[Harp-L] Nail polish and bubbles

[Robert Coble]

(Having apologized before this post made it to Harp-L, let's try once more, then I'll just quit trying.)

Brendan,

I have no particular side in this discussion. As previously stated, I have nothing but the highest admiration for you and the many harmonica marvels you have produced. Truly inspiring!

Unfortunately, I think you and Vern are not talking about the same thing exactly.

Vern's point concerned the amount of leakage at the reed base RELATIVE to the amount of leakage elsewhere. He illustrated that relative difference with a photo of a simple experiment.

The more the foundation of a particular "science" is based on subjective factors, the more likely that it is not scientific. If you truly are an advocate of the scientific method as the best way to test hypotheses, then you should have no problem accepting the result of an experiment which can be easily verified and falsified. If you doubt Vern's results, simply repeat his experiment for yourself and prove him wrong.
Perhaps if you performed Vern's experiment using a superbly customized harmonica, you might come to the same conclusion (or not) as Vern. It takes minimal equipment and time to set up such an experiment and take a photo. Surely it would take less time and money to perform that experiment, rather than Vern sampling the many superb customized harmonicas in search of enlightenment regarding the nail polish treatment, or more correctly, the total customization package.

I think you conceded the argument when you switched targets:

    You seem to have missed my earlier point that nail polish would only
    be used in conjunction with standard embossing, on both the blow AND
    the draw reed, plus optimal gapping. Thus your bubble demonstration
    using stock reeds and slots is not especially relevant to the
    discussion.

    . . . There will still be more air loss from the draw reed
    than the base of the blow reed of course, but relatively less.

Without measurement of the various sources of leakage and the RELATIVE proportion of those sources, it is certainly "unscientific" to ascribe any proportional benefit to just one of those factors, especially when that factor has already been demonstrated to have a RELATIVELY small impact overall.

Vern conceded that all of the customizer's work in toto may be beneficial to a better playing harp via less leakage. His caveat concerned the RELATIVE benefit from the nail polish treatment at the base in isolation from the other work, like embossing and gapping. The proportion of contribution from embossing and gapping may provide a large reduction in leakage RELATIVE to the effect of the nail polish treatment at the base. Ergo, the customized harp may be considerably air tighter, but there is no way to determine the RELATIVE contribution to that improved performance from the nail polish treatment in and of itself. It seems logical to accept that if the RELATIVE percentage of leakage at the base is sufficiently smaller than leakage elsewhere, it does not matter whether the harp is a stock harp or a highly customized one; the RELATIVE percentages will remain essentially in the same proportion regarding that one aspect of the overall leakage amount. Vern's photo shows clearly that there is a huge difference in leakage between the leakage at the base and at the tip of the reed. Since there is very little leakage at the base to start with, there is very little RELATIVE improvement that can be made there. The leakage at the base cannot be entirely eliminated, simply because the nail polish cannot be used to completely seal that source of leakage; a small gap around the reed base must remain.

Vern did not comment on the traditional bending of the reed near the base as a means to reduce the leakage, but I suspect he might also be sceptical of the efficacy of that process as well regarding the RELATIVE amount of leakage that is reduced in the customized harp.

Regarding your "appeal to authority" regarding the small number of "experts" (compared to the total number of harmonica players) who agree with you:

There are many so-called "experts" in particular fields who are ... NOT. Consider the notion of fine wine experts as an example. There have been any number of empirical studies which show that the much vaunted "nose" of these "experts" is at best - a delusion. I'll provide a link to the results of one such scientific study; there are many others reaching the same conclusion:

https://www.realclearscience.com/blog/2014/08/the_most_infamous_study_on_wine_tasting.html

Within that article is a link to the actual PhD study:

http://web.archive.org/web/20070928231853/http://www.academie-amorim.com/us/laureat_2001/brochet.pdf

I haven't bothered to check tea, coffee and perfume "experts" but I would expect those fields to also be highly subjective. Taste is a marvelous sense organ, but it is entirely subjective.

FWIW, Dr. Daniel Kahneman has a wonderful book Thinking, Fast and Slow which gives marvelous examples in many different fields regarding the subjective errors that human experts make. Sometimes I marvel at our ability to get through any given day without drowning ourselves in the shallow end of the gene pool.

Keep up the great work!
Crazy Bob