Supports· moderateYDIH-E008
LeCompte et al. 2012: the proponents' methodological rebuttal
- what the source states
- Re-examination of sites common to the Firestone and Surovell studies reported that Surovell's protocol deviated from the original in ways the authors argue explain the null result (including size-fraction and magnetic-separation differences), and reported successful recovery of boundary microspherules at shared sites using the original protocol.
- what we infer
- The strongest proponent answer in the replication war: a concrete, testable diagnosis of why an independent team found nothing. What it is not: a blinded or criteria-locked demonstration — it recovers the phenomenon using the protocol whose validity is the thing in question.
- limitations
- Lead author later a Comet Research Group co-founder; 'independent evaluation' in the title overstates the distance from the original team.
- The subsequent blind test (2016), designed to transcend exactly this stalemate, again found little at the boundary.