The USB cable myth

[Daudio]

I am 3/4's of the way through 'Musicophila', and greatly enjoying it. It adds to the list of books and articles on psychoacoustics and brain science I've enjoyed in my quest to understand that remarkable organ better.

 

"between your ear and your perception of what you hear, there is a lot of neural processing going on"

 

Quite true, through I take a more optimistic view of the ear/brain's capabilities. Certainly our hearing can fool some, but more importantly the instrument can be trained to an amazing degree. I've seen both, and I think one important factor in a good 'ear' is a good deal of conscious exposure to real acoustic sound.

 

As to the Douglas Self article:

 

"I have found complete scepticism towards Subjectivism to be the only tenable position."

 

I find that to be too extreme a position. A hard core ' meter reader' in fact. But, he can't be all bad since he is also interested in steam locomotives )

 

I find it far more likely that the truth is somewhere in-between the extremes.

[Julf]

As to the Douglas Self article:

 

"I have found complete scepticism towards Subjectivism to be the only tenable position."

 

I find that to be too extreme a position. A hard core ' meter reader' in fact.

 

Sure. But I think he has proven that he has some clue as to what he is talking about.

 

But, he can't be all bad since he is also interested in steam locomotives )

 

Not sure hanging out around steam locomotives does much good for your hearing...

[Paul R]

Sure. But I think he has proven that he has some clue as to what he is talking about.

 

Yes, as long as you treat his opinions with great skepticism of course. Especially those opinions he labels as objective.

[Julf]

Yes, as long as you treat his opinions with great skepticism of course. Especially those opinions he labels as objective.

 

 

As to the way objectivism / subjectivism really seems to split people into two different camps, there was an interesting insight in this article: UBC Study: Analytic Thinking Can Decrease Religious Belief

'"The findings, Gervais says, are based on a longstanding human psychology model of two distinct, but related cognitive systems to process information: an “intuitive” system that relies on mental shortcuts to yield fast and efficient responses, and a more “analytic” system that yields more deliberate, reasoned responses.“Our study builds on previous research that links religious beliefs to ‘intuitive’ thinking,” says study co-author and Associate Prof. Ara Norenzayan, UBC Dept. of Psychology. “Our findings suggest that activating the ‘analytic’ cognitive system in the brain can undermine the ‘intuitive’ support for religious belief, at least temporarily.”'

So maybe, just maybe, approaching our music systems analytically switches off the "intuitive" part of our brain that allows us to hear some of the things the more analytical of us don't seem to be hearing. Or maybe it is the other way around - focusing on the immediate, intuitive aspects of the sound we hear could be switching off our rational, analytic thinking. Would definitely explain some aspects of audiophilia.

 

[Daudio]

'"two distinct, but related cognitive systems to process information'

"Or maybe it is the other way around"

 

 

It sounds to me as if we have two different tools to approach the problem of sound quality. And I get the idea that you think we should choose one or the other. But why not use both, for the best results ??

 

[Paul R]

So maybe, just maybe, approaching our music systems analytically switches off the "intuitive" part of our brain that allows us to hear some of the things the more analytical of us don't seem to be hearing. Or maybe it is the other way around - focusing on the immediate, intuitive aspects of the sound we hear could be switching off our rational, analytic thinking. Would definitely explain some aspects of audiophilia.

 

That's about where I fall in this camp. I don't have the references available here, but there is a school of thought that evaluates people on a scale of Rational/Emotional. People fall somewhere along this scale, and IIRC, had a pretty good record of predicting how people would react to particular situations based upon where they scored on this scale. I don't think it was ever followed up on throughly, but it was interesting. It was kind of branch from General Semantics, if memory serves me correctly.

 

Anyway, yes - that's about it. Most people are able to recognize and balance both their emotional and rational reactions to stimuli, like music. But the kicker is it takes time to do so. Sometimes, in people who are well trained and experienced, it only takes seconds. Other folks may take days, weeks, or even months to process the inputs. First impressions of audio are notoriously misleading, whether those impressions are formed from listening or from measurements. Over time, those impressions are better integrated and form a better opinion.

 

Have you seen those trick paintings that look like a bunch of dots until your brain processes them into an image? It's the same kind of phenomena. Different with hearing than with vision, since we use hearing for different purposes.

 

By that I mean, there is a school of thought that says hearing (in humans) is used more for alerting a person to environmental cues than for analyzing those cues, which it is exactly the opposite with vision. Roughly, this equates to the difference between intuitive/emotional vs analytical/rational.

 

None of this is hard cold fact, just opinion and causal conversation dredged up from memory. Still, at least at first glance, it seems to fit the situation very well, wouldn't you say?

[Julf]

By that I mean, there is a school of thought that says hearing (in humans) is used more for alerting a person to environmental cues than for analyzing those cues, which it is exactly the opposite with vision.

 

I am trying to figure out if the cocktail party effect (selective auditory attention) supports or counters that.

 

Still, at least at first glance, it seems to fit the situation very well, wouldn't you say?

 

Definitely.

[Julf]

It sounds to me as if we have two different tools to approach the problem of sound quality. And I get the idea that you think we should choose one or the other. But why not use both, for the best results ??[/QUOTE]

 

I think the whole point of the study I linked to was that they sort of mask each other out. Or as Paul stated, it takes time to switch between the two.

[Julf]

No idea why the quoting didn't work...

[Daudio]

Julf,

 

Why does there have to be a either-or-choice ?? Granted the two methods don't work consequently, but so what ? Sometimes listen analytically, and sometimes listen intuitively , and enjoy the advantages of both ways !

[Julf]

Why does there have to be a either-or-choice ?? Granted the two methods don't work consequently, but so what ? Sometimes listen analytically, and sometimes listen intuitively , and enjoy the advantages of both ways !

 

Sure - if you are able to switch from one mode to the other at will, and are aware of the possible biases of/in each mode, then yes, I agree, there is value in both.