Dale Williams wrote:MikeH wrote:David's comment wasn't directed at me, but I know I would be beyond offended if accused of rigging the results.
Mike,
I'm not sure how one would describe throwing out 2 of 14 tasters' results as anything but editing/obscuring. Personally I suggested that Thomas just post in spreadsheet form each taster's scores for each wine (if tasters preferred they could be listed by number or letter) and let people decide what is relevant. Pretty standard procedure to have raw data out to be compared to analysis.
Dale,
I am uninterested in furthering this thread, but I'll answer your question and then be gone.
Two tasters from a neighboring city came as a couple, male and female. The sheets they submitted came without any notes whatsoever plus not one of their scores for any wine ever topped 70. their results lent nothing to the tasting.
It's neither uncommon in professional tastings to test for consistency (a test which David met) nor to remove anomalies. My mistake, if I made one, was to tell the tasters that I removed the two--but I figured everyone can add and I would have been accused of removing two scorers anyway.
It's too bad I made the mistake yesterday of reading David's score wrong. It probably reinforced his feeling that I hold a grudge, which until yesterday I did not. No one of course has mentioned thta at the beginning of the tasting I explained to everyone that I am uninterested in the numbers--they were there for the tasters who couldn't do it any other way. What I was interested in was to see whether or not, in a double blind, Finger Lakes Riesling could be considered by tasters on a par with German Rieslings.
I was not there to prove or disprove anyone's tasting abilities, but I fear that with too many wine geeks, that's the approach taken at a tasting. In that light, David saw fit, after being asked not to, to go ahead and post HIS results on about three bulletin boards before I tabulated the tasting results. By doing that, he immediately changed the focus of the tasting in the heads of others to a horse race rather than a learning experience, and no matter how many times I tried to change their direction, the threads stayed with the horse race.
I've asked Robin to remove all my posts. he has declined. As I said, I am uninterested in going any further. Just thought I should tell my side of the story now, since I won't be around to do it later.