4 ms·

The ACM had a nice article debunking the Wald story: http://www.ams.org/publicoutreach/feature-column/fc-2016-06 http://www.ams.org/publicoutreach/feature-colu

The ACM had a nice article debunking the Wald story: http://www.ams.org/publicoutreach/feature-column/fc-2016-06 http://www.ams.org/publicoutreach/feature-column/fc-2016-06

selimthegrim 7y ago
The postscript undebunks it.
CrazyStat 7y ago
> To be precise, regarding Wald's work on aircraft damage we have (1) two short and rather vague mentions in Wallis' memoir of work on aircraft vulnerability and (2) the collection of the actual memoranda that Wald wrote on the subject. That's it! Everything not in one of these places must be considered as fiction, not fact. (emphasis in the original) This is a rather extreme take. Ignoring the rather important fact that the author of the piece missed at least one important source where Wallis gives Wald credit (see the postscript), arguing that something must be "considered as fiction" because it is not attested to in the (known) written sources is unreasonable. I don't know at what point the postscript was added (it appears in the first archive.org snapshot of the page, from 2018; the essay was first published in 2016), but it seems misleading to leave the whole rant up there and then tack on a bit at the end saying "Oh I was wrong by the way."
- kwillets 7y ago
  I think this statement is a reference to a wide body of fake material circulating on social media platforms, including, for instance, a drawing of an airplane dotted with x-y damage locations, which is neither an aircraft that was in use in that theater, nor a type of figure produced by Wald or anyone related. I did read through one of Wald's papers after reading that article, and I agree with the thesis that there's little in them about survivorship bias or a strong need to correct it. Maybe "debunk" is the wrong term; it's more of a clarification and re-emphasis of his actual work.

4 ms·

The ACM had a nice article debunking the Wald story: http://www.ams.org/publicoutreach/feature-column/fc-2016-06 http://www.ams.org/publicoutreach/feature-colu

by kwillets 7y ago

The ACM had a nice article debunking the Wald story: http://www.ams.org/publicoutreach/feature-column/fc-2016-06 http://www.ams.org/publicoutreach/feature-column/fc-2016-06

selimthegrim 7y ago
The postscript undebunks it.
CrazyStat 7y ago
> To be precise, regarding Wald's work on aircraft damage we have (1) two short and rather vague mentions in Wallis' memoir of work on aircraft vulnerability and (2) the collection of the actual memoranda that Wald wrote on the subject. That's it! Everything not in one of these places must be considered as fiction, not fact. (emphasis in the original) This is a rather extreme take. Ignoring the rather important fact that the author of the piece missed at least one important source where Wallis gives Wald credit (see the postscript), arguing that something must be "considered as fiction" because it is not attested to in the (known) written sources is unreasonable. I don't know at what point the postscript was added (it appears in the first archive.org snapshot of the page, from 2018; the essay was first published in 2016), but it seems misleading to leave the whole rant up there and then tack on a bit at the end saying "Oh I was wrong by the way."
- kwillets 7y ago
  I think this statement is a reference to a wide body of fake material circulating on social media platforms, including, for instance, a drawing of an airplane dotted with x-y damage locations, which is neither an aircraft that was in use in that theater, nor a type of figure produced by Wald or anyone related. I did read through one of Wald's papers after reading that article, and I agree with the thesis that there's little in them about survivorship bias or a strong need to correct it. Maybe "debunk" is the wrong term; it's more of a clarification and re-emphasis of his actual work.