> > They've already unblinded, so it would be unethical to do anything other than report what they found. > Absolute and utter ridiculous nonsense. Can you not

> > They've already unblinded, so it would be unethical to do anything other than report what they found. > Absolute and utter ridiculous nonsense. Can you not just admit when you're wrong? Wrong about what? If you think they should _not_ just report their findings, and instead try to change their analysis after already finding this event, then you're free to think that, and you're also free to say so. Personally, I don't think that that would be ethical. > But at least 8 global, coordinated press releases? That's a choice, with consequences. You seem to be asserting that there is something of nefarious happening. The collaboration does coordinate otherwise-unrelated releases by individual institutions. The alternative is that PR folks distributed across different institutions, few if any of whom have any training in physics or statistics, would make whatever claims they feel appropriate at whatever time they feel appropriate (relative to each other, and relative to publication of the actual paper). In what way is that preferable? > 2.6 sigma results become amazing new discoveries. They are not claiming a new discovery. They are claiming to have observed a single event, which is significant at the level of 2.6 sigma. A naive treatment produces a significance of more than 3 sigma, and the collaboration did what you might call "extra" work to be fair in their statistical analysis, which reduced the appropriate number to quote to be below 3 sigma. They state that clearly, and suggest interpreting the event at 2.6 sigma, the less-flashy option. To me, that shows integrity.