Did Amir Change Your Mind About Anything?

@kahlenz

This is the most absurd discussion I have ever read on Audiogon (and there have been plenty of contenders).

There certainly is a lot of absurdity, but there’s also lots of good content as well (much of it from Amir).

I understand the fascination with measurements, but I can’t objectify my enjoyment of music.

Who do you think is actually doing that?

You know audio engineering is not the same as "music," right? Audio engineering involves quantification to understand what is going on so the engineer can take the right steps towards getting what he wants to achieve.

Nobody is "objectifying" their enjoyment of music. Whatever music you enjoy is totally subjective, and no (normal) engineer would say otherwise.

You may as well say "I don’t care to objectify my call to my mother on my iphone." Well of course not. But the engineering behind your iphone relies on objectively verifiable results in order for you to have that phone to enjoy conversations with your mom.

Perhaps you are a bit biased...😊

What about my last post and article ?

Here a test of basic reading abilities: read this article and explain to me why this article is important in acoustic , and how it matter about our discussion... At least i will see if someone know how to read... Nobody reacted to this article , i posted it twice here FOR A REASON...If nobody does understand why it matter to this preposterous war between ears and electrical tools , i will go back to music..😊

And what about my argument? They are all occupied by punching each other in the most absurd way...

Objectivists and subjectivists are twin brothers born from marketing with their focus on the gear, by ears golden or not, or by measurements...... For me and for science audio experience is about acoustical, electrical and mechanical embeddings not about gear choices...Science in audio is basically acoustic before engineering... And in my room too it is acoustic before engineering... Anybody can pick good gear at relatively low price today... The problem is his embeddings and controls for the ears of the owner because he experience sound in a determined acoustic field : his room......

In audio there is one basic science, which is multi-disciplinary, it is psycho-acoustic, not electrical engineering with blind test which is secondary technology answering mainly market design inquiries, thats all......

There is only ONE WAY to train hearing: it is acoustic experiments... Not blind test of gear... Are you serious? 😊

This is the most absurd discussion I have ever read on Audiogon (and there have been plenty of contenders).

 

There certainly is a lot of absurdity, but there’s also lots of good content as well (much of it from Amir).

I get the impression that the walls at Amir's place have lots of indents about forehead high scattered about. Some of them with bloody stains.

All the best,
Nonoise

@amir_asr 

"Do you ever seat down and just enjoy your music like a normal human being?"

--------------

What? Of course I do. I am at desk testing gear for good number of hours every day. All of that is spent listening to music. This is good number of hours per day.

I recently came back from Pacific Audio Fest 2023 and not only did a bunch of listening there, I was the only reviewer posting what music was played there. See my trip reports:

------------

Okay, so I just completed reading all 14 pages of your show report on the ASR forum. Some nice Photos.  I was paying attention to lots of complaints about costs of equipment, or complaints about speaker positioning in the rooms.  A few nice compliments about exhibitors listing components, pricing sheets, and measurements. A few comments such as "sounds decent", or "bright" or "open".  Pretty vague, not descriptive, and no explanation beyond single words at most.  

Honestly - the report so far has no helpful descriptions or details about how things really sounded at the show, with a lack of descriptive detail.  Also noting very limited praise for many systems we are familiar with, particularly with high cost systems. High cost systems can sound good too, yet there is limited reporting.  

Other than some nice photos, reading the 14 pages posted so far was kind of a waste of time for me.  There seems to be a real gap in describing how things sound in a manner folks here on Audiogon can truly appreciate or understand. Perhaps we can ask the question in another way to learn more.  

ASK: 

With your expertise in measurements, can you also share something more about a system that you really like and enjoy?  Then describe how it sounds, and why it sounds great to you? In what ways?

Amir said...."I do too!  There is no question that is what he perceived.  It is just that we don't know if that depended on the actual output of said DACs or other extraneous factors.  Our brain is a wonderful thing when it comes to manufacturing facts.  To make sure that is not happening, we only trust listening tests where only the sound is involved, not the rest of your senses. "

I understand what you are saying but he said that he did not know brand or price and still found a difference, and that's good enough for me.  It seems like you doubted his conclusions due to it not being a perfect blind test.  People find that insulting.  Rightly so.  

I just think that we need to give more credit to the imperfect listening tests that we all do.   I have sat and A/B' d between sources like phono stages and DACs and knowing what they are had no influence on how they sounded.   I wasn't invested either way.  I truly wanted to know how they compared.  Sometimes even forgetting which I had on which input.  Sometimes I wanted the less expensive one to sound better for instance.  And it didn't.

I guess my point is that, yes, we are subject to subjectivity and measurements can keep us a little more sober about that, but generally speaking our ears do a pretty good job, how it sounds to us is all that matters and measurements will not tell us that.  All that can be heard cannot be measured. And what we hear is more important than any measurement.  

In fact measurements are just another way to be fooled.  One might argue that knowing a piece measures well causes more bias than if we knew nothing about the measurements.  So in fact the objectivists may be more subjective and biased and deluded than those that do not know a thing about the measurements.  They think, oh, well, that DAC measured great on ASR so it must sound good.  So it sounds good to them.