Not having the technical expertise many here have, I approach this subject simply, applying a bit of experience and logic:
On one hand I know, through reading and practical involvement in enough consumer testing in my career, that placebo and expectation bias are very real. They have been repeatedly observed and verified, are phenomenon that have been well-known and understood for decades.
The entire audiophile subjectivist position, on the other hand, is built on faith in some supposedly audible but demonstrably immeasurable "X" that audiophiles "hear." This "X" is imagined to be very real audio content that science just hasn't caught up with yet, that will one day be revealed, proving that they were right all along. The ultimate example, of course is vinyl. With all it's clearly audible and measurable distortions and limitations, is declared "better" than digital. Not a personal preference, but something objectively closer to real music.
I don't hear "X" - oh I hear the difference between vinyl and digital, but that difference can be measured and analyzed, found in vinyl's distortions and limitations, and correlated to the difference we hear. Of course the folks who love vinyl, having invested tens of thousands of dollars in it, don't want to believe that they've put all that time, money and heart into building a softer version of audio reproduction that they simple like better. It must be "better." Closer to the nonexistent "original event."
So here's the simple part: What is more likely -- that audiophiles are jumping through perceptual hoops, fueled by expectation bias and a massive need for purchase justification, to hear what they desperately want to hear and believe what they want to believe, or that there is some immeasurable magic as yet undiscovered in this extremely mature industry, that not only renders 100 year old technology superior to the latest developments, it overcomes a plethora of distortions to get there?
That's not a hard question to answer.
Tim