or price alone, but that approach doesn't work for me. I trust my senses, and leave the technical details for others to marvel over. Same with audio, although I do wish that blind comparison was easier. Until I can build identical side by side high quality systems for direct comparison (never), I will just have to rely on my ears with the helpful advice and experience of others. I fully recognize that this will always come with inherent confirmation bias, but as long as I am enjoying what I hear I can live with that :)