In article , Don Pearce
wrote:
[big snip]

Ah - the light dawns! OK, this test is not for the measurable
differences which are known and accepted. It is for the extraordinary
claims made for boutique cables that have nothing to do with this -
stuff like rhythm, air, sparkle etc.

I'm not certain I have understood Andy's intent correctly. However I think
what he is suggesting is a way to test the degree to which the test
subject's decisions would be affected by 'being told what cable is in use'.

The point being that what they are told may be false. e.g they may
told/shown "we are now using cable A', but in reality cable B is now being
used.

The results from such a proceedure are then compared from another, using
the same cables, but where they are given no such 'external' info.

If the test subject *is* being affected by this 'external' (i.e. nothing to
do with the sound) info, it would then show in a 'bias' on the "being told"
tests that changed their results from the "not being told" ones....

The difficulty with this process is that it can only be expected to be
useful if the test subject has not been warned that when they are "told",
*what* they are "told" may be deliberately incorrect at times. As soon as
they are aware of this possibility the effort may become futile. This means
that a snag is that discussing this now may 'blow the gaff'. :-)

Also, they may come to suspect this whilst being tested, so cease to rely
on what is said, and this might also cause any actual 'bias' to vanish. So
such an approach would be quite difficult to validate.

Slainte,

Jim

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