What Max writes is utter rubbish. Wines are not for 'tastsing' but for
drinking, and can only be evaluated (if they have to be evaluated) in
the context of a meal. Everything else is a complete waste of time. Why
do wines have to be evaluated anyway? Are you obsessed with having
something with more points? Why can't you just drink and enjoy? True
connoisseurs do not engage in such lunacy. I don't care how many points
my wine gets by any critic, and I NEVER have tastings, ever. I consider
this some kind of sick joke.

Grow up, people!


Max Hauser wrote:
"John LaCour" in ups.com:

. . . What I have yet to do is understand the difference in preferences
between the critics . . .

- How would you describes the differences in preferences of [various
critics]

There has been some serious and sophisticated study of this question. One
survey of the subject that appeared online (five years ago?) was by a
wine-enthusiast engineer, and used statistical methods to compare some
popular US critics' rankings of the same wines over several years of thier
publications. That study identified areas where they coincide closely, and
others where systematic differences were evident. (I don't have the
reference handy just now.)

I've heard of at least one other serious study, large and searching,
conducted privately with considerable resource, but I don't think it was
published.

Posted in the 1980s on the wine newsgroup were second-hand accounts of the
pioneering 100-point-scale critic (Parker),both opining that small score
differences were meaningful, and also giving specific wines score
differences (very significant, according to the first comment) when he
tasted it under conditions he did not control. However, Parker stresses
right up front in his publication the primacy of the consumer's own palate
in judging wines. (I wonder sometimes if all of his readers notice that
advice.)

I plan to do a blind tasting with my tasting group of wines where critics
seemed to disagree on the quality of the wine.

Sounds to me like an excellent and provocative basis for a tasting.

Blind tastings are how many good tasters developed their palates over the
years. The blind format (carefully arranged to maximize the palate's
sensitivity if possible) is essential (for wine as in other things) to
exclude distracting or biasing influences. The University of California at
Davis, near Sacramento is famous for its food-science program, wine being
one specialty thereof (the famous "Davis" winemaking training, which several
friends of mine completed, is a Master of Science program in Food Science
with "E and V" specialization, enology and viticulture). That university
offers weekend trainings to the public on sensory evaluation. After
training, students are asked to take blind wine samples (technically matched
for color and other cues) and sort them, blind, after randomization. (Those
who can sort the blind samples consistently, a number of times, are then
recruited as wine judges for agricultural fairs.) The ultimate point of
wine for most people is to enjoy it with good food and/or company,
obviously. Tasting wine critically and systematically, on its own, is a
powerful tool along the way to that. It's how wine is made, for example.

Cheers -- Max