Dynamic or Systematic? Bayesian model selection between dark energy and supernova biases

Abstract: DES-5Y supernovae, combined with DESI BAO, appear to favour Chevallier-Polarski-Linder $(w_0, w_a)$ dynamical dark energy over $\Lambda$CDM. arXiv:2408.07175 suggested that this is driven by a systematic in the DES pipeline, which particularly affects the low-redshift supernovae brought in from legacy surveys. It is difficult to investigate these data in isolation, however, as the complicated supernovae pipelines must properly account for selection effects. In this work, we discover that the Bayesian evidence previously found for flexknot dark energy (arXiv:2503.17342) is beaten by a magnitude offset between the low- and high-redshift supernovae. In addition, we find that the possible tension between DES-5Y and DESI is significantly reduced by such an offset. We also take the opportunity to trial Nested Bridge Sampling with Sequential Monte Carlo as an alternative method for calculating Bayes factors.