More Reasons To Avoid Direct Comparison

Accuracy - 

The degree to which the output signal from a component or system is perceived as replicating the sonic qualities of its input signal. An accurate device reproduces what is on the recording, which may or may not be an accurate representation of the original sound.

Musical -

A personal judgment as to the degree to which reproduced sound resembles live music. Real musical sound is both accurate and euphonic, consonant and dissonant.

Above definitions do not imply musical is better (or otherwise). That is because the two definitions were never meant to be compared with in the beginning. Superiority of one over the other is subjectively applied by people to people in the Internet discussions.

Musical simply has a broader definition to Accuracy, and musical implies accuracy - Real musical sound is both accurate and euphonic, consonant and dissonant. So in simple terms, musical is accurate and more. Also accurate do not imply musical, the narrower scope of it’s definition does not allow the inverse to hold true. Musical implies accurate, accurate does not imply musical. Period.

The Internet is making this out to be an “Apple vs Orange” debate, but it’s really a “Smaller Orange vs Bigger Orange” debate. And “smaller” vs “bigger” are relative comparisons because these are still subjective assessments.

In my opinion, a sound system should never be simplified into a “musical” system or an “accurate” system. Or a scale from one to the other. Doing so is illogical. The descriptions are so subjective they lose meaning - musical vs accuracy are mere constructs and any Tom, Dick or Harry have their own opinions, assessments and ideas.

It’s akin to asking people to describe to you how long a piece of string is. This is a waste of time as there is no context at all when discussion length - what is the intent, or purpose of this length? With no firm objectives discussions are simply going around in circles with no end in sight.

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