I think you have a different sort of 'taste' in mind than busterarm does.

It is a very reasonable thing to prefer record over CD. They have different sounds, people have different likes, easy, done.

But if someone tells you they prefer the look of HDMI when you use gold-plated wires, they're clearly deceiving themselves, because as a digital signal there is no difference whatsoever.

So the important question to ask is whether people can hear the difference. I will accept that some people have better/different ears from others, but the best way to demonstrate that ability is a double-blind test.

Your standard is what 'sounds right'. Well, if you can reliably tell me that X technology sounds better than Y technology, without labels on the two sets of headphones in front of you, then great, that's all I wanted. I don't need any kind of research showing that a format is objectively 'better'. I just want someone to show that it's objectively different to human ears.

If someone says they have a preference, but doesn't actually prefer either one in a blinded test, then the labels 'wacko' and 'religious' fit.

Right. I'm trying to refer to the self-deception that people have when it comes to audio gear. A really common example is how many musicians and audiophiles end up buying power filters and claim they make the sound better. Often these people don't need the power filters and you can prove with documentation and test equipment that they a) don't need them and b) aren't doing anything to the sound. Are you playing out live in random clubs? Sure get a power filter (but that's not as important as a surge protector). Are you playing at home with modern wiring and not overloading your circuit? Don't waste your fucking money.

So many musicians end up developing biases about what certain equipment is supposed to sound like. There are a few videos floating around comparing guitar amp/cab modeling gear to the real thing. A lot friends of mine have trouble picking them apart or getting them right in a blind listening test. Frequently the model has some tweaks that make it sound better... or a better description would be to say that it sounds more like what the musician expects that gear to sound like. Some amp X was used on such and such album and has Y sound and the model sounds like that amp does on the album.

I'm frequently right in these blind tests and I end up telling people is that it's because I don't care about the gear and don't have any preconceived notions about what it should sound like. I just listen to the timbre and make my best guess.

What's wrong wrong with it is simple: The question "Is PCM transparent?" is not subject to taste. It either is or it isn't. If listeners can't tell the difference between a source that is being reproduced from PCM or one that is being reproduced from DSD, then we can objectively state that PCM does not degrade sound quality.

You and I can disagree about whether impressionism is a "good" style of painting. The art world spent a good deal of energy debating that point. That is something which is subject to taste. But if you say "yes" and I say "no" to the question of whether van Gogh created his impressionist painting on canvas, then only one of us can be right. In this case, my insistence that van Gogh didn't paint on canvas would put me squarely in the loony or wacko category.

Because Monster Cables use those emotions to rip people off. Unless you really and truly think there's no moral problem with selling cables at a multi-thousand-percent markup based on claims which are trivially disproven, in which case I doubt we'll be able to have a reasonable conversation.