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Sheesh!

Posted by unclestu on April 21, 2010 at 13:43:22:
I do not consider myself to be a scientist, but these were the following factors we checked in our testing on the orientation of fuses. Bear in mind, we initially experimented using a preamp as the system owner had mono block amps increasing the time necessary for the testing.
1. Determine if the removal of the unit's cover affected the sound. It did: removal of the aluminum cover definitely increased the upper frequency content, easily checked by simply replacing the cover without even securing the lid with the screws. Capacitance from the metal cover with the parallel circuit board is the speculation. Later fabricating a plexiglass cover gave the same benefits and dust control.
2. Simple removal of the existing fuse and replacement in the same orientation to check if the act of removal was in some way "cleaning" the fuse holder contacts. No differences were heard.
3. Listening for audible change when the existing fuse was reoriented ( majority heard a change).
4. Checking out a fuse from a new unused box. This happened to be a different brand of fuses, BTW. Differences were heard by the majority, and the orientation was carefully noted. This involved several changes in orientation and the listeners could not see which orientation was involved.
5. Auditioning was further carried forward with a second fuse from the same new box. Differences were noted and the preferred orientation was confirmed to be the same as the first new fuse inserted.
6. Testing then moved to the amplifiers. A quick initial check revealed one fuse to be oriented one way in one amp and reversed in the other. The fuses used were the same brand we had purchased for testing in the preamp. Armed with the knowledge gained from testing the preamp, we reversed the fuse which was not in our preferred orientation. Center focus increased immediately, imaging improved, and soundstaging took on solidity which the system owner, who initially did NOT hear any differences in fuse orientation, commented upon immediately.
7. new fuses were inserted in the amps and the same conclusion was reached as with the preamp again through various swapping of the fuse orientation.
8. I should point out we also ran the preamp fuses for 30 minutes in different orientations after initial testing to determine if break in was not a factor. Maybe half an hour is not enough, though. Since we had a box of five fuses we also started the testing with the fuses in different orientations to make sure that the initial power on did not somehow "condition" the fuse.
But then you are right: The listener's brain ultimately creates all sound perceived. It also is responsible for not recognizing sounds, also. Oliver Sachs has written several books commenting and making observations of the brain ear interface (Musicophilia is one book I highly recommend).
In taking the position that the brain is responsible for misinformation, ie., that any sonic differences are psychosomatic, if you prefer, then by those terms, measurements are totally useless and irrelevant, because every listener's brain would be slightly different. It wouldn't matter that distortion is measured over 10 percent, as some brains may not recognize it.
The value of a Stradivarius should drop to the level of a Chinese made student violin, because I very seriously doubt if even 1 per cent of the average population can hear the difference using a DBT. Reports of humans with perfect pitch must necessarily be a lie and a hoax by your definition unless each person individually claiming such abilities are rigorously and completely "scientifically" tested, as any such claim must be discounted.
There is no doubt that the brain can be fooled. We see it in optical illusions all the time. At the same time, we know of such conditions as colorblindness and it has been determined that the colors involved can vary from a red green blindness to a state where the viewer only sees black and white ( again read Sach's book he Island of the Colorblind). If you are colorblind, and roughly 10 percent of the male population suffers from it, you can rightly make the claim that color perception is purely a state of mind ( which it really is), and that the colors you can not perceive do not truly exist( which it truly does for yourself).

Be careful of world you create. Imposition of your individual perception may work for yourself, but necessarily for others.
It has been my experience that hearing, in particular, requires years, if not decades of training (I'm an old man). Taking music courses in high School and college convinced me of that. Aural training was one of the most difficult classes I ever took, but there were students in the class with near perfect pitch who breezed through the curriculum. My dreams of being a music major was dashed by my poor performance in that class. What is fascinating, though, is that I had practiced listening even though I had switched majors and in the course of over a decade or so my hearing acuity increased tremendously, to the point where my high school teacher was impressed that I could hear certain things he had missed in listening sessions (in high school, we had gone to a local audio store to audition speakers, and on one pair, he exclaimed that the G above high C was way too prominent: knowing the techs at that store, they brought a real time analyzer and did a frequency sweep, and sure enough, there was peak at that frequency level).

It is NO sin not to be able to hear certain aspects of music. The sin is the assumption that if you don't hear it, then it is patently false.
Stu