[nostatic]

Originally Posted by jim1960

Earlier in this thread I described what that experiment would entail. It would not only be difficult to do, it would be expensive to do. The latter part is the most likely reason we're having this debate. I'm sure reaching definitive answers for questions like these would be wonderful to have, but we are where we are for now.

"scientific experiments" applied to musical instruments are largely a fool's errand. At the end of the day, a human plays an instrument, and the human is not able to remove their internal biases from the process. So it they believe something to be true, it likely will be reified.

Some builders have a lot of empirical knowledge acquired over time. Because of the nature of the beast - particularly dealing with wood which always has variability between pieces and over time - good builders notice what tends to work and what doesn't, and iterates from there. I know builders who tone-tap, even solid body instruments. I know other builders that claim it is snake oil. Can you do a "scientific experiment" to prove one way or another? Maybe (still a lot of variables to control for), but we're back to the final process which is a human plays the instrument and their biases will influence the outcome.

Do we ignore science for musical instruments. No. But I certainly thinks slavishly invoking "science" in these conversations is usually just forum noise. The sound that comes from an acoustic guitar is governed by a lot of factors. Really the only question is how much each bit contributes to the overall outcome. And since it remains more archer than arrow, at the end of the day what works for one may not for another - no matter what the "science" says.