FORGETTING the Digital to Analog conversion part, what is BEST Digital source?

[adamdea]

13 hours ago, barrows said:

@pkane2001, I suspect the reason that it may appear to some that you have an agenda, is that some, who may have spent many years developing their listening skills, may feel insulted when you come along and suggest that they are hearing things which are not there.  

There is such a thing as acquired skill in listening for particular attributes (eg noise, phase errors, distortion). The philips golden ear challenge illutrates this.

However, one can only practice a skill if there is feedback as to whether one got the correct answer, there is a genuine control, and one's skill can be developed against known and defined levels of spuria.

All fine so far....

The problem is that most of what passes for acquired listening skills around audiophile parts is just repeated conjecture with increased confidence.  It is not checked against real variables in controlled tests. Hence the prevalence of nonsense about what is and is not audible based on a feedback loop of affirmation of bogus belief. One only has to compare what many people think they know about perceptual coding with what they really can hear. There is no mystery here,  just as there is no mystery about how repeated sighted tests of cables et. can simply reinforce people's views about what they think they are hearing (or more strictly as to whether what they are hearing is based only on sound pressure waves and not other sensory or cognitive inputs). It is also notable that in many blind tests those who think they have great listening skills turn out not to have them any more than ordinary human beings. 

 

In short repetition is not the same as practice, and a hobby is not the same as a skill.

[adamdea]

12 hours ago, pkane2001 said:

 

True, but I do this for myself and not for others. If anyone is interested, I'll share my findings, but these obviously don't reach the status of proof positive (or negative ). I'm not an EE, but I do have formal training in electronics, computer, and chip design. When I find something that doesn't agree with my understanding of how things work, I get excited, not upset. It's an opportunity to learn something new. I see too many here that just want to prove their viewpoint at all costs. I'm much more interested in a deeper understanding.

 

That's a marvellous world view. However, I can't help noticing that many people with a very sound grasp of electronics nevertheless have a lack of interest in the science involved in hearing, which is of course perceptual science/psychoacoustics/the psychology of hearing. If every time they hear something which your doesn't agree with their understanding of "how things work" , they assume that the answer lies in electronics then they are just going to go round in circles. 

Of course if they have found this thing using structured tests, so be it. But if they have found it by sighted listening tests then the answer will almost certainly lie in perceptual science. We need to let go of the idea that what we hear is purely the result of a sound pressure wave input. The very slightest acquaintance with perceptual science should get rid of this.

[adamdea]

21 minutes ago, pkane2001 said:

Of course. Here's something I said a bit earlier in this thread when talking about blind tests:

 

 

It seems we are in agreement. I suppose the point I was making is that one very rarely encounters events which cannot be explained by our current understanding of how things work.  As you pointed out ealier most results of sighted listening experience are explicable without recourse to any hypothesis about the DUT 

[adamdea]

1 hour ago, Fokus said:

 

This is the first time in my 27 years on audio newsgroups that I can reply to a posting with nothing more than ... my signature.

 

Happy New Year, Mr O: always a pleasure. I seem to remember that there is a technical distinction in perceptual science between illusion and hallucination- is it down to whether it is a result of a properly working system or not?.
Incidentally, your signature for some reason makes me think of Munch's Scream

[adamdea]

On 1/19/2018 at 10:17 PM, fas42 said:

 

A "properly working system" throws up an immensely impressive illusion, one which includes all the intensity and "vibe" of the "real thing" - anything less in capability couldn't even be called a hallucination ... perhaps a good analogy would be a very young member of your family trying to show you magic tricks, that he's learning from a book - you hide your smiles behind your hand, as he fumbles through the moves  ...

Err sorry: I meant to ask in the context of the distinction between an illusion and a hallucination whether the former may be a the result of properly working perceptual system.