One of the most enjoyable and personally useful things about wine for me is how much the beverage greases the wheel for sharing…time, emotions, memories, etc. In that spirit, I would very much enjoy working with you all on delving into the possibilities adumbrated earlier. My winery email is steven@stevenkent.com.

Arthur and I agree with your premise: “I would argue that a good reviewer brings the very thing you do not like to the review process, and that is the ability to make qualitative judgments based on the interaction of factors.”

The difference is in the factors, and that’s where the conversation should begin.

The problem with a four-way email is obvious–you can’t make the process real time interactive. But there are ways to have chats online that are more immediate and can handle multiple people.

As for the flight to LA. Drats. I was scheduled to be there this month, but the trip got postponed. I’ve been in Sonoma twice over the past twelve months, but have no immediate plans for another trip. If I can get one particular project off the launching pad, I might be out your way within a few months.

Maybe online for now is a good way to handle this. Maybe we can think about developing a standard for wine review that we can actually present to the industry. That would be a first–and I can hear the wailing already

You have my email address and I have yours. Let’s set up an email group of four and begin to explore some of the concepts before we take a couple of days to get together. We may even have to take up a fund-raising effort to get Tom out here.

The number of factors that experienced reviewers take into account is enormous. And each of those factors have ranges of value, have interactions with other factors, etc. More that that, I would argue that a good reviewer brings the very thing you do not like to the review process, and that is the ability to make qualitative judgments based on the interaction of factors.

So, when we start these conversations, I am going to ask for specifics from you, and then I am going to ask you about variations, interactions, etc. If this effort is to be at all useful, it is going to have to move beyond philosophy into specifics. And to make things more difficult, there is going to have be room for variances in observation and measurement. I am not interested in writing the absolute rule book of tasting standards to which all tasters must adhere. I would need another fifty years of experience to do that, and I am not going to live that long.

By asking me not to insist that it is the only way is like asking me not to try my best.

The success of any venture hinges on one being committed to it.

The only way to disprove that something does not work is to have a large number of people try their damndest to prove it.

If they can’t make it work, it means one of two things: 1. (most obviously) those that have tried thus far have been unsuccessful which does not rule out the possibility of the goal being unattainable), or 2. it is not possible to achieve (an assertion that gains strength with more and more people trying to do the same thing and failing).

Of course, then one has to explore if the methodolgy or criteria need to be changed – and verification and testing is repeated.

In the process you identify problems, confounds and limiting factors. As you strive to your goal, either the thing you envisioned emerges or it doesn’t. I get that.

Since you talk about rating wines in the context of balance, typicity and complexity, I am led to believe that you are more closely aligned to my way of thinking than our back-and-forth would suggest.

Off-line you mentioned that people come to the wine evaluation table with some bias (prejudices, preconceptions, preferences and worldviews). Certainly. But some biases are beneficial and some are deleterious. Perhaps a collective examination of how different biases contribute (positively or negatively) to the final judgment should be part of this process/exploration.