Food for thought for all us audiophiles

An interesting article. I suspect that much of the differences many of us hear can be explained by this. I personally have caught myself "hearing" differences based on my expectations and desires rather than what I actually hear. And I call myself an especially objective, analytical person. But there is one major problem with this article. In fact the problem is pretty the same as the problem the writer is lambasting. The article contains no information on testing "audiophiles" to determine if they actually can hear a difference. In other words, the writer made up his mind then dragged together a bunch of semi-related information to support his position, rather than running double blind tests himself. A bit hypocritical if you ask me.

Instead of suggesting the convergent effect for cases of consensus, I’d like to suggest sheer politeness. It’s better than turning to the person listening next to you and asking “Are you DEAF?!?”

"Apart from the overall lack of evidence and the sheer physical implausibility of some of the products, there is some classic research in social psychology that have implications for this topic."

‘Overall lack of evidence’ of what? Is there proof Led Zeppelin is better than Beethoven? It’s about perception (and preferences). I’m sure perceptions can be colored, but more important is simply the ability to perceive and the value placed on differences. Years ago, my brother thought I was crazy for spending money on expensive cables. He is an electrical engineer and thought there should be no audible difference in speaker wire. I sat him down one day and played the system through lamp cord then through the cable I had at the time (MIT MH-750 – yes, it was awhile ago). He said’ yea, it sounds a little better’, shrugged his shoulders and left the room. To me it was like night and day but he was just not as passionate about sound as I was. The difference meant nothing to him even though it existed. The same difference in sound can be experienced as completely different magnitudes by different listeners. It’s similar to how one person finds a painting beautiful while another sees it and walks by without giving it a second thought. Oh, and well engineered products usually test better, sound better, and cost better. :)

"While our senses are rather limited, our ability to fool ourselves is almost endless."

Speak for yourself.

"In fact, cognitive dissonance theory predicts that the more you pay for the cables, the more inclined you will be to conclude that they sound good, regardless of the actual quality of the cables."

I would argue there are more people who set up brand new expensive pieces of equipment and are disappointed at first hearing it, than those who love it, until of course it breaks in. How then would this be explained? (OK I’m sure someone will say its initial buyer’s remorse that the kids will never get braces…..until you get over that.)

I don’t think (in most cases) owning expensive equipment is simply a matter of people being able to afford it so they buy it. I used to work in an audio store and most of the audiophiles were from modest means. They bought expensive products for the sound it created, not because they were wealthy and could afford it.

"Is it really possible to tell the difference between normal high-end equipment, and equipment that veers into the audiophile range?"

Yes. I have many friends who are not into the hobby but have heard expensive systems and “get it”. They have been able to hear the differences in equipment incredibly well even though their ears are not ‘educated’. In fact one of them is a building contractor whose hearing is becoming impaired and he is an incredibly astute listener.

"In other words, it’s not really worth trusting an audio reviewer who is older than you are, because there is a range of higher frequencies that you can hear while they cannot."

How do you know a 25 year old reviewer hasn’t blown his/her eardrums out with ear buds/pyle driver subs/the new straight pipes he put on his Harley?

As a person ages, their hearing normally changes very gradually. Perception of live music, and reproduced music will change as well – but equally. This does not mean that a reviewer cannot distinguish differences in equipment it’s just their frame of reference has changed. Even with reduced sensitivity to higher frequencies acuity can be spot on. I would be more inclined to take the advice of someone with 40 years experience than rookie with ‘fresh’ ears. Therefore I would suggest extending a reviewers useful life to 62 years so they can at least collect Social Security.

Yes, those are common sentiments outside our hobby and even inside. It seems like the objectivists have such a hard time with the subjectivists. Art is subjective and fun. Is that a problem?

"Instead of suggesting the convergent effect for cases of consensus, I’d like to suggest sheer politeness. It’s better than turning to the person listening next to you and asking “Are you DEAF?!?”"
-Hifibri

Wonderful observation, and hilarious too!

Curious all this.

My wife's sister's husband is an engineer, music lover, and wire skeptic. Big amps and Ohm speakers? OK. But wire is wire. He also says old men (which he is rapidly becoming) can't hear the difference if there is any anyway because "our hearing is shot".

I am in early middle age and my eyes are going and I have to ask people to repeat themselves. But my "ears" have never been better. By that, I mean I am able to pick out subtle differences in musical performances, recordings and stereo systems that I could not detect or articulate as a younger person. I have "learned" to listen better. I would also argue that there is a lot more to "hearing" than high frequency extension, such as things like spatial cues and PRAT.

With that said, I am wondering if any of you can point me towards any published double blind tests that describe:
1) perceived differences in audio equipment - say one of the recognized "best" CD players under $500 vs the "best" under $2000 vs the "best" over $10,000
2) perceived differences in audio cables across a similarly broad price range
3) a test of a group of self-proclaimed audiophiles vs a group of non-audiophiles in terms of ability to distinguish differences between wires or equipment
4) a test of a group of older people vs a group of younger people in terms of ability to distinguish differences between wires or equipment?

Turns out the wife of the above mentioned engineer (otherwise known as my sister-in-law) is an epidemiologist who recently developed the double blind test for a successful cancer vaccine. If I can find the time and overcome inertia, I am considering trying to get the wife to design a little study to address these silly questions, and support or refute her husbands biases. And that would be either a very good or a very bad idea, or both.

Now I just need to convince a local stereo dealer to lend me several $100K worth of stuff...

Curious that the response to this article has led a few members to actually fall into the holes the article refers to.
S7horton has decided they "disagree"(?!) with the graph; on what basis? Because it might be right? Of course it's true that not everyone will lose hearing exactly as the graph shows, but the point is that ON AVERAGE (that's how science creates graphs) we all lose our hearing bit by bit as we age, and that varies depending on how we treat our ears.
Then Hifibri has presented a pointless comparison between cheap lamp cable and purpose-made hifi speaker cable. No-one would argue that quality speaker cable wont sound better than bell-wire, but the article was talking about at what point spending any more becomes pointless, such as whether $7000 cables can really sound better than $70 or $700 cables. It's no different to saying "this $10 watch tells the time better than a sundial, so this $5000 watch must tell the time heaps better than the cheap one." Chances are they are both as accurate. My own real experience is that my $20 TAG copy from Bali has worked flawlessly for 15 years, while my $500 Seiko failed after 6 years.

Back to audio... To me the simple mistake is that too many audiophiles - myself included - use terms such as "better", "improved" and "accurate" interchangeably. Yet these are not the same.
For example, a new IC cable may make my system sound "better" or make an "improvement" to my ears and brain, but may have actually made my system less accurate in terms of a faithful reproduction of the original recording. Whether that makes a costly cable worth the money comes down to my own tastes. But whether that cable actually carries a signal more accurately can't truly be tested by human ears, as this is too subjective.

That's my 2 cents worth...