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analog vs. solid state/digital
| Message Board > Music Chitchat - General ( Indie, Jazz, World, Electronic etc.) > analog vs. solid state/digital |
| Musicman User Info... | lets shed some new light on the subject ........ "the question of whether the ultimate nature of reality is analog or digital," and point out that "as we delve deeper and deeper into both natural and artificial processes, we find the nature of the process often alternates between analog and digital representations of information." As an illustration, I noted how the phenomenon of sound flips back and forth between digital and analog representations. In our brains, music is represented as the digital firing of neurons in the cochlear representing different frequency bands. In the air and in the wires leading to loudspeakers, it is an analog phenomenon. The representation of sound on a music compact disk is digital, which is interpreted by digital circuits. But the digital circuits consist of thresholded transistors, which are analog amplifiers. As amplifiers, the transistors manipulate individual electrons, which can be counted and are, therefore, digital, but at a deeper level are subject to analog quantum field equations. At a yet deeper level, Fredkin, and now Wolfram, are theorizing a digital (i.e., computational) basis to these continuous equations. It should be further noted that if someone actually does succeed in establishing such a digital theory of physics, we would then be tempted to examine what sorts of deeper mechanisms are actually implementing the computations and links of the cellular automata. Perhaps, underlying the cellular automata that run the Universe are yet more basic analog phenomena, which, like transistors, are subject to thresholds that enable them to perform digital transactions. so ....... why do we all think analog is so superior if our brains put the signal through a digital filter anyways? - Sat, 12 Apr 2008 9:00am | ||
| DTjackson User Info... | Consider my mind blown - Sat, 12 Apr 2008 9:40am | ||
| Hearse User Info... | If you're interested in this kind of thing, you might want to check out theories around the granularity of time itself, which may suggest that everything is necessarily 'digital', to use that analogy. - Sat, 12 Apr 2008 10:00am | ||
| Tyler User Info... | it depends on what you're talking about. the "imperfections" of analog technology, such as tube amplifiers, tape, and vinyl, are what gives it a lot of the character that people like. I don't think the digital approximations of these characteristics are ever completely accurate. tube amps provide distortion in a different way, the increase and decrease in gain acts different. even comparing a real spring reverb to a digital model of a spring reverb demonstrates this. if you smack a real one, it'll make a loud crash. if you smack a digital reverb, nothing. that little natural difference is reason enough to make an argument. mp3s, as a digital format, create more indesirable imperfections - using the masking effect in compressing an audio signal and generally limiting the span of frequency and possible dynamic range. even CD-quality wav files only have a maximum frequency representation of 22,050 Hz - SOME humans are able to hear beyond this. whereas analog recordings, even past the whole argument for an unlimited sampling rate, impart the "warmth" or natural equalization and physical imperfections of the medium onto the recording. I guess my point is that, although we may "hear" digital, that doesn't necessarily relate to the arguments for solid state vs tube, or cds vs records. because as long as we're able to hear the difference between our technologies, we can still subjectively rank them. - Sat, 12 Apr 2008 11:49am | ||
| Musicman User Info... | yes i agree! the imperfections are more delicious in analog ... take the analog synths where completely random things happen!! i think my argument was more that "if you like it you like it" - not that they are the same, but that analog isn't necessarily more "real" than digital. the audiophiles get their backs up about digital music being "canned", but on a philosophical level i don't know if i agree. i have flip-flopped on this issue for a while and was curious what people had to say. .... and the granularity of time yes.... i like smolin's LQG i must admit. smolin is a convincing character! - Sat, 12 Apr 2008 11:56am Edited: Sat, 12 Apr 2008 12:03pm | ||
| Kivarenn82 User Info... | if a tree falls in the woods, and no one hears it.. is it analog? - Sun, 13 Apr 2008 4:29am | ||
| Hearse User Info... | All media create distortions of real sound. The preference towards 'analogue' methods is simply a preference of a certain type of distortion. For example, the preference of tape or tube represents the preference for soft-limiting of overdrive versus the hard limiting of CD or transistor. The truly hardcore listen only to live acoustic performance. I suggest that represents a relatively small group of LiveVictoria users. - Sun, 13 Apr 2008 2:00pm Edited: Sun, 13 Apr 2008 2:01pm | ||
| Tyler User Info... | but even live acoustic performances impart the differences in performance space on the listener. the natural equalization and absorbency / resonance of materials makes every listening location slightly different. do you listen to your live performances in anechoic chambers? I realize this isn't really related to your point but it's just something else to think about in this thread. - Mon, 14 Apr 2008 3:19am | ||
| Musicman User Info... | yes interesting ... it was for related reasons that glenn gould stopped live performance - he believed true connection with the artist happened through recording ..... - Mon, 14 Apr 2008 12:54pm Edited: Mon, 14 Apr 2008 12:55pm | ||
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