Hmmm, a moment of soul searching on that one. Reviewed the posts in this thread I can't see where I conjecturing anything there. Everything I've said I've done, I've done.



Conjecture is a risky thing on a site like this. Someone conjectures up that it's okay to shoot long at big tough animals with marginal rounds, then some "mama's boy" reads it and now he's out there "popping off" at a herd of elk at 350 yards because someone conjectured that it should work. Meanwhile it's one (or more) of North America's most magnificent game animals that gets turned into coyote fodder.



One certainly can't stop such behavior in the field; however, one can certainly try to be responsible what one writes where a 1000 newbies can see it and then go give it a go based on the digital vapor of someones imaginings. Nope, not too fond of internet conjecture held out/appearing as fact.

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The Ph. D. thing:



Yep, plain jane statistics says that a sample size of thirty is required for a meaningful statistical conclusion for most cases. So one is to put a life time of hunting and 30 head or more elk on the "altar of conjecture" in order to come up with a statistically valid conclusion that "this ain't working too good." Sorry, I got an ethical issue with that approach. Talking to a wide cross section of experienced folks on the internet COULD be a reasonable and quickly doable alternative, but like with statistics it may or may not tell you what you want to hear.

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PhD Humor:

the PhD measures with a micrometer, the foreman marks it with a grease pencil, the workman cuts it with an axe!



Converted To---



"Hunter Conjection" Humor:

The engineer in product development computed and measured the ballistics of the cartridge to 1/1000th of an inch.



The sports writer confirmed it to within 3/4 of an inch off of the bench and then embellished the facts to keep his popularity up.



The hunter, shoots at a bull elk at 350 yards with his tack hammer 308 and a jerry rigged field rest, on a blustery fall day, the bullet doesn't quite fly "down the string" quite like it was supposed to, after clipping the shoulder bone, the bullet creates a mortal wound but fails to penetrate far enough to be quickly lethal, the coyotes eat well.



Only 29 more elk to go and it will be statistically valid! Ouch! Not good.



Good Luck and Good Hunting,

EKM