I may be way off, but isn’t binary just base 2?
We had to figure out base 8 in college for computer stuff and I think it made it so we did not need to use the fudge factor to use “e,” or natural logs.
I am sure Ken can set me straight.
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Ah, professore, salt in the wounds. Sorry to have missed it. I’m glad the night was as good as I imagined it would be.
T
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My view is that “perfection” is unattainable. 100 should be never. I’d love if reviewers capped their scores for new release wines at something like 95, and reserved anything higher for a wine that has reached its pinnacle. Even then, those kinds of scores should be much more rare than they are. The number of 100 point scores awarded is just silly.
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Extremely rare. How any wine reviewer on a current release can rate a 100-point wine is beyond me. Agan flawed system.
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Agreed. We were having a wine with some friends the other night. The wine was not something great and all of us had tasted better wines, but it was not terrible and it was really interesting. For me, that’s a great attribute and we were all happy because it was fun.
Right now I’m drinking a wine from Paul Gordon, the 2019 Esquisto. I don’t know that anyone would put 100 points on it. But it’s sure interesting and it changes every time I try it and I’m happy to have it.I don’t even know how to score it because there are elements that I adore, and a few things I"m not happy about. I would have no way to parse points. The French have this excellent term “jolie-laide” and we have no way to translate that into numbers, but it’s a great concept.
And BTW Joseph - not trying to pick at you and didn’t mean to come off that way if I did.
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I think Ken was just pointing out Leibniz was a very accomplished dude in the world of mathematics.
I had digital logic professor that made us learn how to create various numbering systems on the spot. So for instance he could ask us to create a base four system on an exam while showing our work of course. We of course had to learn to do math on the spot in the standard binary and hexadecimal systems.
The subset 100 of our standard base ten system for wine scoring has been so distorted in how its used by the vast majority of people that its probably best to apply some sort of logarithmic scale in order to make the ratings useful again. Maybe Ken can remind us how to do that.
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very much appreciated
Well that is sort of what I am trying to understand. I haven’t rated anything 100 points because I have some idea in my head that 1 day, I will taste something better in that category. That something could be made, and likely is or will be made that is a “wow” no question about it give this 100 pts wine.
For example I currently have a 2011 Alvear Pedro Ximenez de Anada open. Parker gave it 100 back in 2013. I have now been tasting it over the course of a week. I think it has improved over the days and I like it a lot, but I am not sure that I prefer it over NV Alvear Pedro Ximenez Solera 1927 which I have once rated 96 and then again 94. The 2011 came out a bit flat, and as time has gone on the acidity started to show a bit more adding some complexity.
So I guess what prompted this was a bit of introspection. I am trying to see how stringent others who personally rate wines are, as I reevaluate how stringent I am to see if I am I setting impossible standards for 100 pt wines.
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For me:
If you hold 100 as something wines asymptotically approach then, of course, you never give it 100. If you are waiting to try that one bottle that rules them all, then you will likely never rate 100.
I personally don’t fuss over such a figure. I try to bin wines into enjoyment grouping and that does it for me. The only use I have for ratings is for this. I only map to the 100 point scale to put it in relatable terms.
Hedonic adaptation is also a real thing. If you only drink truly excellent wine, your 95 will probably be someone else’s 100. I think that’s perfectly ok.
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From memory (Daniel) Rogov used to have his assistant insert previously rated wines blind into the tasting lineup for the session. I think this was mostly for tastings on the same day, as a way of double-checking his palate hadn’t gone south due to the volume tasted. IIRC if he scored a wine more than +2 or -2 than when he first tasted it, the tasting stopped for the day. FWIW, as with many wine critics, he tended to operate on a fairly narrow range, so +3 or -3 was rather a big change e.g. from excellent to average.
Clearly not a practical thing if focused on the very favourite wines, but an example of someone trying to take consistency seriously.
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I like that a lot. I was considering opening another of the NV Alvear Pedro Ximenez Solera 1927 to have sbs with this 2011 de Anada, but being opened at such different times seemed an unreasonable comparison.
Do you know if it was +/-2 on any rating for that wine from that day? Like if he rated it a 95, then a 97, then a 3rd time at 93, would it be OK? That would seem off to me, but if it was +/-2 from any rating for the day on that wine I think it would be pretty legit.
I guess it would also depend on food pairings if there are any and the amount of time the bottle was open, assuming the cork wasn’t put right back in. I have had plenty of wines that are a 90 a half hour after opening and 92+ after 3 hours in a decanter.
I think there were only duplicates, not triplicates
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The point system is purely a marketing tool. That being said, I see consumers catching on to people like Suckles that rate an industrial, $7 wines like casal garcia vinho verde in the 90s and scoff.
100 points wines should be as rare as an honest politicians.
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that is pretty damn rare lol. This thread is more about people’s own idea of a rating rather than critics or stores ratings. I would imagine very few on here use a similar scale to Suckling.
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I stand corrected. Retired life is great. I highly recommend it.
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If you treat points like a z score, then yes, you’ve defined the top to be some distance away from the average and, given how you believe quality is distributed, large deviations are likely rare. The question is: what is your sample?
If you treat points a little more objectively, then it’s possible to try 10 100 point wines in a row (like 10 people could get a 100 on the same 8th grade math test). You are saying nothing about the distribution and only focused on the standard. Then the question is: what’s your standard? If it’s like the Putnam exam, then it will be a rare day someone gets a 100.
In practice, I doubt most are capable of doing the latter. I suspect most, at least implicitly, do the former, though without much consideration to the sample.
This is why scores over time, for most, likely aren’t comparable. This is why a z score taken in 1980 of inflation isn’t relatable to a z score taken of inflation in 2019 without re doing the scoring considering the sample. If you don’t all you have is a reading that only considers what came before
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He would if he had any clue what you’re talking about. 
But yes, binary is just base 2.
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Perfect at just 21 years?
Sorry you couldn’t be with us. Every bottle showed really well. And the food and company were great too.
I don’t use the word “perfect”. “There is a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in.”
Technically, I rated the Rabaja 98-100. The Rocche is youthful but already mind-blowing. Perhaps if I get to try the Rocche in 20 years, I will rate it 102 points!
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