nautious
yup!
yup!
Snake oil, fraud, confirmation bias
It is becoming increasingly apparent that many threads about legitimate topics devolve into one or more of the contributors here making claims of snake oil, fraud, or confirmation bias thereby derailing the conversation beyond the valid and relevant thread topic and this is getting ridiculous. For anyone here who honestly holds the position that there is snake oil and fraud in the world of Music Reproduction Systems I challenge them to prove their claims in court it should be an easy task based on the claims they make here in Audiogon AND they will make a fortune because in the US once proven they can file a class action suit and profit enormously from the efforts of others to deceive. These people regularly claim that "there is no evidence" that things such as cables or fuses make a difference when in actual fact Audiogon is filled with evidence that these things make very real differences in
Music Reproduction Systems of course those who claim fraud reject that evidence as "confirmation bias" but in absence of any documentation from them they are only repeating the claim they have made so many times that has been refuted many times here by those who have demonstrated to there satisfaction that they make a difference. I think in actual truth the real fraudsters here are those that repeatedly make these claims of snake oil and fraud and often they have no experience to back up there claims they simply say the claims are impossible!
- ...
- 125 posts total
The way I look at it is if you’re happy with the purchase then that is all the evidence needed. It’s none of my business how you spend your money. And vice versa. Hearing is a personal thing, nobody knows what others can hear or not hear and all the "evidence" in the world of measurements and double blind tests are meaningless. If you hear a difference in a fuse, God bless you and enjoy it. If you can’t hear the difference between components to justify the cost, there is nothing wrong with you -- so afford others that courtesy. |
Well, it seems like it's all of our business when somebody makes the choice to make their "evidence" a matter of public discussion. I'm not sure why people think they have the right to say dumb things in a public forum and not be challenged on them. Everybody sure is entitled to their opinion, including me, even it that means I think you're crazy. It's a two way street. If you don't like what somebody might think of your silly idea, it might not be a bad idea not to toss it out there. As the saying goes, it's better for people to think you're a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt. Rather than try to reduce the cable and tech talk forums to havens for snake oil believers, I think a dedicated snake oil forum would be best. "Snake Oil: The forum for beliefs that have no basis in the laws of physics" Granted, that would probably move the bulk of the content of those forums to the Snake Oil forum, but it would be really nice to have a place to talk about actual technology in a realistic and analytical way. That's my rub with the snake oil crowd. They accuse the "Naysayers" of disrupting their little powwows, but how many decently analytical discussions have they derailed with their bogus ideas of directional wires, magic rocks, burning in cables, and other silliness? I lurk a lot at diyaudio. What passes for tech talk over here would be an absolute laughing stock over there. What's more, you display a lack of understanding over there and you've got a crew of guys in just about every forum ready to school you with facts, figures, and formulas. These snake oil believers... They got NOTHING for facts. They lap up the ad copy jargon and mythical claims like gospel. They don't ask hard questions. They don't seek deep understanding. I built a simple amp. Good for me! Everybody should try building their own electronics if for no other reason than to learn and experience exactly what doing this or that to a piece of gear really does. I've thoroughly enjoyed dealing with and learning from the crowd over there. I am THRILLED to be able to ask a dumbish question and get an answer from Nelson Pass! I can't say I've actually seen any snake oil over there. It's interesting how an army of guys with soldering irons, scopes, and distortion analyzers deeply study what they're hearing until they know why they're hearing it. Not here though! "I hear it!" is the only evidence required. It's pathetic. |
Actually, the audio hobby in general and this forum in particular are not intended to be or set up to be a peer review of anything. Especially when many of the targets of tweakaphobe scorn and anger are quantum mechanical in nature or things that go BUMP in the night. The technology of many audiophile devices the last twenty years or so, including aftermarket fuses, is beyond whatever the average bear can remember from school. This is not the faculty of Harvard or the AES or the Journal of Physics. A peer review is by uh, peers. What we have here, my friends, are not (rpt not) peers. Let the wailing and hand wringing begin! Education is what’s left when you subtract everything you forgot from school. A sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. If thy eye offend thee cut it out. |
@geoffkait , I do not have any opinion one way or the other on fuse directionality. I do not have any personal experience listening to the direction of a fuse. Now that’s out of the way. I notice you never try to inject fuse directionality on the Cable Asylum. We both know in short order a Bored Member would chime in and tell you to take to another AA forum. Come to think of it, I haven’t seen a post of yours on the Cable Asylum for quite awhile. https://www.audioasylum.com/audio/cables/bbs.html . |
- 125 posts total