Alastair Mackay has a post-publication peer review of the Lancet study on excess Iraqi civilian deaths from last fall.
Space Blogroll Update
I’ve added a blogger who’s an employee at Johnson Space Center to the “Space” links to the left, who runs the “Mazoo” blog. I’m keeping this person anonymous, because I don’t know if (s)he wants the notoriety–if a self outing is desired, I have a comments section. As a content sample, there are some thoughts there on Hubble, the role of aeronautics in NASA (the first “A” and a subject to which I’ve been giving some recent thought) and the new administrator.
I’ve also moved Spaceship Summer, Rocketman, and The New Space Age blogs to the “AWOL” list, in the interest of weeking my garden, since I’ve seen no posting there for quite a while. They can inform me if they start posting regularly again.
By the way, if there are other space bloggers out there of whom I’m not aware, let me know, either in a trackback/comment here or via email.
[Update a couple hours later]
Here, via Instapundit, is another space blog previously unknown to me–Space Law Probe
Homesick
It was one of the wettest winters on record in southern California this year, and having moved to Florida last fall (just in time to be hit by two hurricanes), I missed it. All the rain has apparently made for a fantastic bloom of wildflowers there, particularly up in the Golden Poppy Reserve in the hills west of the Antelope Valley. Transterrestrial web designer Bill Simon took a trip up there this weekend, and this is a sample of what he shot.
I liked this one, too:
The rest of the images can be found here.
Nothing To Say
Sorry, just one of those days. Or weeks.
Working on a book, and feeling a little burnt out.
The Old And The New
Jeff Foust has a good rundown today on the state of the commercial launch market and industry. It’s a subject of limited interest, though, to those of us who want to go ourselves. On the other hand, Sam Dinkin has an interview with Dave Urie that offers much more promise in that direction.
Rocket Man
My take on the incoming NASA administrator is up at TechCentralStation.
Expanding The Anglosphere
The US has apparently decided to buttress what should be a natural ally, if they can get all of the nutty socialism out of their system.
Who Is Home?
Here’s one more post on Terri Schiavo and the (so far) ineffable nature of consciousness.
Must Have Been All The Big Macs
Some researchers are theorizing that the Neanderthals were wiped out by free trade. As John Miller points out:
What does this tell us about anti-globalization protestors?
Clueless At GWU
I wish I could get a sweet gig like this. I could have given NASA much better advice than this study, for a lot less than three hundred thousand:
The study by George Washington University researchers urged the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to cut down on shuttle flights by limiting construction on the space station and to reinvest extra funds in developing a new manned vehicle. NASA could use shuttles as remote-controlled cargo ships to finish the station, the report said.
No matter how many times people make that recommendation, it remains fundamentally wrong, and displays an ignorance of economics, and the purpose of the Shuttle. There’s no point in flying it at all if you’re going to fly it without crew, and no way to justify the expense of maintaining the infrastructure for it. The astronauts, who are paid and willing to risk their lives, are the least valuable element of the system, and NASA has an oversupply of them. NASA only has three orbiters left, and if it loses one more, it will almost be out of the Shuttle business anyway, regardless of whether or not more astronauts are lost.
But I can’t get my head around this bizarre notion that some seem to have that sending people into space is supposed to be risk free. What is it about that environment, unlike the sea, coal mines, construction, or any other activity in which people die all the time, that make some people check their brains at the door?
NASA at least had an appropriately diplomatic response:
Erica Hupp, a spokeswoman for NASA, said the organization “appreciates all the work that George Washington University put into its study. We are working toward the same goal to make human space flight more reliable and less hazardous.”
Translation: thanks for the clueless advice, but no thanks. What a waste of money.
[Update on Saturday morning]
Keith Cowing isn’t very impressed, either.