ELBA GREASE

In exile from exile, I sort of miss one of the places my Island friends would insist I accompany them to on Friday nights: a watering hole called the “Elbar Room” which serves up a wonderful sour drink called “Elbar Grease” (I am serious)—it is like drinking straight lemon which for some reason I‘ve always liked (GW says I may be missing a gene).  Anyway it’s some kind of sparkling wine with extremely sour lemon liquor and nectarines.  The shiny military brass barstools alone make the place interesting. Sadly, I don’t know when I can return just yet. 

Andrew Gelman notes, on his blog today, some philosophy of statistics articles in the on-line journal, Rationality, Markets and Morals; the issue grew out of a conference that Aris Spanos and I organized at the London School of Economics in June 2010 on ”Statistical Science and Philosophy of Science: Where Do/Should They Meet in 2010/2011 and Beyond?”   I invited Gelman to contribute to represent a "Bayesian error statistical" perspective that he discusses in a paper he was working on with Shalizi. 


Unfortunately, the intended introductory articles, mine and the Cox-Mayo dialogue “A Statistical Scientist Meets a Philosopher of Science: A Conversation” are not up yet, nor are articles by Hendry, Spanos and others. I’m sure they’ll appear soon.  I can point interested readers to the unexpurgated version of the Cox-Mayo conversation of June 2011; but you will have to ask.

OK, so here’s a little Friday late-night puzzle: Mayo is in the middle, but who is to her left and who is to her right?  The first to answer both correctly wins a genuine historical relic I brought back from Elba: a small fuschia cloth tassel housed in glass that was apparently captured from Napolean’s military carriage in Waterloo.  It looks authentic.