Empirical test of relative support
A ternary diagram is used to illustrate which distributions are most
consistent with the tree and animal species inventories. The saturated
model is used as a baseline. For each inventory, the LL of each
distribution is subtracted from the LL for the saturated model and the
difference is exponentiated to produce a relative weight. For example,
if the saturated model LL is 10 and the log series LL is 8, the weight
is exp(2) = 7.39. The weights are used to generate x -ycoordinates in a ternary diagram with the standard equation: x =
0.5 (2 wo + wl)/(wo +
wl + we) where wo,
wl, and we are the weights for the odds,
log series, and expe distributions; andy = 30.5/2
wl/(wo + wl +
we).