In Reply to: Steve Eddy baiting wannabees.... posted by PeAK on March 27, 2004 at 16:53:48:
Jon would no doubt win hands down in a Cable Asylum poll. Cult worshipers abhor truth. This fact alone has permitted cable companies to make millions and Jon to feel like a big shot for years.But truth is persistent and unrelenting. Despite every effort of man to suppress it, eventually truth prevails.
Someday, somewhere, perhaps a group of quality audio people will come together in a forum dedicated to the pursuit of truth wherever it may lead, all willing to drop their own personal biases, dogma, pretenses and claims to credential or intellectual superiority.
Perhaps this group will be willing to take a holistic approach to audio issues in which the entirety of the reproduction chain is examined from both a macro and micro perspective, with each perspective pursued in tandem with the other. Perhaps this group will learn secrets only remotely hinted at now as to what really happens as low level signal pass from source to preamp and from preamp to amp, and what really happens as high level signals pass from amp to speaker.
Perhaps this group will demonstrate what it possible when all aspects of the chain work synergistically, and it will become clear that we don’t need to spend $10,000 for a 1-meter pair of interconnects to minimize distortion (or avoid ground loops, or whatever) of the signal as is passes from one component to another (or avoid ground loops, or whatever).
Perhaps this group will learn secrets that are only remotely hinted at as to why so many believe that vacuum electronics, which fails in almost all objective measurement comparisons with solid state electronics, brings them so much closer to the live experience than does solid state.
Perhaps this group will learn secrets that are only remotely hinted at as to why so many (including me) believe that vinyl, which fails in almost all objective measurement comparisons with digital, bring us so much closer to the live experience than does digital.
Perhaps controlled testing can be explored in depth with the assistance of experts in the art of testing human perceptions, and move beyond the same old tired arguments dealing with DBTs (and Jon’s favorite: naysayers vs. yeasayers) that have been hurled back and forth by the doctrinaires on both sides for decades. Perhaps this dedicated group will develop critical new controlled testing methods which decisively recreate the casual, long-term, at-home listening experiences (while removing the bias which is unavoidable in sighted listening comparisons) in which so many of us (including me) detect substantial sonic differences between and among cables. And perhaps armed with this import tool, this group will devise effective ways of comparing objective, measurable electronic characteristics with improved listening experiences.
And perhaps, with the power of this group unleashed, amazing developments will occur which significant improve what is possible at the leading edge of the state of the art, while at the same time bringing down the cost of achieving that leading edge to where even young, severely budge-restrained audiophiles can feast at the table of what many of us know is possible with even today’s current state-of-the-audio-art.
But the time and place for such a group is not here at AA, and with the current attitude of the Bored and probably the majority of Inmates, it is unlikely that AA will ever serve as the foundation for the formation of such a group. Here what matters is not the unfettered search for the truth, but one’s credentials and whether one can pass a rigid dogma litmus test.
As just one example, you say:
“Both you [Jon] and John Curl work as professionals in the industry and as consultants. You have a body of work that can take the unitiated and show them the way and are not shy about revealing paper references. You have commercial products too your name that are widely accepted. There are companies that take your cable recipes and earn a decent living. I know guys are human but more times than not I find you are correct and my personal experience are that you have been right in the longer run.
You guys would make great managers who sometimes need to make decisions that fall in the grey areas. But nine out of ten times, I think people would respect the science behind your conclusions.â€
As a proud owner of JC-1s I certainly concur that John has (with a lot of help from Bob Crump that seems seldom to get mentioned) demonstrated that he can produce a successful commercial product. Yet, I can think of no instance on AA where John has been challenged on a specific technical claim of his where he has been willing to engage in reasoned discussion of the scientific support for that claim. My experience of Jon has been similar.
For the life of me, I cannot understand how anyone could conclude that the attitude expressed by John Curl and Jon Risch on AA is conducive to advancement in the state of the art in the context of a discussion forum. Their pontifications which they are unwilling to defend against reasonable critique simply are an attempt to advance their own sense of self-importance. They contribute nothing to advancing the state-of-audio-art that could benefit all of us consumer-type audiophiles.
____________________"To dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free."
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Follow Ups
- You are probably quite correct. - Phil Tower 07:32:55 03/28/04 (8)
- Re: You are probably quite correct. - john curl 00:15:27 03/29/04 (7)
- Hi john - jneutron 14:14:37 03/29/04 (1)
- Re: Hi john - john curl 15:19:22 03/29/04 (0)
- Re: You are probably quite correct. - Dan Banquer 11:12:44 03/29/04 (2)
- Re: You are probably quite correct. - john curl 15:20:34 03/29/04 (1)
- Re: You are probably quite correct. - Phil Tower 16:00:48 03/29/04 (0)
- Re: You are probably quite correct. - Phil Tower 05:13:24 03/29/04 (0)
- Re: You are probably quite correct. - Steve Eddy 01:38:59 03/29/04 (0)