What do we hear when we change the direction of a wire?


Douglas Self wrote a devastating article about audio anomalies back in 1988. With all the necessary knowledge and measuring tools, he did not detect any supposedly audible changes in the electrical signal. Self and his colleagues were sure that they had proved the absence of anomalies in audio, but over the past 30 years, audio anomalies have not disappeared anywhere, at the same time the authority of science in the field of audio has increasingly become questioned. It's hard to believe, but science still cannot clearly answer the question of what electricity is and what sound is! (see article by A.J.Essien).

For your information: to make sure that no potentially audible changes in the electrical signal occur when we apply any "audio magic" to our gear, no super equipment is needed. The smallest step-change in amplitude that can be detected by ear is about 0.3dB for a pure tone. In more realistic situations it is 0.5 to 1.0dB'". This is about a 10% change. (Harris J.D.). At medium volume, the voltage amplitude at the output of the amplifier is approximately 10 volts, which means that the smallest audible difference in sound will be noticeable when the output voltage changes to 1 volt. Such an error is impossible not to notice even using a conventional voltmeter, but Self and his colleagues performed much more accurate measurements, including ones made directly on the music signal using Baxandall subtraction technique - they found no error even at this highest level.

As a result, we are faced with an apparently unsolvable problem: those of us who do not hear the sound of wires, relying on the authority of scientists, claim that audio anomalies are BS. However, people who confidently perceive this component of sound are forced to make another, the only possible conclusion in this situation: the electrical and acoustic signals contain some additional signal(s) that are still unknown to science, and which we perceive with a certain sixth sense.

If there are no electrical changes in the signal, then there are no acoustic changes, respectively, hearing does not participate in the perception of anomalies. What other options can there be?

Regards.
anton_stepichev
Please explain what does "modulation of 60Hz and the audio signal" mean, and how this mysterious action differs from the usual addition of signals (mix), which usually occurs in the signal circuit.



That means 60Hz power, 1000Hz signal you could get 1120, 880, but also any mixed multiple of either.
@dletch2
No, some guy (Essien) who is not an expert on psychoacoustics, neural acoustics, neural processing, etc. stated that he discovered the unsolvable problem, that no one else thought of as unsolvable, and assigned himself as the expert (without peer review). When I read the things he writes, like that paragraph above, it just sounds really silly to me. There are other words that come to mind, and none of them are remotely kind because, what he wrote is silly.

I have to repeat: Essien refers to a lot of authoritative opinions, and you just reduce all their thoughts to zero without doubt. Whose words are silly then?
audition__audio
I dont understand the concern of those like dletch2 for the rest of us deluded souls.
There are two possible explanations. Some are overcome with religious fervor -  they are driven by fundamentalist evangelical  belief, i.e. "blind faith." The others simply come here to argue. Both get what they seek.
Hi, I really enjoy reading the comments in this thread, but as noob here I felt intimidated to answer. I was thinking of this story about wine, when suddenly people started posting about wine and Riedel glasses, so I felt empowered :)
While reading this thread, something seemed off in my system, as I've been playing around, experimenting, as a noob audiophile would do. Then I checked my interconnects, Van Den Hul 102something, and they were plugged in the other way around. There's a sticker where the earth is, that should go to the source, yes, a grounded reason :)
Felt better after reversing.

My good friend and I had a favorite wine bar downtown Budapest, and we went there quite often, tasted almost everything on the menu bar the most expensive ones. They served by the glass, exclusively in matched Riedel glasses. One day I got a French wine, way above our usual budget, we drank it at home (from my friend's Riedel glasses) then went down to our favorite bar and ordered our favorite wine. It tasted way worse than we remembered. The first time I tasted wine I wanted to spit it out it tasted so bad. It's an acquired taste that gets more refined the more you taste. Unfortunately, once you taste good wine it's difficult to drink lesser ones, though possible, they don't give you the same satisfaction. I think something similar is happening when listening to music. As I kept replacing components, putting on acoustic panels, I kept hearing more and more details, but also more and more flaws. I believe the more accustomed you get to a certain level the more you realize what's wrong or what's missing, with other words, the more transparent the system and the more used your brain is to a certain quality, detail level, the easier is to spot problems. When I first installed my 4k total worth of gear I was amazed at how splendid the sound was. After a few weeks, it started to sound wrong. I started to notice the room reacting, the standing waves, the whole cacophony. One by one I replaced everything with stuff costing 5x or 10x, and I noticed the difference. I even went back to changing components to make sure I wasn't a total tool.

When we go to sleep our ears and still hear the noises around us but our brain has a clever filter/firewall that enables us to sleep. It blocks the familiar noises so we can relax. However, if there's a siren blowing we will wake up, as we know that's the sign of danger. Sirens have been around for a few hundred years or less. Evolution taught our brain what's relevant and what not. We moved to a new apartment, near train tracks, first few days/weeks were a bit unusual but we got used to it, now we can sleep through the night, though the trains are still going on time.

I can easily imagine that originally our ears (and maybe bodies) are capable of picking up a much wider frequency spectrum than the current science considers de facto, but due to our planet getting noisier our brains just filter things out in the conscious domain (as proven by scientists). It could be that our brains go into a different state (alpha or theta) while listening to music, it widens the acceptance of frequencies which enables our brain to sense or perceive something different. And that could be the point where traditional science fails to answer, especially if it starts with the well-known and accepted theorem that humans' audible spectrum is 20hz to 20khz.

In my opinion, doing double or triple-blind tests with something that's an acquired taste won't provide scientifically sound results. I think if we really wanted to have a successful test we would need a huge group of people participating in a 3-month boot camp, listening to the same systems and songs until they start harboring suicidal thoughts, and maybe after that it could prove something, though probably just barely and it would raise more questions than it answers.

Going deeper in psychology, who we are is based on our DNA, our experiences in life starting from being in the womb, growing up, becoming aware, spending time learning things that interest us, and deciding we don't want to change anymore, what we know is a fact and we're fine with that. Or maybe we do and then we question everything, starting from the very first experiences to the directions of cables.
@OPLet me remind you of the question that you moved out of: If some objective interference enters the signal circuit and can be detected by ear, it should be easily measured. But we know that such interference cannot be measured in any serviceable amp. How can this be explained?
@dletch2
You keep insisting there is a demonstrably audible difference that cannot be detected by instruments. This simply is not true. Neither that the differences have been demonstrated in anything other than ad-hoc fashion (i.e. at least blind), nor that in that same situation no one could measure a difference.

@dletch2, You are engaged in demagoguery and do not help to understand the topic at all. Very sorry. But I’m still waiting for the answer to the question if you want to continue the discussion.