Soundstaging and Imaging: The Delusion about The Illusion

celander says:

Those expressing confusion about my original post should try placing my post into the context of the link I provided. Yes, it requires one to click a link and read an article. If one has the energy to type a response and click the “post” button, then one would likely have sufficient energy to read the Stereophile article. Soundstaging and imaging are both discussed and differentiated there.

If they're confused, maybe it has something to do with the way you confused the issues in your original post? Because the word you used, "delusion", never appears in the Stereophile article. Instead, its just another rather straightforward classic John Atkinson piece on recording, playback, and loudspeaker technical evaluation:

You have to cut through this philosophical confusion by using a recording not of music, where you don't know the provenance, but of an artificial signal such as the dual-mono pink noise I created for Stereophile's Test CDs. This signal should be perceived as an infinitely narrow point of sound at all frequencies midway between the loudspeakers. If that's how it sounds, then by inspection you know absolutely that the information on all recordings will be produced without spatial distortion. If the pink-noise image isn't narrow or consistent with frequency, then, even before you listen to music, you know that the loudspeaker has problems, regardless of your preferences.

Seems to me you liked the sound of "delusion about the illusion" so much you went and used it even though it has nothing to do with the article. You made it sound like anyone hearing imaging is deluded. Or even worse, that its deluded to think that soundstaging and imaging even matters. 

Maybe next time try a little less clever and a lot more clear?

Its no delusion. Whenever I drop something small on the floor first thing I do is stop and listen for it to stop rolling around. Then I go and look and it is always right where I knew it would be by sound alone. When someone walks up to me out of sight I know they are coming, how close and how fast, by sound alone.

The XLO setup CD has a great track where Doug Sax walks around a room talking and clapping and when your system is really well set up you can clearly hear his voice and clapping coming from exactly where he says he is, including as he walks around to the sides and even when he goes behind you!

There are a lot of delusions the OP may well be suffering from but hearing the realistic portrayal of a sound stage is probably not one of them.

Odds of survival go way down if you can't tell from which direction the sound of the lion comes. Swap out the lion for a guitar, the ears for a microphone. How does that really change anything? Its as real as real can be.