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Nice example! But yes, I agree. My field is certainly not astronomy but... that method to remove noise seems extremely weird. XKCD-level joke weird. Even in the
by JorgeGT 6y ago
Nice example! But yes, I agree. My field is certainly not astronomy but... that method to remove noise seems extremely weird. XKCD-level joke weird. Even in the rebuttal arxiv paper cited here where they use a 3rd degree poly to remove the noise it seems... not to fit very well? Seems strange to use a random fit without any guesstimate of the underlying cause/model of the noise.
- gus_massa 6y agoSorry for the very late response... > they use a 3rd degree poly to remove the noise it seems... not to fit very well They are not trying to fit the noise, they are trying to fit the hidden smooth signal that if hidden by the noise. In some cases it is difficult to make a formula for the real signal, so you can approximate it locally with a polynomial. The idea is that after you subtract the smooth part, you get only the noise. So you can calculate the expected noise level. And if the "noise" has a big peak, you can guess there is something strange, like a big absorption line. See also my other comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24985680 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24985680