Unbaking Cakes Since 1998

Posted by neuronaut on March 16, 2015
The long dark 5 o'clock tea of the soul

Since I’ve been involved in audio demixing for quite some time now (and on occasion have been called ‘crazy’ for even attempting it) and created some tools that clearly prove it can be done (the first one being a product called Påndøra for MacOS in 1998), I do meet the occasional hardliner at trade shows that starts the inevitable discussion about unbaking a cake. It always goes down something like this: “You can’t separate instruments from a mix. This is like trying to unbake a cake. Once all the ingredients are mixed and form the final product that process can’t be reversed, right?” – Wrong! Our auditory perception doesn’t work like that, but if you really must use that example, how about a good cook being able to guess the ingredients from tasting the product? See, it can be done. Noone said it would be a lossless, fully reversible process, but it doesn’t have to be. Our brain is pretty good at filling in the gaps, so any software attempting this must indeed also add to the process.

pandorascreenlargePANDORA-Screen

And for all of you who still remain unconvinced, scientists have recently uncooked egg white. Not exactly a cake, granted, but it’s a first step. Read the article here: http://www.sci-news.com/othersciences/chemistry/science-uncook-egg-whites-02439.html

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