Response to this subject has been adequate and I was not going to participate. I have also not read the middle part of the (repetitious) debate, so I apologise if my small contribution has been touched on by others - only if so, it would appear to have been in vain..... Nevertheless, one finds that yet again, some are fighting about matters not in question/matters that has been adequately proven. So...
Nobody is accusing anybody of lying or being of inferior hearing. Quite acceptable that what you perceive to have been audible, was in fact a genuine perception. The phrase "I believe this/that" is accurate. But that does not make it dogma. For there are as many others with different experiences, and who is to denigrate them? It is interesting, if not tragic, that those who are adamant that their ears are infallible and should not be criticised, are the first to criticise the hearing of others.
Those very "informed" members should be reminded that their homework is incomplete. The fact that the hearing of the most acute ears can be "bluffed" has been researched very well by many centres, notably some Scandanavian universities. (The research of the hearing mechanism takes place least of all to satisfy hi-fi enthusiasts; hearing and deterioration/lack of the same is a very important acoustical programme on which millions have been spent over decades in aid of the hearing impaired.)
It is in this sense that we are quite past guess-work and "belief", as proper homework on the subject would show. Most of the claims I read here on non-audibility of cables are substantiated by properly controlled blind tests. And please folks, with respect to the simplifiers/short-cutters of this matter; a proper test is not listening to A and then to B and deciding B was better. Not even after several consecutive tests! The matter of statistically proving a case connected with any of our senses (and hearing is simply just that) is time-consuming and needs to conform to certain procedures - this is a whole subject on its own.
The simplest "consumer" kind of test that has been conducted often, is to have folks listen to their satisfaction to whatever is in question, knowing what they are listening to. This is then repeated "blind", i.e. without the subject(s) knowing what they are listening to, and so often with the result that the ability to discriminate has miraculously disappeared.
The solution is that we should stop becoming personal everytime this subject comes up. In fact, it has little to do with hearing acuity; it is prevalent among a wide variety of normal people.
Finally, please do not become upset when EEs show irritation at folks desiring that they should accept the impossible. 4+7 cannot be =17; water doesn't flow uphill, just because someone is convinced that he/she has experienced it. Scientists do not know everything, but they know certain things. And pious claims that "there are wonderful things about the ear that is not known yet" is quite true - but very little of that will have to do with audio signal reproduction.
