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Good thoughts Ted. I have no doubt that logistically the SR's in RDSS, Dave's numbers, Beyer’s, whatever, are most likely translated logically but as you know, a turf route translated to a dirt sprint no matter how accurately doesn't represent reality if the horse can't run a lick on the dirt. Also agree that the risk/reward decision is the name of the game.
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Such is one of the big problems of handicapping: How do you address the unknown quantities?
Thinking of it in terms of Aristotlean truth (i.e. false/true, 0/1) is probably not a good idea. A better idea is to think of it in
degrees of truth: 0.00 to 1.00 and everything in between.
Think of it as a confidence number, representing how confident you are in the ratings.
Some horses' ratings are more reliable because all of their races have been on similar surface, distance, and maybe even same circuit, without significant layoffs. These horses would be as close to a "1.00" as a horse can get.
On the other hand, some horses - more common in turf races - have never raced on today's surface and sometimes not even at the approximate distance. These horses are closer to the low end; closer to 0.00.
In
Percentages and Probabilities 2012 I published stats for "Good Race at the Approximate Distance," to address distance shifts. It does not address very well this discussion but is a step in the right direction. Depending upon the conditions of the race (and especially the age of horses) the distance factor itself goes from very important to totally negligible.
And even if a horse was a "1.00," how reliable are the ratings at a particular track? In our par times we have a metric called the "Speed Reliability Index" (SRI) which rates each track on how well the horses run back to their previous ratings.
IMHO, even the 1.00 horse - same surface, distance, etc. - isn't really 1.00 because of the SRI. If you are trying to use speed at a track like Keeneland, forget about it (as they say in NY). On the other hand, at tracks like CBY the horses run very reliably.
Okay - enough diatribe.