Where are these careful measurements? Are you 100% sure they don't change the harness between runs and have a large enough sample size to be statistically significant?

All great questions you’re invited to ask the author. I was specifically responding to the “honeymoon phase” allegations and hand waving.

Fair enough, but if you can't answer them, you can arguably not use their work to support your point either.

I assume good faith

Methodological mistakes can and do happen despite good faith.

I'm not sure I'm arguing what you think I'm arguing. I'm not arguing against measurements. I'm saying that it's relevant to recall that honeymoon phases exist in the general human behavior, whether it applies here or not.