Comments on: Ivory-billed Woodpecker

By: MARK ROSE

MARK ROSE — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 14:00:34 +0000

I SAW SEVERAL PILATED WOODPECKERS IN THE JOHN BRYANT STATE PARK LOCATED
JUST EAST OF YELLOW SPRINGS, OHIO ABOUT FIVE YEARS AGO.

By: Mark Pippin

Mark Pippin — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 04:07:29 +0000

I agree with David Sibley’s analysis of the situation. After five years of fruitless searching, nothing was found to suggest the ivorybill still exits. The money and effort could have gone to help a species that still has a fighting chance of survival like the California Condor or the Whooping Crane.

By: Erik Hendrickson

Erik Hendrickson — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 04:58:47 +0000

As I understand it, the Nobel Prize in Chemistry was just awarded to a researcher who claimed to have discovered new kind of crystal – a quasicrystal. The discovery did not fit widely held beliefs at the time, and he was discounted – and at first could not even get approval to publish his findings. With perseverence, he convinced others to look, and his findings were verified and duplicated.

One of my heroes, Linus Pauling, was so negative on the idea, it has been reported that U.S. chemists are far behind the rest of the world in this area of research.

Is there a term for something that is at first called “pathological science”, but later is found to be “science”?

Another of my heroes, David Sibley, challenged my idea of “counting frames” in the Luneau video and in videos of PIWO (Feb. 16 above). Give me another chance coach? It is meaningful because EVERY video of PIWO has at least several frames that show unambiguously (to EVERYONE’S satisfaction) that it really is a PIWO. Skeptics merely cherry pick the PIWO frames that are inconclusive. There are zero frames in the Luneau video that unambigously show the bird is PIWO. That’s important – but we need a statistician to determine if it’s “significant”.

By: David Sibley

David Sibley — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 00:38:16 +0000

Yes, I agree it fits in that category. An excellent popular book expanding on these ideas is “Voodoo Science” by Robert Park. And if you are interested in reading more I highly recommend “How We Know What Isn’t So” by James Gilovich. He even explains some of the psychology behind peoples’ persistent beliefs in ESP, etc.

By: Bob Lang

Bob Lang — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 00:23:16 +0000

The debate surrounding the continued existence of ivory-billed woodpecker has a lot in common with so-called “Pathological Science” defined in Wikipedia as follows:

Pathological science is the process in science in which “people are tricked into false results … by subjective effects, wishful thinking or threshold interactions”. The term was first used by Irving Langmuir, Nobel Prize-winning chemist, during a 1953 colloquium at the Knolls Research Laboratory. Langmuir said a pathological science is an area of research that simply will not “go away” — long after it was given up on as ‘false’ by the majority of scientists in the field. He called pathological science “the science of things that aren’t so”.

By: Douglas Loisel

Douglas Loisel — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 05:32:20 +0000

Mr. Sibley,

The Collin video – http://ftp.aip.org/epaps/j_acoust_soc_am/E-JASMAN-129-024103/jasa_movie6.mp4 – is of an Ivory Billed Woodpecker. With all due respect it’s indisputable. Please explain to me why this isn’t an IBW but I have looked at this video literally hundreds of times and I cannot come to another conclusion. The IBW mystery has changed my life and I am not looking for a confirmation, just an explanation.

Thank you,

Doug

By: Alan Dixon

Alan Dixon — Fri, 10 Jun 2011 16:39:38 +0000

I have only just discovered this website and this debate on it, even tho’ like most people my interest in the IBW was rekindled following the “rediscovery” and I have been following the story ever since. I have been birding, on and off, for 40 years in Europe, mainly the UK, and am also fascinated by people’s ability to see things that aren’t actually there. Even now, after all these years I am still amazed at some of the claims made by people standing in front of me about what they’re looking at.
When the “rediscovery” was announced I felt a shiver go down my spine and it brought a lump to my throat – if the IBW was still extant there was surely hope for loads of other “extinct” birds? Unfortunately, Cornell were wrong and it is as simple as that. Here in the Uk we have our own version of the IBW debate; it’s about whether or not there is a self sustaining population of big cats panthers/pumas) living in the wild after escaping from captivity. We’d all like to believe it’s true but with all the technology available today (and the skilled searchers)this type of thing ought to be relatively easy to find. None ever are.
I’m as sorry as everyone but we ought to get used to it I’m afraid, it looks increasingly unlikely that the IBW does still exist. please don’t stop looking though, and the increased protection afforded to you fantastic forests is one very positive outcome (as are the very entertaining books about the search!)

By: David Sibley

David Sibley — Thu, 19 May 2011 17:55:55 +0000

Hi Bill, Thanks very much for the comment. I’m glad you found the video analysis helpful.

By: David Sibley

David Sibley — Thu, 19 May 2011 17:30:29 +0000

Josh, You've grossly misread my comment of July 24, 2010 (not June 24). I said there was a vanishingly small possibility that a population of Ivory-billeds still exists, not that there is a small population. Millions of dollars were spent on searching for them without success, and at the same time a few thousand dollars was denied for the Po'o'uli, which went extinct shortly after that. Given that Endangered Species funding is limited, would you recommend continuing to pour millions into the possibility that you might find Ivory-billeds, while other species disappear for want of one percent of that amount? I hope not.

By: Bill Pranty

Bill Pranty — Thu, 19 May 2011 00:38:52 +0000

Good evening David,

Thanks for all the careful, frame-by-frame analysis of the Luneau woodpecker with known Pileateds. When you compare the two sets of images it becomes much easier to see that the Luneau woodpecker could be/is definitely a Pileated.

I understand why Cornell can never refute their earlier findings but it is disheartening to see so many respondents on this page (and elsewhere) continuing to argue that the Luneau woodpecker is an Ivory-billed despite all the evidence to the contrary.