CafeNoir wrote:Oh man, that hurts. You're saying my 1974 signal green Opel Manta wasn't a chick magnet?

That depends... did the "chicks" you picked up have large Adams apples and speak in deep tones?

As a GM official said when asked "What's the difference between a Cadillac Cimmaron and a Chevy Cavalier?"
About 5 grand

Phaelon56 wrote:But I CAN have some influence on some of the people I meet in helping to shape or alter the path of their subjective opinions about the objective differences in coffee. .... And having these beliefs is in no way an indication that I am "mesmerized by pop culture subjectivism".

The first thing you say is exactly what I've been saying: taste can be trained to meet common standards, and such common standards are desirable for a functioning group of coffee lovers.

I'm sorry you are offended that I characterized you thinking that you disagree with me as "mesmerism." I didn't mean it personally.

I meant that our culture comes ready made with common modes of thought and speech about taste. Ironically enough, this common mode of thinking is a quasi-religious and completely superstitious awe at the power and glory of ones "individual and subjective" tastes and preferences. To say that "I did this because I like doing it" is the same as saying "sleeping pills have a dormative property," that is, it says nothing at all.

This is why I call "because I like it" taste explanations mesmerism. It's a way of stopping rational thought about taste, rather than starting it.

I've come to realize a high correlation between yumminess-to-me and *extremely* objective quality. A deobfuscation of my wiring and beans has worked wonders that I wouldn't have predicted. That's my current standing.

another_jim wrote:I recommend basing your taste in coffee on its terroir, and on the care that went into growing, prepping, roasting and preparing it. That is an objective standard for taste in coffee. Choosing to use it consistently is up to you.

I can buy-in to this, but it describes a lifetime of learning. To transform taste sensations into meaningful interpretations of terroir, care in handling, etc. is very difficult. For example, I have a bit of experience with roasting my own coffee. This experience has given me the ability to know when I get coffee from my local roaster that has a roasting flaw (like a stalled roast). How do I taste the care in handling, when I have no idea how it was handled, and without an expectation of everything that poor handling comprises or tastes like?

Keeping these standards objective through the transformation from red cherry to the taste in one's mouth is the whole trick, as one needs standards against which to benchmark. I would love to have some shortcuts through this process - similar to what Jason refers to with Le Nez du Vin, only in descriptive form.

Mark

another_jim wrote:taste can be trained to meet common standards, and such common standards are desirable for a functioning group of coffee lovers.

Why is that? Diversity of preferences is not good? Conformity in taste preference assists in the survival of the group and is therefore "desirable"? The thread that this was split from seemed to me to be a guy expressing some slightly odd ideas and (about half the time) getting burned for people thinking he was trying to make people believe what he said. Are we really expected to believe everything that is written here? Someone even said that the reaction to him was necessary because people might read the thread and believe the OP. Sounded to me like a certain amount of heretic burning. There are separate communities of people here on the subject of tamping, on lever machines, even on the amount of technical messing about that is desirable in making a cup of coffee, and memberships in these overlap and vary over time. Why can't there be different communities around taste?

Elsewhere in the thread:

HB wrote:good sensory judges can distinguish between their personal preference and a well-explained standard of an exceptional espresso

This reads like standards trumping personal preferences, and that makes me nervous, whose preferences are being encoded in the standards?

Randy G. wrote:That depends... did the "chicks" you picked up have large Adams apples and speak in deep tones?

That depends... are we talking about Pat? or Chris?

Re the topic at hand I don't have anything useful to add about taste, as my palate is about as educated as a palette (the kind made from rough wood). But I was glad to see King Seven's reference to Mark Rothko, as it felt like a lopsighted analogy between taste and sight when the latter was reduced to the ability to distinguish between red and green.

Malachi wrote: "Correct"?!?!?!
As defined by WHOM?

coffeefrog wrote:This reads like standards trumping personal preferences, and that makes me nervous, whose preferences are being encoded in the standards?

Again, to say "I like it because of MY preferences," is to say "thou shalt not question what I do." We have a sort of social contract that when we work, we hold ourselves responsible for the consequences of our actions and decisions; but when we are shopping, eating, etc, we don't. That's fine by me. In fact, if I had my druthers, I'd rather never be held responsible, credited, praised or blamed for anything at all.

But that is not what I'm talking about. So please don't accuse me me being some sort of grinch trying to take away people's Adam Smith given right to like whatever they please.

Question: Bill likes Starbucks better than Dunkin Donuts, Sally the reverse. How much are their lives improved by being able to get the one they want?
Answer: A bit, but nothing dramatic.

Question Now Sally learns about coffee, she knows what she is drinking, enjoys expensive auction coffees more than others, can taste the flaws in roasting etc. Now, how much more than Bill does she get out of drinking any coffee, good or bad, Starbucks or DD. Just a bit, or maybe a whole lot?
Answer: You decide

I strive to be objective in my taste to get more pleasure out of my coffee, not to take it away.

King Seven wrote:I think it is wise to separate "taste" and "preference" here.

We're all seeing the same Rothko hung on the wall, some of us will like it and some of us will not. We can all discuss its form, nuance, textures and colours.

Taste is, as Jim said, an evolutionary mechanism. Yes, there are anosmias and other genetic quirks of smell but not to the extent that to one person two different aromatic compounds would smell like apples and cement, while to everyone else they smell like two similar sandalwoods.

Science, specifically food science, went to great lengths to understand the mechanisms so they could exploit them. I see Coca-Cola as one of their great achievements. I know I shouldn't like it, I understand why, but I do love the stuff. (The cane sugar one though, not the evil stuff in plastic bottles. Well, not as much!)

Yeah, I could have made that clearer. But I am talking about preferences, not about raw taste acumen.

Many of our preferences are out of a job, now that we don't have to "prefer" food over poison. Aesthetics in general is about harnessing these out of work abilities into some form of play, be it enjoying Rothkos versus De Koonigs or Coke versus Pepsi. It's similar to sports, in which we harness and enjoy our physical abilities in games now that we don't have to trudge through the landscape to stay alive.

It's more fun playing bridge than old maid because bridge rewards skill and knowledge and old maid doesn't. It's also more fun to play bridge well than to play it poorly. That doesn't mean that good bridge players are better than poor ones or old maid players, but it does mean they are enjoying themselves more.

Drinking coffee is an activity that rewards skill like bridge, and it becomes more fun to drink coffee as one gets better at it. But like any skilled activity, it requires a language of appreciation and a fund of experiences making that language meaningful to be able to share with others.

I'm not sure if Coke is like bridge or old maid, whether its marvelous intricacies open up to the taster trained in food science. It would be interesting to find out.

In modern art, the language of appreciation itself has become part of the game, so that enjoying a Rothko simultaneously requires arguing about the complete theory of Rothko aesthetics -- that's a little too much skill for my blood. And I'd rather be talking about cupping than coffee aesthetics. But we need these discussions on occasions to reassure ourselves that appreciating coffee is a meaningful activity, not just some elitist humbug.

BTW, congrats, the Brits win again. Do I need to move from Chicago to London now to get really good espresso?

another_jim wrote:Again, to say "I like it because of MY preferences," is to say "thou shalt not question what I do."

For some, to say "I am being objective" is to say "thou shalt not question what I do".

malachi wrote:You have to be kidding.
And what do you base this pearl of wisdom on?

I can't take people who believe japanese people have magic tongues capable of tasting 5 flavours and that every taste is a combination of 5 flavours serious.

shadowfax wrote:Wittgenstein?

I was rephrasing another_jim. Wittgenstein was a bit like that in his early years, but he got over it.

Hi fellows. I see this has taken an interesting road.

The appreciation of sight is based on outward characteristics, meanwhile flavor isn't. Ancient Greek art was appreciated by outward characteristics. Beauty was on the form and shape. But in the romanticism period, it was the other way around. Beauty was an inward characteristics. It was the faces and expressions that mattered. Actually, it was a reaction against seeing the world through reason. Some people had an obsession towards reason and started doing geometric shapes on the gardens. For example, during the period of reason expansion, all the sudden, only gardens with geometric shapes were loved and the other gardens were hated.

Taste is an inward appreciation. And because of that, its appreciation depends on individual previous experiences.

Cheers