Do you believe that our hobby is splitting?

I really expected those Heresy IVs to sound good and they didn’t. There is both expectation bias, and it’s also not a blindfold to perception. Nobody is immune to it, and yet it doesn’t affect all outcomes to an absolute degree.

This appears to infer that because your conscious expectation didn't align with your perception that expectation bias didn't play a role in your evaluation?
 
This appears to infer that because your conscious expectation didn't align with your perception that expectation bias didn't play a role in your evaluation?
it’s both possible that it influenced me and that it didn’t dictate my decision like many insinuate it would. Again, I’m not saying it doesn’t exist. I know what it is.
 
it’s both possible that it influenced me and that it didn’t dictate my decision like many insinuate it would. Again, I’m not saying it doesn’t exist. I know what it is.

Sure, it's a factor, it's always there, we've no idea which way it's swaying, and we've no idea how big a factor it is in any given situation. Agree those who say 'of course you did/didn't because you did/didn't expect it to' do not understand it.
 
i thought that was what I said.

But what if it doesn’t matter? I concede I have expectation bias before listening to a new component or speaker system, but that lasts as long as the first listen. If I don’t like what I am hearing, whatever expectation bias I may have had, just disappears. Sure, I can pat myself on the back if my experience matches my expectations, but I’m sure not gonna buy anything if I don’t like what I hear.

My read is that you're saying that expectation only last as long as the first listen, that if you don't like what you're hearing expectation bias disappears which both read to me like you're saying it only applies initially and under certain conditions. The last sentence infers expectation bias is conscious - that we know what the expectation is that is driving the bias, which we do not. My apologies if I've misread it.
 
Given the stakes here, which aren’t high unless somebody is spending beyond their means, I just think it’s one of many things to consider. Like with my Klipsch audition, there’s only so much you can do sometimes. I have no desire to bring laboratory-level care to my hobby, so I’m aware of it and actively think about it. Certainly more than I used to. But I still just really want to sit down, listen, and use my experience to make a judgment call. We’re all different and need different things to feel comfortable in a decision.
 
Given the stakes here, which aren’t high unless somebody is spending beyond their means, I just think it’s one of many things to consider. Like with my Klipsch audition, there’s only so much you can do sometimes. I have no desire to bring laboratory-level care to my hobby, so I’m aware of it and actively think about it. Certainly more than I used to. But I still just really want to sit down, listen, and use my experience to make a judgment call. We’re all different and need different things to feel comfortable in a decision.

You don't like it, you don't like it. There's no need for any justification, data, or evidence. Full stop. Outside of a fringe of people who play "objectivist" on TV, no knowledgable person who understands this stuff would ever take issue with that.
 
On this particular forum, I truly believe one reason we get along so well and don't typically have these kinds of deep arguments is that we are not all dead-set members of specific tribes, once and forever only in either that "first or second group" you alluded to. Those groups are not mutually exclusive, there is definitely also a third group that we seem to have a healthy number of members here belonging to. My post above that ended in "thats why they make chocolate, vanilla, and strawberry" was an attempt to illustrate that not everything needs to be so binary, and regarding the topic of this entire thread, no I don't think the hobby is splitting, not any worse than it ever was and it's probably better than it used to be.

The old analog vs. digital, or tubes vs. solid-state wars have largely ended in an armistice, surely evidence there is a middle ground to be had. The same needs to happen with regard to the objective vs. subjective debate, there is ample room for both approaches, but that requires things aren't always considered in a hard core binary fashion. Those in the third group have managed to embrace both approaches to this hobby, and have flatly rejected the idea that they wish to belong to only one tribe, follow only one mantra, or spew dogma at the expense of other's enjoyment of this hobby.

It seems to me that belonging to that third group, or simultaneously residing in both the first and second groups, and able to embrace both and reject neither, allows our members here to more easily adhere to HiFi Haven Rules #1 and 2.

As I said above in response to @JohnVF, I've never seen any technically knowledgable evidentiary-oriented person (objectivist/subjectivist are BS labels, so I try not to use them) ever take issue with someone's preference. That said I don't know what a 'dead-set tribe member' looks like.

I can't see that making the equation ternary is any better than binary, especially when the juxtaposition is charged with such resentment.
 
I was just pondering the title of the thread - is our hobby splitting? I think it has always been split, first into those for whom it is a "hobby" and those for whom it is just tools for entertainment. Then in the 60s we increasingly saw a division into good quality "higher end" and "consumer", then into SS vs tubes. It seems to be that the closest we've ever come to a sort of "continuum" from entry level to expensive was a period in the 70s when SS pretty much ruled the roost, turntables and RTR were the sources of choice. Go into an average decent stereo shop and you could find everything from entry-level to high end, often within any one line. In the 80s tubes started to make a comeback, variety of sources multiplied and things started to get more tribal. The hobby has been split for ages. If anything things are perhaps getting a bit more coherent, at least in rational circles. IMHO
 
I've never seen any technically knowledgable evidentiary-oriented person (objectivist/subjectivist are BS labels, so I try not to use them) ever take issue with someone's preference.
I think you're right about those labels sucking, and if we do away with those labels we can also do away with the "groups" themselves. I wouldn't actually know for sure if many of the worst attack dogs who claim to be pure objectivists are truly technically knowledgable, it would seem they are, but I don't know them well enough to really know for sure just how technically competent they might be, and I'm not really the right person to make that assessment anyway.

I can't see that making the equation ternary is any better than binary, especially when the juxtaposition is charged with such resentment.
Ternary is better than binary when that 3rd group consists of folks who can allow for either a subjective or objective assessment of something, and not feel the need to immediately question, mock, or attack either one. I'm talking about in the context of a hobby, where we're supposed to be having fun. Rigorous controlled listening tests as proof or it didn't happen aren't fun.

I don't think resentment is really the right word JP, as that suggests a certain personal bitterness or scorn as a result of having been treated unfairly. Further, much of what I did describe is now very much in the rear view mirror as it doesn't really happen here at HFH at all, but it did happen with incredible regularity on two other audio forums I've belonged to. Both had to ban a bunch of members, and create special sub forums with rules such as the following:

If what you want to post includes words/phrases like "placebo," "expectation bias," "ABX," "blind testing," etc., please post it in the Sound Science forum.

All other sub forums then prohibit that line of talk, because most members there had grown extremely tired of the same old demands ad nauseam for proof by measurements and DBT or it didn't happen. Not fun.

I'm very glad we don't have that same problem here, as the creation of those kinds of rules did then turn off many other members to the extent they either lashed out and earned a banning, or they simply quit that forum entirely and walked away, never to be heard from there again.
 
My original post, right at the start, deals with the mistake you are IMHO making.
A mistake? It was a casual off the cuff audition. Which is the part of this hobby I actually enjoy. It’s a hobby. What do you really think would have changed he outcome? The speakers had an obvious cupped hands coloration in the shouty. midrange. Subjective terms for a knowingly subjective audition that told me more in a minute than in days of reading about something. I know you don’t think it told me anything … but I’m confident in having learned what I needed to learn, and how I learned it.

Why on earth would I want to bring laboratory levels of bias controls into something I do for fun? The consequences aren’t dire.
 
I was just pondering the title of the thread - is our hobby splitting? I think it has always been split, first into those for whom it is a "hobby" and those for whom it is just tools for entertainment. Then in the 60s we increasingly saw a division into good quality "higher end" and "consumer", then into SS vs tubes. It seems to be that the closest we've ever come to a sort of "continuum" from entry level to expensive was a period in the 70s when SS pretty much ruled the roost, turntables and RTR were the sources of choice. Go into an average decent stereo shop and you could find everything from entry-level to high end, often within any one line. In the 80s tubes started to make a comeback, variety of sources multiplied and things started to get more tribal. The hobby has been split for ages. If anything things are perhaps getting a bit more coherent, at least in rational circles. IMHO
In regards to the subjective/objective divide, it’s not the hobby splitting. It’s different ways that people are wired. Allowing a subjective outcome really offends some brains just as other brains can’t understand the need for it at all. Most people are in the middle somewhere but this hobby appeals to aspects that excite those different brains.
 
A mistake? It was a casual off the cuff audition. Which is the part of this hobby I actually enjoy. It’s a hobby. What do you really think would have changed he outcome?

Are you asking me to say the same thing a third time? Why?

The speakers had an obvious cupped hands coloration in the shouty. midrange. Subjective terms for a knowingly subjective audition that told me more in a minute than in days of reading about something. I know you don’t think it told me anything … but I’m confident in having learned what I needed to learn, and how I learned it.

Sure. “Obvious”. We have covered that. The way the mind works, the apparent sonic attributes that are not in the sound waves will be just as ‘obviously real’ as those that are.

Why on earth would I want to bring laboratory levels of bias controls into something I do for fun? The consequences aren’t dire.

You wouldn’t. Hey, I don’t do it. If you think that is my message, you misunderstood.

What I am suggesting that you don’t want to do, however, is come on here and describe your listening impressions as if you are certain that you are describing sound waves. The way we conduct our hobby auditions, that’s not a valid conclusion.

Also, just being a hobby doesn’t mean there is no interest in the truth. Stamp collectors want to know whether an apparently-rare stamp is real or counterfeit. They wouldn’t be satisfied with the fact that a cursory examination leaves them sure that it ‘looks like’ the real thing. Similarly, are we happy with counterfeit sound? That would make us uniquely sloppy, even among hobbyists.
 

Are you asking me to say the same thing a third time? Why?



Sure. “Obvious”. We have covered that. The way the mind works, the apparent sonic attributes that are not in the sound waves will be just as ‘obviously real’ as those that are.



You wouldn’t. Hey, I don’t do it. If you think that is my message, you misunderstood.

What I am suggesting that you don’t want to do, however, is come on here and describe your listening impressions as if you are certain that you are describing sound waves. The way we conduct our hobby auditions, that’s not a valid conclusion.

Also, just being a hobby doesn’t mean there is no interest in the truth. Stamp collectors want to know whether an apparently-rare stamp is real or counterfeit. They wouldn’t be satisfied with the fact that a cursory examination leaves them sure that it ‘looks like’ the real thing. Similarly, are we happy with counterfeit sound? That would make us uniquely sloppy, even among hobbyists.
You don't seem to be getting it that I fully understand the affects of confirmation and other biases on my observations, and yet I'm perfectly happy to forgo such rigor in my hobby.

I'm not certain of my observations, but this is a casual setting. Nobody here thinks I undertook some lab-level exploration of the Heresy IV, especially as I was clear that I gave them one-song's chance. Their faults were obvious to me, in an informal manner. It's entirely possible that in another context, another mood, another place, they'd be more to my liking but I doubt that the faults I heard would entirely be absent. I didn't go into the positive traits- I loved their dynamics, their fullness at low volume, and the way they did manage to throw a soundstage even if it hovered near the floor. All subjective notes, of course- but many of us are here for the ENTERTAINMENT of reading somebody's casual observations. And that's all they are, and everybody knows that's all they are.

If large numbers of people are out there auditioning speakers in a more controlled manner, where are they? I see a lot of charges telling people to add such rigor to their exploration, but I see approximately zero instances of anybody doing it and reporting back.

*Except for my friend who visited the Harman Group, where they have a sophisticated blind audition setup for visitors. He was also the gentleman who set up the Heresy IV with me.
 
One more thing on the Heresy thing.

I was encouraged to take them home and try them in a familiar environment. I do think that would have been a more useful exercise in determining things. Not because it would have removed confirmation bias, but because it would have removed many of the other variables in the demonstration. Unfamiliar amp, the obviously worn/misaligned cartridge, the decrease 'at ease' of being outside the home and me being in a hurry as I was late for an event. So, while sighted, I'd have had direct back to back comparison with what I was familiar with. Obviously more useful, but again, I know it wouldn't have been any sort of final say.

My audition was actually to audition them to see if I wanted to borrow them, not buy. And I didn't want to borrow them after the audition. If this had been my old buddy's store in the basement of the apartment tower I used to live in, I'd have loved to have taken them on the elevator ride that so many other bits of stereo kit took. Laziness, a ho-hum audition, and not owning a wagon anymore intervened.
 
Are you asking me to say the same thing a third time? Why?



Sure. “Obvious”. We have covered that. The way the mind works, the apparent sonic attributes that are not in the sound waves will be just as ‘obviously real’ as those that are.



You wouldn’t. Hey, I don’t do it. If you think that is my message, you misunderstood.

What I am suggesting that you don’t want to do, however, is come on here and describe your listening impressions as if you are certain that you are describing sound waves. The way we conduct our hobby auditions, that’s not a valid conclusion.

Also, just being a hobby doesn’t mean there is no interest in the truth. Stamp collectors want to know whether an apparently-rare stamp is real or counterfeit. They wouldn’t be satisfied with the fact that a cursory examination leaves them sure that it ‘looks like’ the real thing. Similarly, are we happy with counterfeit sound? That would make us uniquely sloppy, even among hobbyists.
What truth should we be interested in?
 
In regards to the subjective/objective divide, it’s not the hobby splitting. It’s different ways that people are wired. Allowing a subjective outcome really offends some brains just as other brains can’t understand the need for it at all. Most people are in the middle somewhere but this hobby appeals to aspects that excite those different brains.

This seems to be more a sky/earth perspective. Subjective outcomes are a foundation of perceptual science; what we're really talking about is ears-only listening or not. My suspicion is that we're simply talking past each other here.

I think what trips a lot of people up, it did me, is to read proclamations of wanting to achieve a specific sonic goal and exit the equipment merry-go-round, yet not take steps that can actually help achieve that goal, and more so flat-out reject the very notion. There are several idioms that square it up rather nicely, which is how I view it today.

As an aside, the Hoffman forum are big on filling out an equipment profile. I've often thought an 'audio goals' section would be far more useful.


If large numbers of people are out there auditioning speakers in a more controlled manner, where are they? I see a lot of charges telling people to add such rigor to their exploration, but I see approximately zero instances of anybody doing it and reporting back.

:)
 
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