Missing Malaysian Airlines MH-370 - Thread 6

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From member's link above:

Since the US Navy provided comment some days ago, the underwater search has been significantly narrowed through detailed acoustic analysis conducted on the four signal detections made by the Towed Pinger Locator on ADV Ocean Shield.

For the further analysis to be conducted, the pings must have been recorded.

Hmm, interesting, Akey.

So before the oil was discovered at all, using the pings and satellite analysis, the likelihood was, say, x% that this was the right area.

Some oil was discovered which either was or wasn't compatible with being from a plane (if it had been plane oil, the further question of it being plane oil from MH370 or not would have been raised)

So is the theorem saying that now the oil is definitely not plane oil, the likelihood is lower than the original x%?

A tidied up version of ping detections was played on various news channels & is on YouTube - sorry can't link directly atm, phone being a pain.

Had no idea Bayesian statistics were being used by Akey when talking about probability; obviously used in recovery of Af 447 but I was relying on layperson common sense when challenging "back to square one"

Can't get my head round something binary having a value of neither 1 or 0 - binary to me is ones & zeros [thick]

Bayesian stats can come up with the wrong answer.

Every statistical inference method inevitably generates "incorrect" answers, because of incomplete information.

I was simply pointing out that my original assertion was accurate.

Yes, that's pretty much it Doc.
Say, P(Correct Area) was 0.5 with a negative oil and 0.9 with positive oil, then if it was a coin toss as to whether the oil would come out positive/negative, then the prior probability of P(Correct Area) would be 0.7.

ie in this analagous example the probability has dropped from 0.7 to 0.5.

So is P(negative oil) lower than P(no oil found at all) ie the probability a few days ago before the oil was detected?

Ah, well that's an interesting question.

And there are probably good arguments that those two probabilities are nearly equal.

I can see where this is leading but, as soon as the oil was discovered the probability that the search area was correct was irrevocably altered, (by the possibility of a positive oil test). That information can't be "undiscovered".

AKey, thanks for the discussion. When I was talking about unchanged probability I meant that before the oil was detected to now, but I agree I wasn't clear on that.

The oil slick was the single piece of supporting physical evidence for the pings.
Without it, the likelihood that the correct area is being searched is much lower.

So when I said "without it", (which was what your original comment referred to), I wasn't referring to the slick itself being physically absent or undetected, I was referring to the absence of any confirmatory evidence from the test results.

I hope this clarifies matters.

Thanks both of you for your Bayesian for Dummies explanation, understand better now but won't be choosing it as specialised subject on Mastermind!! [Grin]

"The search area for the missing MH370 plane has narrowed and will be at "a critical juncture" in the next two days, says Malaysia's acting transport minister.

Hishammuddin Hussein said an underwater drone would finish searching the area within the next week."

BBC.

Yes, I read that this morning.

I could understand the raw Inmarsat data not being released but I do wish that they would ; even if only to a handful of people on the internet who have attempted to reverse engineer what is in the public domain.

Thinking of the likes of Jeff Wise/Duncan Steel

I guess if the various teams of experts searching for the plane particularly wanted the advice of the indviduals that you've named, they could ask them to join the investigation. I don't see that it would necessitate releasing information that might be sensitive into the public domain.

I know singers, just wondering if it would ameliorate the "it could have just as easily flown North" brigade in the absence of wreckage.

i really think it seems most likely that the original reports from vietnam and china of debris and oils slicks exactly where it would be logical for the plane to be were correct and everything since is a nonsense.

sorry that was a bit brief. i've been doing a lot of reading.

i have to say i've changed my view of malaysia and the government there by filling in a lot of gaps and understanding their political position vis a vis the west and recent war crimes and economic policies and i am feeling very untrusting of anything the western media prints about them.

i've also ended up digging a lot deeper into what is going on in the world of weapons development and demonstrations and east/west military relations and messages and just how blurry the line between military and civilian/private sector has gotten.

it is all pretty messed up and whilst not proposing a 'conspiracy theory A' answer i am ready to concede that we don't know even a quarter of what is really going on between world powers, military forces and private sector weapons and technology developers at the minute.

i also stand by my position that it is naive and historical to hold onto the idea that powers wouldn't hurt civilians. if drones and international surveillance and everything under that tip of the iceberg don't wake you up to that i don't know what will.

"I know singers, just wondering if it would ameliorate the "it could have just as easily flown North" brigade in the absence of wreckage."

I don't think that would help. And I don't know who would have the authority to get all the relevant NDAs signed and enforced.

" it is naive and historical to hold onto the idea that powers wouldn't hurt civilians. if drones and international surveillance and everything under that tip of the iceberg don't wake you up to that i don't know what will."

Quite.

2/3 of defined underwater search area scanned with no sign. This is quite interesting www.forbes.com/sites/brucedorminey/2014/04/21/malaysian-777-ocean-floor-wreckage-may-lie-miles-outside-search-area/

Anyone read the Daily Fail article today??

www.ibtimes.co.in/articles/549068/20140422/missing-malaysia-plane-mh370-landed-somewhere-crash.htm

Considering the source I'm not sure if this is what major media outlets will soon be reporting...

Malaysia govt want to issue death certs. Families are angry

"According to “Fox and Friends” live on Tuesday morning April 22, the lack of a debris field and finding nothing in the tedious search has put more emphasis on other options for the flight's fate. The search that continues to come up empty-handed in the Indian Ocean has prompted the search authorities to revisit the other possibility of the plane being on land. New Straits Times reports that the ITT are “now looking at the likelihood of starting from scratch” with a search for the plane on land."