Objectivists are terrified at the prospect of a world that contains unexplained phenomena ... So I would sate that Objectivists fear psychoacoustics because 1. It is poorly understood 2. It relegates their "measurements" to less than 20 percent of the significant events that actually occur in perception ... Now if that isn't a great troll, I don't know what is.
Ayn Rand was a nutcase.
P
Well I agree about the trolling part anyway.
Seriously, others already showed that science-minded folks actually embrace psychoacoustics rather than reject it. I refer to the frailty of hearing perception all the time in my posts, to explain why people believe that magic outlet covers and LP demagnetizers ad nauseum change the sound when clearly they do not.
IMO, the ones who are "terrified" are those who are highly vested in their current view. Whether actual financial investment, or just years of incorrect beliefs when challenged by scientific proof. There's also the "I want to believe" mentality, not unlike the appeal of TV shows like Celebrity Ghost Stories and the X-Files. These people prefer for things to remain unknown, and reject attempts to explain and quantify.
--Ethan
The New Yorker had a fairly extensive article on Rand that I read last year. By all accounts, from childhood she suffered a forceful if semi delusional personality disorder. The Ayn Rand who stated that "reality should never be faked" was, in fact, an invented, fictitious persona.
What passed as her philosophy was cobbled, cribbed, derivative, and largely unoriginal. She clung to words like objectivism, rational, and reason rather like a drowning person grabs at pieces of drift wood hoping the pieces might fashion themselves into a boat, or as talismans that she hoped would infect and justify her world view.
What is most interesting about Ayn Rand is that she managed to generate a mythology from her personality disorder that allowed her to create compelling fiction. It is not unusual for poets and authors of fiction to create mythologies for the purpose of motivating and structuring their works. William Butler Yeats and William Blake would be examples. You could say that Rand's fiction is the fashion statement of her personality disorder.
However, there is a difference between effective, seductive literary devices and viable philosophy.
the sight of arcing is something I can never quite get used to.
I am certain that most of the time you yourself make decisions based on what sounds "right" or "true" without having to double check each and every parameter change with zoomed waveform analysis vs the raw mic feed.
Wow. It just boggles the mind, the sheer magnitude of ignorant, uninformed, opinions based on hearsay (and probably from Nat Branden's camp) that have been expressed here about Ayn Rand.
Meanwhile it remains that Psychoacoustics as a real discipline would help further the reproduction of music in the Home. I personally lament the unfortunate curve taken by a good portion of the High End Audio Industry cottoning to the new fad some have termed Audio Relativism. There is no goal except whatever pleases a given or a group of individual fidelity and realism be damned... Several manufacturers are too pleased to oblige and we now, have more than ever I would think in High End History a vast numbers of gears whose only merit is to be expensive tone controls ... Some cables come to mind but also amps, preamps too
It is curious that some rigid objectivists listen to MP3 and find it acceptable at the higher sampling rates. But they hate Psychoacoustics ...
It's OK, everyone gets a one free troll pass.
My speakers (Soundlab A1 PX) have separate bass, middle and treble controls. Once they are properly setup with the help of an analyzer, "tweaks" such as cables and mains purifiers are much more evident. If your system does not have resolution enough or the tonal balance is severely tilted there are no tweaks that can improve it.Makes me wonder if it wouldn't if preamp manufacturers had just left them in their products. And if they had, would it have quelled the need for tweaks in general.
There's a science to politics? Who knew?
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