I'm aware that this is what happens what a filter is set at a negative value, and I guess from this example that the same thing happens at high filter values. (Maybe the value is looping?) I've never noticed this problem when the filter is keep > 0 and < 10000, so I think you can avoid it like that until a fix is given. But yes, the resulting sound is always at max volume.
I believe that at least LPF can become unstable at lower frequencies (I still need to confirm this). Most likely the stability of the filter at given frequencies will also depend on the sample-rate is I'd suggest supplying yours when giving this kind of example. In this case 44.1K v.s. 48K can make a big difference, I suspect
IMHO it would be good for these filters (LPF, BPF, etc) to confirm that the coefficients resulting from the requested parameters actually result in a stable filter.
As a side-note, I tend to monitor through a mixer with the soundcard at full volume and the hardware faders down to a reasonable level and only use headphones directly from my laptop when on the move. Even then I will rarely start code I'm not sure about with headphones on. Our ears may well need to service us for another half century or -hopefully- more. That's a long time for a precision instrument that can easily take the state of the art in technology to task in many regards.
Perhaps it's not necessary to note this again but Tomasz's description of the blast he got scared me a bit.
Kas.