Friday, February 10, 2006

An online poll

At Arkansashunting.net, people were polled for their response to this question: "Do you think that at least one Ivory Billed Woodpecker is alive and well in Arkansas?"

As I type this, the 127 responses are fairly evenly split, with a slight edge to "No" (the poll has apparently been ongoing for at least a couple of months).

I'd be the first to say that online polls like this have very limited, if any, value (since the respondents are self-selected, etc).

However, I do think that this poll might reflect a broad trend. If it was run six months ago (in early August, just after it was reported that Prum and Robbins had "confirmed" the rediscovery), I think the answers would have skewed pretty heavily towards "Yes". If it is re-run six months from now, I think the answers will skew pretty heavily towards "No".

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