Gross story, but worth thinking about

[nightflier]

I read an article in Stereophile last month, I think it was from Michael Fremer, where he explained that he had lost most of his hearing in his left ear - a career altering problem, he thought. After going to the doctor, he found out that it was wax build-up and after a "cleaning" he had years of earwax buildup removed. This is a bit gross, I know, but it got me thinking about all those people on this board who say they can't hear the difference between A & B, when someone else can. Could this be the cause?

Hitting closer to home, how likely is it to be a problem for someone in his early 40's, for example. Is this common? I keep my ears clean, but who knows what may have been pushed up there by thousands of q-tips over the years?

[basite]

I had that once,
nothing dangerous or so, but still annoying in our hobby...

mostly happens when you sleep on one of your ears every night

I found out that I had one in my left ear when I was showering, and that the water didn't get out of my ear, and when it did, I still didn't hear good, because the water gets behind the wax, until it dries up.

if you think you have too much wax in your ears, then go see a doctor or so. normally he should be able to remove, by means of doing some warm (warm, not hot) water, in your ears, then the wax should come out...

it really isn't age related or so, and it can is quite common, but easy to avoid...


Keep them spinning,
Bert.

[topspeed]

Well, you can always go to your doctor and get your ears cleaned (something I love to do) or a lot of spa's will have a service where they stick this candle/tube thingie in your ear and literally melt the ear wax out of your ear. Gross but effective.

I have a feeling that of all the things that can lead to loss of hearing, ear wax is fairly low on the totem pole. From blasting car stereos to hunting to your work environment, there are any number of things that damage your hearing. I've been drumming since I was 6, so I'm pretty confident that's done far more damage to my hearing than any ear wax.

[Dusty Chalk]

No, there's more to it than that. There's an awful lot of psychology involved. It is a natural tendency to try to listen "through" the equipment to the music, and non-audiophiles are just better at it than we are.

[JohnMichael]

There are several good OTC ear wax treatments. Used regularly it could keep you from visiting the doctors and losing any precious sounds. I also recommend trimming the ear hair to reduce that obstacle.:idea:

[PeruvianSkies]

Hearing is similar to that of seeing...everyone has various levels in their ability to see and also hear. Some people have 20/20 vision and some have acute hearing. Since everyone is going to hear slightly differently it's hard to make any standards, but the difference is rather minimal across the board, so it's probably safe to say that the majority of people are relatively hearing the same thing, however, you can also train your ears to hear a little bit better through the act of cancellation, which is a mental process that you can develop, which is learning how to pick apart certain things within the stream of sound. This is no different than a person who can understand someone speaking a different langauge, you need to have the ability to tell where certain words begin and others end. If you don't know the language it all seems to run together, no different than with music.

So why do people have debates over what they hear or don't hear? Well, I think more than anything else it's differences in equipment, rather than people. Since we all have different equipment setup in different surroundings and places it's impossible to come to any definitive conclusions on what we are all hearing. Wouldn't it be great to have a huge place where all of us could get together and each setup all of our gear and compare things back and forth for days???

[SlumpBuster]

Hearing is similar to that of seeing...everyone has various levels in their ability to see and also hear. Some people have 20/20 vision and some have acute hearing.

That's one of the reasons I have always discounted the "Golden Ear" ideal. Sure some people have better hearing, just as some have better hearing. But, you never really hear of people arguing over what they see, or at least not to the same degree they argue over what they hear. I just can picture two cinephiles standing in front of an HDTV arguing over the "blacks." You either see the darker black or you don't. But, people will argue to no end about the "blackness" of a turntable or a cable. It just seems to me that if there was creedance to the "golden ear" theory, you would hear similar arguements in other senses.

But, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe wine enthusiast have the "golden tongue" set and have been eternally debating the same.

[Dusty Chalk]

But, you never really hear of people arguing over what they see, or at least not to the same degree they argue over what they hear. You can. The following study was performed -- an unlabeled colour wheel was shown to people, and people were asked to point to the spot on it which most characterized the definitive version of the six primary and secondary colours: red, green, blue, purple, orange, yellow. When the results were added up, 5 of those colours had a normal Gaussian distribution (the bell curve), while one -- green -- had two peaks. So one should often get the argument "that's green"/"no, that's green".

Except that people are pretty smart, and refuse to argue over stupid stuff like that.

[emorphien]

I can feel the wax in one of my ears from time to time. I need to get it cleaned at some point I think.

btw, 20/20 vision isn't necessarily good, some people have 20/10, 20/15 and so on. It's just based on an average calculated decades ago I believe.

A better comparison would be to color discrimination and color vision, where some have normal color vision and very good color discrimination or normal color vision and bad discrimination abilities, some have abnormal color vision and poor discrimination (like me) and so on and so forth (to the few people who are totally color blind). Some people have very good hearing and can hear almost all the way up to 20Khz, and some people are better than others at detecting things being off key, etc.

[audio_dude]

another thing, I have the unfortunate problem of my Eustachian Tubes in my left or right ears plugging up and going almost temporarily deaf in that ear for a couple weeks, it usually happens at least once a year (AND VERY ANNOYING!) cause it pretty much stops me from enjoying all music and such... actually, the tube in my right ear was just plugged a couple days ago, but, i decided to do some research on the net, and it turns out that pinching your nose and blowing, for like 5 seconds, over and over again clears it!

oh well, at least i'll no longer have to suffer it... although my brother did have to have surgery to unblock his after like 9 months, too bad he didn't know!

well, theres my little rant, and the Eustachian Tubes being clogged, damn, its annoying... anyone else had this problem?

[nightflier]

But, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe wine enthusiast have the "golden tongue" set and have been eternally debating the same.

Well now we're talking about something I do know a thing or two about. Wine tasting is something that can be learned to a great extent. For example you can teach yourself to differentiate the different smells (vanilla, chocolate, raspberry, etc.) through exercise and repetition. Since our taste buds are fairly unsophisticated (they can differentiate only four different tastes), what we taste, is actually mostly what we smell in the food since our sense of smell is so much more capable. When we eat & drink, most of what we recognize is actually from of our sense of smell both before the item enters our mouths and afterwards, when the smell makes its way to our nose through the throat. So my point is that tasting is something that with patience, anyone can learn to some degree that is well above those who don't take the time to do this.

Someone also mentioned art. Again you can learn to recognize patterns, lines, symbols, and colors in an art piece as it relates to other art pieces. By looking at enough art, these patterns become apparent, even when studying modern, completely abstract art. Of course, as with taste, it takes time and patience.

So if we extrapolate that to sound, one should be able to, after repeated listening sessions, hear differences in extension, pitch, depth, and clarity between different pieces of equipment and different recordings. It's all a matter of taking the time to listen to music and over time to learn to recognize the patterns.

Getting back to my original post, I was just wondering how common ear wax obstruction was and how much it does affect our ability to hear the details of what we listen to.

[Dusty Chalk]

Alright, this whole thread is TMI, so I might as well post my experiences:

I am pretty avid about cleaning my ears. I go in. I only recently learned that you're not supposed to*, so I stopped. I also very recently tried the Murine over-the-counter stuff (pour in some special liquid that liquifies the earwax, then rinse with warm water). I've heard stories of other people doing this and getting great googobs of stuff coming out of their ears. I got hardly anything. Which means that basically, my ears are pretty clean (despite sinus problems). I must already do a pretty good job of cleaning them. I do make sure I don't push anything in, but rather pull stuff out. So now, I only do it when my ears itch.

*for two reasons: (1) you could damage something; (2) you could push in and impact the wax, which would be the exact opposite of the desired effect.

[grooves]

Woah! It wasn't me with the ear wax story! I hear equally poorly from both ears without any wax! Ask my detractors....

-Mikey

[grooves]

That's one of the reasons I have always discounted the "Golden Ear" ideal. Sure some people have better hearing, just as some have better hearing. But, you never really hear of people arguing over what they see, or at least not to the same degree they argue over what they hear. I just can picture two cinephiles standing in front of an HDTV arguing over the "blacks." You either see the darker black or you don't. But, people will argue to no end about the "blackness" of a turntable or a cable. It just seems to me that if there was creedance to the "golden ear" theory, you would hear similar arguements in other senses.

But, maybe I'm wrong. Maybe wine enthusiast have the "golden tongue" set and have been eternally debating the same.

I agree! I don't believe in "Golden Ears." MOST people can hear differences in audio gear and know what's good and what sucks. The only differences are really in terms of experience and being able to hear differences and explain why and what. I've proven that repeatedly with total non-audiophiles...

Fremer, Stereophile

[basite]

another thing, I have the unfortunate problem of my Eustachian Tubes in my left or right ears plugging up and going almost temporarily deaf in that ear for a couple weeks, it usually happens at least once a year (AND VERY ANNOYING!) cause it pretty much stops me from enjoying all music and such... actually, the tube in my right ear was just plugged a couple days ago, but, i decided to do some research on the net, and it turns out that pinching your nose and blowing, for like 5 seconds, over and over again clears it!



that's annoying indeed, good that you found a solution...

doesn't the Eustachian tube open when you swallow?
I think so, it regulates pressure level in your ear to match it with the outside air pressure...

Keep them spinning,
Bert.

[SlumpBuster]

another thing, I have the unfortunate problem of my Eustachian Tubes in my left or right ears plugging up and going almost temporarily deaf in that ear for a couple weeks, it usually happens at least once a year (AND VERY ANNOYING!) cause it pretty much stops me from enjoying all music and such... actually, the tube in my right ear was just plugged a couple days ago, but, i decided to do some research on the net, and it turns out that pinching your nose and blowing, for like 5 seconds, over and over again clears it!

oh well, at least i'll no longer have to suffer it... although my brother did have to have surgery to unblock his after like 9 months, too bad he didn't know!

well, theres my little rant, and the Eustachian Tubes being clogged, damn, its annoying... anyone else had this problem?

Yeah, I had that problem. I would see an ear, nose, throat specialist, if you haven't already. There are a number of easy fixes, including drugs. I had it happen every year from like age 18 to 25. I think my problem was directly related to second hand smoke. Since non-smoking clubs and bars have become more prevalent, I haven't had any problems. I'm just not around smoke anymore.

But, you should be careful because those clogs can become infected and lead to permanent damage. You may not even be able to feel a low-grade infection, but they can still cause scarring. Or, so I've been told.