Is Audiophiledom a confidence game?

[Ralf11]

30 minutes ago, Samuel T Cogley said:

Best.

CA.

Quote.

Ever.

 

Thx!  But not original - I heard it as a grad. student (IIRC) and followed academic tradition by foisting it on my own grad. students.

[Teresa]

3 minutes ago, vmartell22 said:

 

Burning-in a USB cable? oh god   [v puts popcorn in microwave and start hitting refresh...]

 

 

v

 

 

I burn-in everything whither it needs it or not. I have the XLO / Reference Recordings - Test & Burn-In CD so it's no big deal. I try to give everything a fair chance.  

[jabbr]

49 minutes ago, Ralf11 said:

Jabbr - I've seen medical school profs. do things w/o statistics.  OTOH, I'm old and it was long ago - tho just one state over from you.  I thought OMG like thoughts, and "this guy probably sends reviews back to journal editors in red pencil" but as a very junior faculty I kept my big mouth shut.

Case reports? Anecdotal reports are useful to gather enough impetus to do a study. The pathologist who discovered CTE (in a single ex-football player) was savaged by the NFL, called a quack and worse. Then the players families organized a study. The one published by BU/VA. Oh boy.

 

Again, I tag each report based on how convincing the info is. We have many anecdotes that Ethernet cables sound different -- to convincingly disprove, standing behind "Science", you need statistics.

[jabbr]

39 minutes ago, esldude said:

Well I was thinking about the opposite approach.  Is what I had in mind doing 8th generation copies.  Every parameter was at least 8x worse.  Is that audible versus the pristine original.  Didn't seem to be.  

 

Now that doesn't definitively show something 8x better rather than worse wouldn't be an improvement.  But we are already into the realm where some physical constraints of air and sound won't allow that level of improvement. 

1) this introduces a slew of other variables. I haven't gone through the math in detail but there are interactions between the ADC and DAC that could obliterate what I would expect would be subtle differences between Ethernet cables. 

2) if you aren't going to do the test properly, why bother? get Cat 6/6a and don't worry about it.

3) If you insist, first you will essentially write a paper on why ADC/DAC generational copies don't make a difference. Have you measured phase noise? What accuracy? we can go on and on...

4) Basic principle of measurement is that the equipment you use to measure is better than the device you are measuring, if you want me to give up this rule of thumb, you are first going to need to do alot of work to convince me. 

[jabbr]

Look, this Ethernet cable straw man has probably been beaten to death.

 

If you'd like to look at something which by all reasonable indications is snake-oil confidence game, why not "grounding boxes" aka an antennae stuck in the sand.

 

That is a topic where known physics does not provide a mechanism of action (at least to my own knowledge). @marce -- you got anything on this one?

[marce]

Arghhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!

[lucretius]

16 minutes ago, jabbr said:

Look, this Ethernet cable straw man has probably been beaten to death.

 

If you'd like to look at something which by all reasonable indications is snake-oil confidence game, why not "grounding boxes" aka an antennae stuck in the sand.

 

That is a topic where known physics does not provide a mechanism of action (at least to my own knowledge). @marce -- you got anything on this one?

 

Why would anyone use a "grounding box" over an earth ground?

[Ralf11]

it's groovey lookin' and costs a LOT more = betteah & bettah

[rando]

It matches the aesthetics and veneer of their cable cooker?

[esldude]

37 minutes ago, jabbr said:

1) this introduces a slew of other variables. I haven't gone through the math in detail but there are interactions between the ADC and DAC that could obliterate what I would expect would be subtle differences between Ethernet cables. 

2) if you aren't going to do the test properly, why bother? get Cat 6/6a and don't worry about it.

3) If you insist, first you will essentially write a paper on why ADC/DAC generational copies don't make a difference. Have you measured phase noise? What accuracy? we can go on and on...

4) Basic principle of measurement is that the equipment you use to measure is better than the device you are measuring, if you want me to give up this rule of thumb, you are first going to need to do alot of work to convince me. 

Now I don't know if you worked at it or not.  

 

Every single one of your points is an indication of a misreading/misunderstanding of what I had in mind. 

1)  Yes it introduces a slew of other variables.  I wasn't using ethernet at the time, but USB.  Yes I would expect differences to obliterate subtle cable differences.  Yet if such obliteration at a measurable level is audibly of no consequence those obliterated differences would seem well below being an issue.  

 

2)I was testing with what was available as my estimation of finding something with USB was well below making sense to invest heavily in expensive test equipment.  Ethernet cable is an even lesser probability. 

 

3)This one simply doesn't apply.  ADC/DAC generational copies make lots of differences.  Except to the human ear that is. 

 

4) I never asked you to give up that so you made that one up. 

 

One reasonable approach when you don't have the measurement gear, but have a way of degrading signal quality in terms of perceptions like sound is to degrade a signal progressively and see if a difference is noticed perceptually.  If you degrade things one step and it is noticed you may have a hard time learning anything. If it takes several steps that tells you more.  Determining which parts cause the eventual perception of degradation may or may not be clearcut. 

[crenca]

44 minutes ago, jabbr said:

Look, this Ethernet cable straw man has probably been beaten to death.

 

If you'd like to look at something which by all reasonable indications is snake-oil confidence game, why not "grounding boxes" aka an antennae stuck in the sand.

 

That is a topic where known physics does not provide a mechanism of action (at least to my own knowledge). @marce -- you got anything on this one?

 

So, if I may sum up the last few pages - basically, jabbr and company is saying that no one has (and no one likely ever will - Big Science is expensive in both time and $money$) do the rigorous science needed to enable anyone to say with any "scientific" confidence that in spec Ethernet cables can not/do not sound different.

 

Thus, even Big Science is leveraged as part of the Audiophile confidence game, not by its input, but by its absence - all you objectivists don't really understand the very objective ground you argue from.  And the status quo goes on and on and on...

[plissken]

7 minutes ago, crenca said:

 

So, if I may sum up the last few pages - basically, jabbr and company is saying that no one has (and no one likely ever will - Big Science is expensive in both time and $money$) do the rigorous science needed to enable anyone to say with any "scientific" confidence that in spec Ethernet cables can not/do not sound different.

 

Thus, even Big Science is leveraged as part of the Audiophile confidence game, not by its input, but by its absence - all you objectivists don't really understand the very objective ground you argue from.  And the status quo goes on and on and on...

 

I wouldn't say that is entirely the case. I think if I could get 20 participants to go through the testing rig I have that it would be an accepted #. 

 

I've had a proof of concept video on Y/T for a few years now and I haven't blocked comments and so far no one has taken testing procedure to task. 

[jabbr]

22 minutes ago, crenca said:

 

So, if I may sum up the last few pages - basically, jabbr and company is saying that no one has (and no one likely ever will - Big Science is expensive in both time and $money$) do the rigorous science needed to enable anyone to say with any "scientific" confidence that in spec Ethernet cables can not/do not sound different.

 

Thus, even Big Science is leveraged as part of the Audiophile confidence game, not by its input, but by its absence - all you objectivists don't really understand the very objective ground you argue from.  And the status quo goes on and on and on...

 

Nah ... I think that if there are any differences, they are artifactual and can/should be eliminated with better power supplies and improved isolation techniques at the DAC. I've long suggested fiberoptic Ethernet which is really cheap these days and eliminates any issues with EMI/leakage currrents along the cable itself. Common sense argues against spending $1000 on an Ethernet cable. I don't need scientific proof of common sense.

[mansr]

30 minutes ago, crenca said:

So, if I may sum up the last few pages - basically, jabbr and company is saying that no one has (and no one likely ever will - Big Science is expensive in both time and $money$) do the rigorous science needed to enable anyone to say with any "scientific" confidence that in spec Ethernet cables can not/do not sound different.

 

Thus, even Big Science is leveraged as part of the Audiophile confidence game, not by its input, but by its absence - all you objectivists don't really understand the very objective ground you argue from.  And the status quo goes on and on and on...

Consider this, though. If cables really had all these strange properties, don't you think Big Science, or the military, would have looked into it by know. DARPA and its ilk have investigated far weirder things, just in case there was something, e.g. the Stargate project.

[wgscott]

6 hours ago, lucretius said:

 

You would think, but in my ealier years I have come across many who would not accept this. And while you may think the above a good example, I would argue that "God" is not a valid concept and should not form part of any hypothesis (i.e. the statement "God exists" is neither true nor false, rather it's simply giberish -- it has no real meaning).   

 

I don't think it is a good, nor an appropriate example.  

 

I just wanted to make clear the popularity of a belief should not be a criterion for whether it would be accepted as a null hypothesis.  The lack of a deity is a more parsimonious hypothesis, just like explaining something with four physical forces is more parsimonious than explaining something with five.

[jabbr]

2 minutes ago, mansr said:

Consider this, though. If cables really had all these strange properties, don't you think Big Science, or the military, would have looked into it by know. DARPA and its ilk have investigated far weirder things, just in case there was something, e.g. the Stargate project.

 

They have. 

[mansr]

11 minutes ago, jabbr said:

They have. 

And?

[Speed Racer]

53 minutes ago, crenca said:

 

So, if I may sum up the last few pages - basically, jabbr and company is saying that no one has (and no one likely ever will - Big Science is expensive in both time and $money$) do the rigorous science needed to enable anyone to say with any "scientific" confidence that in spec Ethernet cables can not/do not sound different.

 

Thus, even Big Science is leveraged as part of the Audiophile confidence game, not by its input, but by its absence - all you objectivists don't really understand the very objective ground you argue from.  And the status quo goes on and on and on...

 

Come on, now. Your grounding boxes have no basis in science to do anything at all except the wire may act as an antenna. The wire acting as an antenna is NOT a good thing as it may color the sound which you seem to like better......

 

At least the Ethernet cable argument has some legs as different cables may affect the Ethernet PHY differently.

[mansr]

1 hour ago, lucretius said:

Why would anyone use a "grounding box" over an earth ground?

Why do you need earth ground (unless building a radio)?

[mansr]

20 minutes ago, Speed Racer said:

At least the Ethernet cable argument has some legs as different cables may affect the Ethernet PHY differently.

Not if the cable is built to spec. Especially Cat 7 and 8, which are widely touted for audio, leave very little room for variation.

[Speed Racer]

Just now, mansr said:

Not if the cable is built to spec. Especially Cat 7 and 8, which are widely touted for audio, leave very little room for variation.

 

I don’t disagree! Notice I used the words least, some, and may. I didn’t say I was buying into it. 

[crenca]

53 minutes ago, jabbr said:

 

Nah ... I think that if there are any differences, they are artifactual and can/should be eliminated with better power supplies and improved isolation techniques at the DAC. I've long suggested fiberoptic Ethernet which is really cheap these days and eliminates any issues with EMI/leakage currrents along the cable itself. Common sense argues against spending $1000 on an Ethernet cable. I don't need scientific proof of common sense.

 

There is no common sense (singular).  There are common senses (plural), and they are not commensurable with each other.  From the general to the particular, we have two conflicting con-sensus (the latin etymology is illuminating) about what IS audiophildom (i.e. subjective vs objective).

 

As an "obejctivist", I agree with you but probably for differing reasons.  While I grant the Scientific Industrial Complex its authority - in this case to define what is and what is not science, I also recognize that in our technocratic modern lives we rely on all sorts of things on that rest on much less rigorous evidence, and yet are not "subjectivised" to the degree that some allege audio is.  

 

I do think you have set an unnecessary high bar that was always going to fail and that "common sense" as applied to audio is in fact a subjectivist position.

[Ralf11]

No rigorous definition of what is and what is not science - some things are clearly in or out, but there is large gray area (tho cable testing is not in it).

[jabbr]

2 minutes ago, crenca said:

I do think you have set an unnecessary high bar that was always going to fail and that "common sense" as applied to audio is in fact a subjectivist position.

I’m a pragmatist. That’s a thing.

[jabbr]

1 hour ago, mansr said:

And?

It’s incredible that Ethernet has been made to work at 10g through copper.

 

The industrial stuff tends to be fiber which is  often attractive in military applications (no EMI which can be snooped, not EMP sensitive, etc)

 

What special properties are you interested in? Terabit?