Trust your ears

[Teresa]

22 hours ago, Allan F said:

...Now please excuse me while I leave this forum and move to my living room to enjoy listening to music. 🙂

 

I agree, music is what is all about. The Audiophile Style forum is a nice diversion and I often learn something I didn't know before and at other times I am amused by what I read. 

 

7 hours ago, skikirkwood said:

 ...people following audiobacon's every word about $1000 dollar power, USB and ethernet cables. 

 

I feel sorry for them. Hopefully anyone spending such extravagant amounts of money for items that offer little or no improvement are rich enough to thrown money away and that it doesn't destroy their marriage or cause them to become homeless.

 

3 hours ago, kumakuma said:

Isn't it amazing that lost objects are always in the last place you look?

 

That's because once found we quit looking for them. 

 

My biggest problem is I start looking for an item I can't find and then during my search I forget what I'm looking for.

 

One of two things happen:

1. I happen to see it and say "oh that was what I was looking for" 
2. I don't have a clue and give up and go sit back down.

If it was important, in time I will go look for it again if not I just don't worry about it.

[AnotherSpin]

9 hours ago, kumakuma said:

 

No, you win.

 

You've succeeded in derailing yet another thread with your metaphysical musings.

 

There is no metaphysics here. I am only saying that all and any objects are in our subjective knowing. That is, what we hear in audio cannot be wrong, it is right. So we can trust our ears, there is no other valid option, imk. You can think otherwise, I am not asking for consent.

[Racerxnet]

5 hours ago, AnotherSpin said:

You can think otherwise, I am not asking for consent.

If you are not asking for consent or for approval, why are you commenting on any subject matter. I doubt many want to read about your bullshit in a audio forum, or whether something exists or not. 

[March Audio]

5 hours ago, AnotherSpin said:

 

There is no metaphysics here. I am only saying that all and any objects are in our subjective knowing. That is, what we hear in audio cannot be wrong, it is right. So we can trust our ears, there is no other valid option, imk. You can think otherwise, I am not asking for consent.

"Any and each object, or thought, or feeling appears in our subjective knowing only. There is no other way for us to know it"

 

"No reason to worry, every-thing in apparent world only seems to be true. How can an object be true if it does not remain stable and changes endlessly every millisecond, morphing from one state to another, being born and disappearing infinitely? The unchanging eternal and limitless knowing subject is the only truth."

 

"If you know an object, it exists for you. If you don't know the object yet, it does not exist for you. You, as knowing subject exist before, during and after you know any object, old or new."

 

All you are doing is spouting schoolboy metaphysics which obviously has zero relevance to this thread.  You have been spamming this irrelevant nonsense across multiple threads as if its some profound intelligent commentary.

 

Its not.

[AnotherSpin]

31 minutes ago, Racerxnet said:

If you are not asking for consent or for approval, why are you commenting on any subject matter. I doubt many want to read about your bullshit in a audio forum, or whether something exists or not. 

 

You can ignore, no problem.

[March Audio]

3 minutes ago, AnotherSpin said:

 

You can ignore, no problem.

How about you stop disrupting multiple threads with your irrelevant spam?

[opus101]

2 minutes ago, March Audio said:

How about you stop disrupting multiple threads with your irrelevant spam?

 

You're not the mod here - why don't you get on with saying whatever you have of value relevant to the topic? Leave the moderation to OP or Chris.

[March Audio]

10 minutes ago, opus101 said:

 

You're not the mod here - why don't you get on with saying whatever you have of value relevant to the topic? Leave the moderation to OP or Chris.

Im just echoing the opinions of the multiple other posters who think this poster is disrupting thread after thread with his nonsense.  Just take a look above.

 

Its difficult to get on with contributions when they are repeatedly interrupted by this guys metaphysical BS.

[opus101]

1 minute ago, March Audio said:

Im just echoing the opinions of the multiple other posters who think this poster is disrupting thread after thread with his nonsense.  

 

Why do they need echoing? They don't speak loudly enough for themselves?

 

Not saying that all of what @AnotherSpin is saying is relevant to the thread, it isn't. But hectoring him certainly doesn't improve the thread one iota.

[March Audio]

12 minutes ago, opus101 said:

 

Why do they need echoing? They don't speak loudly enough for themselves?

 

Not saying that all of what @AnotherSpin is saying is relevant to the thread, it isn't. But hectoring him certainly doesn't improve the thread one iota.

To get the message home to the guy that what he is doing is not acceptable.

 

As @kumakuma pointed out, he has already derailed the thread, probably his objective.  He has already been rebuked by Chris for trolling.

 

You clearly dont think its acceptable, so your complaints to me are disingenuous.

[opus101]

1 minute ago, March Audio said:

You clearly dont think its acceptable, so your complaints to me are somewhat disingenuous.

 

Irony meter off the scale.

[AnotherSpin]

52 minutes ago, opus101 said:

[...]

Not saying that all of what @AnotherSpin is saying is relevant to the thread, it isn't. 

[...]

 

It seems to me that what I have said is relevant. I believe that we can trust our ears and I justify my opinion by saying that all so-called objective data is within our subjective knowing. I can say it again, I don't demand to agree with me. Everyone has the right to think as he or she chooses and to express his or her opinion freely. Given, of course, freedom still means something. 

[John Dyson]

11 minutes ago, AnotherSpin said:

 

It seems to me that what I have said is relevant. I believe that we can trust our ears and I justify my opinion by saying that all so-called objective data is within our subjective knowing. I can say it again, I don't demand to agree with me. Everyone has the right to think as he or she chooses and to express his or her opinion freely. Given, of course, freedom still means something. 

Off topic (like this subject), but I'll comment:

You can trust your hearing to know what you like for enjoyable listening.

For technical measurement, hearing is not trustworthy for many/most things, and can vary quite a bit.   This is from real, personal experience, and many people have seen the results of my dependence on my hearing for my project.   In fact, since my hearing (and probably most peoples) is somewhat variable, doing a calibration over longer than a few minuts will have limited benefit.

I will give an exception for direct, immediate A/B comparisons, where there can be some reliability.

 

Reliability over days/weeks/months is VERY suspect.   For comparisons, for highly detailed differences, people usually seem not to have accurate memory beyond about 10seconds.

 

In particular, frequency response (a spectral estimate) appears to be incredibly unreliable in the general case.

Again, I am speaking for purposes where it would be desirable to have access to an objective type measurement, but sometimes such 'objective' technique/technology might not exist.

 

[kumakuma]

1 hour ago, AnotherSpin said:

 

It seems to me that what I have said is relevant. I believe that we can trust our ears and I justify my opinion by saying that all so-called objective data is within our subjective knowing. I can say it again, I don't demand to agree with me. Everyone has the right to think as he or she chooses and to express his or her opinion freely. Given, of course, freedom still means something. 

 

This is a thread in the Objective-Fi subforum. Your opinions about the nature of reality are off-topic here.

[Iving]

The Thread Title (and possibly intent) is bait.

 

You can't debate both sides of "Trust your ears" harnessing empirical data. It's implicit in "Trust your ears" that empirical data are overridden.

 

In Objective-Fi, the Thread as launched ("omg i thought i could hear a difference, but i hadn't even changed input source - geddit?") is at best an echo chamber. At worst it becomes tinder for the same old tensions.

 

The gap between soft-Objective and soft-Subjective can/should be had out as argument. But not here.

[kumakuma]

33 minutes ago, Iving said:

The Thread Title (and possibly intent) is bait.

 

You can't debate both sides of "Trust your ears" harnessing empirical data. It's implicit in "Trust your ears" that empirical data are overridden.

 

In Objective-Fi, the Thread as launched ("omg i thought i could hear a difference, but i hadn't even changed input source - geddit?") is at best an echo chamber. At worst it becomes tinder for the same old tensions.

 

The gap between soft-Objective and soft-Subjective can/should be had out as argument. But not here.

 

It seems to me that the fundamental problem is that many subjectivists want to have their cake and eat it too.

 

They want to be able to freely share their opinions on the rest of the forum without being "harassed" by objectivists AND come into this sub-forum to attack those with a more objectivist view of the world.

 

 

[The Computer Audiophile]

39 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

 

It seems to me that the fundamental problem is that many subjectivists want to have their cake and eat it too.

 

They want to be able to freely share their opinions on the rest of the forum without being "harassed" by objectivists AND come into this sub-forum to attack those with a more objectivist view of the world.

 

 

 

I encourage people to report this when it happens in either subjective or objective forums. It ain't right. 

[PeterSt]

What ain't right is the atmosphere here.

 

I suppose my previous post got NOT deleted by accident ?

[The Computer Audiophile]

1 minute ago, PeterSt said:

What ain't right is the atmosphere here.

 

I suppose my previous post got NOT deleted by accident ?

This is the objective sub-forum. If your comment isn't objective, it doesn't belong. We have plenty of other areas to discuss subjective items. 

[Confused]

A curious thread.  I am actually going to see if I can nudge this back on topic.

 

First to declare that I see myself neither as a subjectivist or an objectivist.  I think it is important to listen to kit, and see if it suits ones ears at a subjective level.  If it does not, then I see little point.  That said, I am keen to see measurements, I like to try to hear if measurements align with my subjective view.  This is interesting.  In general, I would like to see more measurements of kit, more of them and more detail.  Why not?

 

Do I trust my ears?  Up to a point.  For example, if I tried a blind test of my main system versus the sound from my iPad, my trustworthy ears would be able to tell them apart ten times out of ten, no problem.  This is no big deal though, because I could measure my main system and iPad, and find significant measurable differences between the two.  As an example, I have some music with very clear low bass sounds.  This bass is simply not produced by the iPad, my ears could register this easily..

 

There is a scale here.  I could come up with A/B comparisons that would be increasingly more difficult to tell apart blind.  Maybe KEF Ref 3's versus KEF Ref 5's.  This would be harder, but with the right music doable.  But again, they measure differently.

 

When we get to comparing say two competently engineered and manufactured per specification digital cables, I probably could listen and decide which I preferred, but I would not be sure if I was kidding myself.  Could I reliably pick cable A over cable B in a blind test?  No, I doubt it.  (I would be happy to try though, if someone set up such a test)  Many will claim they can do it.  How many have demonstrated that can do it is controlled blind test?

 

So for me there is a level at which I trust my ears, which gradually moves to a level where I would not trust my ears.

 

What is the level at which ears cannot be trusted?  I have no idea, but this is where the controversy lies.

 

The earlier link was good.  Many could not pick out MP3 files as being inferior.  Of course, MP3 versus lossless is easily measured, but maybe there is something else going on here, maybe for some ears MP3 is for some reason subjectively preferable.  This is not necessarily a straightforward issue as to what measures best sounds best.

 

My view is that this topic can be debated, but will never be fully resolved.  What I think is needed is a lot more properly controlled blind test type experiments.  But these are expensive and difficult to do, and results will always be contested.  That said, I still think that more rigorous blind testing to try to scientifically establish exactly what can and cannot be discerned, is what is needed.  Otherwise we are just swapping opinions.

 

As this is the objective-fi area, maybe we need more links to any high quality blind testing that has been performed in the past, to get a better understanding just how trustworthy ears can be. (or not)

 

 

[PeterSt]

It was objective. I asked to proved something which should make the thread subject legit.

So, move the thread then ?

 

Some people seem to think it is still fun in here.

It is not. Not at all.

 

Mind you, the same people bash at everyone by now. I can do too, until I'm banned. But I'd sincerely hope you ban the others first. After that it may be a better world, again. And again for a while maybe.

Really ...

[PeterSt]

3 minutes ago, Confused said:

Of course, MP3 versus loserless

 

Great one.

[PeterSt]

4 minutes ago, Confused said:

What is the level at which ears cannot be trusted?

 

When companion auditioners start to disagree upon what both as individual heard and wrote down.

It never happens, you know. Now over here.

[The Computer Audiophile]

Just now, PeterSt said:

It was objective. I asked to proved something which should make the thread subject legit.

So, move the thread then ?

 

Some people seem to think it is still fun in here.

It is not. Not at all.

 

Mind you, the same people bash at everyone by now. I can do too, until I'm banned. But I'd sincerely hope you ban the others first. After that it may be a better world, again. And again for a while maybe.

Really ...

 

Peter, if you don't have fun here, I highly recommend you take some time away. 

 

It's also not lost on me that @March Audio seems to find his way into every argumentative thread. 

 

People bashing isn't allowed. If you see it, report it.

[Confused]

5 minutes ago, PeterSt said:

 

Great one.

Well spotted Sir!  For the record, you spotted this so fast, I just had time to edit it out of my earlier post.  Oh the shame, but yes, the typo was mine!