Are audiophiles similar to wine tasters? My understanding is that wine tasters cannot reliably pick an expensive wine by taste alone. Is audio similar to this or is there merit to it?
I think its about feeling you have something special.
Of course now we've come full circle and records are the new best sounding thing.. I remember having to clean them and hearing pops and skips... but here we are.
but I'm old and my ears are happy with mp3s....
Professional wine tasters are like human spectrometers. They can tell you each component of the wine (aromas, sugar, alcohol, tanins, etc...), using that and their knowledge, they can identify characteristics of grapes and vineyards, process, and defects. The audio equivalent would be a sound engineer, who can listen for bad mixing, noise and distorsion. Both work with producers to improve their products.
Audiophiles have more in common with wine "connoisseurs", who have some knowledge but are sometimes influenced by marketing and the placebo effect and are mostly driven by enjoyment and sometimes social status.