Varying alpha, blinding, and bias in existing measurements

TL;DR

This study critically examines the impact of blinding procedures on measurements of the fine structure constant alpha using ESPRESSO spectra, revealing that fixing alpha during analysis introduces systematic bias and emphasizing the need to treat alpha as a free parameter from the start.

Contribution

The paper demonstrates that fixing alpha during spectral analysis biases measurements, highlighting the importance of including alpha as a free parameter to obtain unbiased results.

Findings

Fixing alpha biases measurements towards initial values.

Blinding procedures can introduce systematic bias.

Treating alpha as a free parameter avoids bias.

Abstract

The high resolution spectrograph ESPRESSO on the VLT allows measurements of fundamental constants at unprecedented precision and hence enables tests for spacetime variations predicted by some theories. In a series of recent papers, we developed optimal analysis procedures that both exposes and eliminates the subjectivity and bias in previous quasar absorption system measurements. In this paper we analyse the ESPRESSO spectrum of the absorption system at z_{abs}=1.15 towards the quasar HE0515-4414. Our goal here is not to provide a new unbiased measurement of fine structure constant, alpha, in this system (that will be done separately). Rather, it is to carefully examine the impact of blinding procedures applied in the recent analysis of the same data by Murphy (2022) and prior to that, in several other analyses. To do this we use supercomputer Monte Carlo AI calculations to generate a large number of independently constructed models of the absorption complex. Each model is obtained using AI-VPFIT, with alpha fixed until a "final" model is obtained, at which point alpha is then released as a free parameter for one final optimisation. The results show that the "measured" value of alpha is systematically biased towards the initially-fixed value i.e. this process produces meaningless measurements. The implication is straightforward: to avoid bias, all future measurements must include alpha as a free parameter from the beginning of the modelling process.