Friday, August 15, 2003
1. THE POINDEXTER FILE: HE STILL DOESN'T GET IT.
In his letter of resignation as head of the Pentagon's Office of Information Awareness, John Poindexter says it was a misunderstanding. His "innovative approaches" to intelligence, he explains, were "victims of ignorance." A PhD physicist from Caltech, Poindexter has been involved in innovative approaches before (WN
27 Feb 87), (20 Mar 87),(WN
1 Jan 88). As National Security Advisor to President Reagan he was at the center of the innovative Iran-Contra scandal and was convicted of lying to Congress about it. With that background, it was hardly surprising some members of Congress didn't trust him. His resignation is effective Aug 29.
2. THE HUBBLE TROUBLE: ASTRONOMERS ARGUE FOR EXTENDING ITS LIFE.
NASA turned to an outside panel of experts to study whether the Hubble Space Telescope should be retired in 2010 as currently planned. At issue is how to allocate resources given that the launch of the James Webb Space Telescope is planned for 2011. The panel, chaired by John Bahcall, proposed extending Hubble's life with an extra shuttle service mission beyond the one currently planned. Good idea, but there is no budget for a second shuttle mission. There may not even be a shuttle. A better plan might be to keep Hubble and get rid of the space station, since it's not doing anything.
3. THE ISOMER BOMB: HOW A DENTIST'S X-RAY MACHINE WENT TO WAR.
Well, maybe not quite. A news story in this week's issue of New Scientist magazine reports that the Department of Defense is currently pursuing an isomer bomb, which would supposedly release its energy in the form of gamma rays from the decay of a nuclear isomer of Hf-178. Indeed, such nuclear isomers are on the Militarily Critical Technologies List. The claim is that decay can be accelerated by irradiation with low-energy x-rays. We're told that the scientist who did the research used an x-ray machine borrowed from a dentist friend. A JASON panel determined that the idea is theoretically implausible and the evidence shaky at best. A group that attempted to reproduce the effect in a carefully controlled study at the Advanced Photon Source found nothing.
4. CALIFORNIA: GUESS WHAT THIS STORY IS ABOUT.
Nope, it's nothing to do with Ahnold. California is undoubtedly the source of a lot of hot air, but this week it was announced that the state has won a round in its fight against global warming. On Monday, General Motors and DaimlerChrysler dropped their lawsuit against the state over its "zero emissions" law, which requires auto makers to sell vehicles that release little or no carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, phasing them in over the next two decades.
(Andrew Essin contributed to this week's issue of What's New.)
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