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Skeptoid

Skeptoid #328: Secrets of the Stradivarius

Skeptoid

Brian Dunning

Skeptic, Social Sciences, Skepticism, Paranormal, Conspiracy Theories, Urban Legends, Science, History

4.63K Ratings

🗓️ 18 September 2012

⏱️ 15 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The secret of history's greatest stringed instrument, the Stradivarius violin, is that there is no secret.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

How do we judge the relative merits of works of art, as each has a different meaning

0:08.4

to every beholder?

0:10.0

Is there any absolute scale by which we can measure the quality of a piece of music,

0:15.2

or the beauty of a passage, or even a single tone?

0:19.1

And yet, as a society we've somehow decided, the strativarius violin produces the finest

0:25.9

sound.

0:27.3

Is that just an opinion, or is there any science behind it?

0:31.7

The secrets of the strativarius are today unskeptoid.

0:35.7

Hey everyone, Brian here.

0:43.3

A quick favor, we are conducting an audience survey.

0:47.0

We'd be really grateful if you could take just a few minutes and answer our survey.

0:51.4

This is the kind of thing that's sort of an engineering and marketing necessity to make

0:54.7

the whole free podcast ecosystem flourish.

0:58.3

So please check it out.

1:00.0

Also surveys are fun, you get to talk about yourself.

1:03.1

Please visit survey.prx.org-skeptoid to take the survey today.

1:10.5

That's survey.prx.org-sk-e-p-t-o-i-d.

1:18.2

Thanks.

1:24.0

You're listening to Skeptoid, I'm Brian Dunning from Skeptoid.com, secrets of the strativarius.

1:32.3

She pushed the instrument into my hands even as I held them up toward it away.

1:36.4

No, I said don't let that thing anywhere near me, I'll break it.

1:40.1

But the violinist was insistent, and it was catch it or let it fall.

...

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