OMG! Here we go again! Dangit Bill, haven't you been paying attention?

Quote:
You simplistically state that if it looks like a duck and it walks like a duck and it quacks like a duck, then you can draw a conclusion. With that limited amount of information you could easily reach the wrong conclusion. To reach the correct conclusion you would need some experience with a real duck and some experience with the item being described as a duck.

Until you have both, you have nothing.

It's easier to make a leap of faith right off the cliff than it is to take some time to gather the facts.

What if your experience with a duck is only with a white duck? If someone says he has a brown duck, is that then still a duck if it doesn't look like your duck? If you have no experience with a brown duck but the person tells you it sounds like a duck, does that make it a duck? How do you know the person with the brown something knows what a duck is? Maybe what that person has is an animal that brays but he's never heard a duck quack so he thinks all animals that bray are actually quacking? Unless you can see the animal and compare that to your duck, how do you know what it really is?

You don't.

Do you call that man a fool because he thinks he has a duck and you don't think so? What if he does have a duck and you could use a duck? His "duck" is brown and you've never seen a brown duck. You've never heard his animal make a sound, he's just told you it quacks.

But you could use a duck.

What do you do? If you dismiss him, you loose. If you accept his offer, you can do what?

You can decide for yourself.

What if you accept his offer but what he has is not a duck? Do you think he's a fool? Do you not buy what he has to sell? What if someone comes along and tells you what he has is a goose? If you don't know what a goose is, do you tell that man he's a fool just because you don't know what a goose is? What if it turns out what the first man has is the goose that lays golden eggs? You could really, really use some golden eggs!

But what you know about are white ducks.

Do you send everyone off calling them all fools because you know what a duck should look like, walk like and quack like?

Or do you talk?

Do you remain open to the possibility you might find some value in what is being offered?

Who is the fool if you are offered a brown goose that lays golden eggs but you will only take a white duck?

No one wishes to be the fool in that story. But there are quite a few people who also only know white ducks and they don't want to know about geese or golden eggs. And they particularly don't want you to know about geese or golden eggs.

But maybe you've seen something that isn't a duck lay something that isn't just an egg. Do you continue to believe them when they say there are no golden eggs and there are only white ducks or do you believe what you've experienced? If they're wrong about the ducks and the eggs, what else might they have wrong?

No one wishes to be the dumb guy. But there are a few who would prefer you were dumb. They would prefer you stayed dumb. They like it when no one is smarter than they is.

It's easier that way.

And here's another....

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There are iron ingredients contained in the printing ink of CD's. e.g. iron oxide is used for red, yellow or brown ink, cobalt is used for blue or green ink and nickel is used for silver ink.

I bet the same applies to the coloring agents used in poster putty. So please Bill, spare us. This IS an audiophile forum!

RG

Have a pop, blow your nose with a tissue and get your head out of the fridge.

I’m sure that no one will read this from a long-dead thread but I thought those two quotes were priceless. Personally, I believe that the cable controversy can’t begin to compare to the lengths people will go to in order to justify demagnetizing CDs. Yes, this is an audio forum and it’s the only tiny, tiny corner of the world where these people can exist. But I must disagree with your ultimate defense of their behavior and your plea to essentially “let them be.” These are not just meek innocents who just want to say a few words about the metallic content of cobalt ink and then retreat into their treehouse like Keebler elves. Can you imagine what these people must be like? They can’t be dumb, not if they know such arcana and are able to preform that level of sophistry. And there’s no way that they contain these traits to Stereophile. No, they spread their evil thinking at cocktail parties across this great nation and pass it on to their unsuspecting children. Can’t you see them, reading “Goodnight Moon” to some defenseless infant and explaining why the lag relativity imposes on the moon would make the story a violation of physics? No, we must take up torches like the townspeople in Frankenstein and hunt these people down wherever we can find them. As we beat them, shouting, “Cobalt ink needs demagnetizing, eh?” we will be striking blows for all good, decent Americans who wish to live their lives free from pedants and know-it-alls everywhere!

Spoken like a true English major. Thanks for the laughs!

Geoff Kait
Machina Dynamica
Not too chicken to change