[USS Alaska]

Through a process called statistical extrapolation. It is familiar to people skilled in said discipline.

So us dummies can call it by it's street name, "SWAG" Scientific Wild Ass Guess".

Watch out, looking down your nose like that can cause a brain bleed out. That is a process familiar to people skilled in said discipline.

[nwrep]

SWAG is not a bad name for it, as it mostly amounts to that. Difference is that the SWAG is successively adjusted as new data comes in.