Randi Calls BS on Audiophiles

James Randi, eponymous skeptic of the James Randi Educational Foundation, has called out the obsessive audiophiles of the world and offered a $1M to anyone who can prove in a scientifically valid double-blind study that the exorbitantly priced $7,250 Pear Anjou speaker cables actually sound any better than their already over-priced Monster Cable alternatives.

We at the JREF are willing to be shown that these “no-compromise” cables perform better than, say, the equivalent Monster cables. While Pear rattles on about “capacitance,” “inductance,” “skin effect,” “mechanical integrity” and “radio frequency interface,” – all real qualities and concerns, and adored by the hi-fi nut-cases – we naively believe that a product should be judged by its actual performance, not by qualities that can only be perceived by attentive dogs or by hi-tech instrumentation.

I’d be willing to bet an additional $1M that no one can come up with the proof. [via]