Thank you for your reply.
It's all about how one conducts oneself online. Effective communication online is an art. The way one writes, ones choice of words, and the occasional use of a smiley, can be very effective in conveying irony, humor and good will.
People who spend a lot of time on forums need to learn how to comport themselves appropriately.
Agreed. Since I have not heard from Mark I trust that my apologies in the first post of this thread have been accepted.
Also, endlessly dragging on a debate is pointless.
Perhaps. LuLa authors may say something similar in a future article (something that are scientifically unproven and disputed, to be polite).
For example, one can find endless debate about topics like audio and photography (and wine) and a lot of it comes down to personal experience and opinion. There is no point (obviously) in debating opinion.
Some will no doubt claim that opinion is the only thing worth discussing. I do disagree with you, I think that many of the heated debates are due to:
1. Different levels of scientific training/accomplishment
2. Different levels of argumentation and logic skills
3. Different levels of trust in casual human observations
Some people clearly think that what they experience is the one and only indicator of how the world works. Others think that people are notoriously unreliable in self-reporting. One could (and many do) call these "subjectivists" and "objectivists". If you have tracked audiophilia for the last 20-30 years, you will see that there have been a clash of cultures, where basing the hobby, journalism and product development on measurements and blind listening tests have been abandoned by many in favour of sighted listening tests. I think this is sad for both the hobby and the availability and competition of audibly good products. It also means that "audiophilia" today is very isolated from the sciences that could have been used to advance the state of the art.
Me myself having designed audio technology starting with my master thesis, I know how difficult it is to objectively rate your "child", that you have spent a lot of time and energy into. In my view, the designer is as unreliable as the hifi-journalists and owners out there. The only way to get robust answers to the questions "do they sound different", "which sounds better", is imho careful blind-tests. And they are time-consuming and often boring. Oh, and the conclusion on my thesis was that my gadget was slightly lower rated than the reference implementation. Who would have thought....
Mark is a very smart, well educated, and talented individual. He has a Phd in physics, is an accomplished musician, a highly successful venture capitalist (investing in high tech firms), and is a widely exhibited, collected and respected photographer. Do you really want to get in a pissing match with him? I think not, especially when there is no way for either of you to prove anything in an online debate.
I could list up my CV and we could measure which is longest, or we could just dismiss such irrelevant stuff and rely on our arguments,and references. The point is moot as long as Mark have chosen to not participate in this discussion. If he does, he is welcome. If those discussions are considered OT for this site, you (Mark) are welcome to PM me.
Even though I believe that audiophile cables most likely are cases of "the emperors new clothes", I would really love to be proven wrong. I would love even more to prove myself wrong, to publish in a reputable magazine and enjoy the possibilities and funding (not to mention the pure joy) that comes from having rocked science. Sharing the $1mill from the James Randi foundation with Mark would not hurt, either.
-h