Michael, I think I see what you are getting at, but don't think
I agree. There is DBT for audio. You may not agree it is the
best way or with how sensitive it is versus other ways. But
there are double blind tests.

Try this scenario. You sign up to be a subject in the local
university psychology department's student experiments.
You aren't even told what the experiment is testing you
for or anything. You are told to sit in a chair until they
call your name over the intercom. When called to come into
an adjacent room for some testing.

Now you don't have to remember your name or what it sounds
like. Lets say the real experiment is the aural threshold of
hearing your name and responding. They have the 'intercom'
speaker behind a black veil put out different odd low level noises.
And mix in your name at a known level. Maybe even "Michael
we are ready for you". Well if you don't hear it you won't enter
the adjacent room. When you do they could have you come
and sit for brief 'tests' of your ability to discriminate shades of
colored squares at different light levels. Then they send you
back into the room to wait for them to ready other color
arrangements. You are called again. If you hear it you respond.
Do some more tests of color discrimination and wait some more.
So on and so forth a few times.

Well, they could determine whether or not your threshold were
consistent for a few trials. Change to different amplifiers and
try that again to get your threshold to hearing your name. And
see if it differs with different amplifiers.

You would have just participated in a double blind test, assuming
the other people doing the test were also blinded. And it has
nothing to do with memory etc. It does have to do with your
threshold of hearing your name over two differing amplifiers.
And whether there is any difference. The color discriminations
need not be a real test other than to get your attention elsewhere.
You wouldn't even be aware that any listening test was being
done.

Dennis

"Michael Scarpitti" wrote in message
. net...
I'll be brief. I'm a firm believer in DBT for objectively-verifiable
data (such as whether a given drug cures cancer) but given that sound
is fugitive, (and that consequently audio perception is inherently
non-repeatable, subjective, and not quanifiable) DBT is impossible.
Tharefore no debate on whether DBT is useful in audio is warranted.
There cannot be any such thing as DBT in audio.

One can take two samples of lenses and take pictures with them, which
'fixes' their performance on something outside our bodies: the film.
The film or prints made from the film can be studied at leisure and
directly compared without having to 'remember' what the one looked
like.