Links for 2010-06-15

"Astronomers everywhere, who have been waiting since Kepler's launch in March 2009 to get their hands on this data, will be rushing to telescopes to examine these stars in the hopes of advancing the grand quest of finding Earthlike planets capable of harboring life out there.

But a lot of attention has been paid in astronomical circles over the past few months to what the Kepler team will not be saying. By agreement with NASA, the team is holding back data on its 400 brightest and best planet candidates, which the astronomers intend to observe themselves over abusy summer. "

"Waiting for old-media outlets to use the current information culture to find fresh voices and gifted stylists is a bit like watching a drowning man scorn a bunch of float cushions in order to clutch to an anvil. The major newspapers stick to columnists who comfortingly echo the old op-ed culture of forty years ago (or who were writers in the op-ed culture of forty years ago): the arguments, the analysis, the riffs are all as predictable and narrow as Marmaduke or The Family Circus on the comics pages. It's like deciding to hop on a Viking's funeral boat while thinking it's a cruise ship bound for the Caribbean. "

"To be sure, some terrorists are steely and skilled--people like Mohamed Atta, the careful and well-trained head of the 9/11 hijackers. Their leaders and recruiters can be lethally subtle and manipulative, but the quiet truth is that many of the deluded foot soldiers are foolish and untrained, perhaps even untrainable. Acknowledging this fact could help us tailor our counterterrorism priorities--and publicizing it could help us erode the powerful images of strength and piety that terrorists rely on for recruiting and funding. "