Kepler Mess: We Could Certainly Use Carl Sagan Right Now

Keith, you're creating a storm in a teacup.

The slide clearly says "the first 700 planet candidates" so that is the context.

Much ado about very little. Of course the galaxy is filled with Earth-sized planets, with quite a few containing biospheres and a number of intelligent civilizations. It's significant that we're getting our first hard evidence of another slip down the scale of self-centered exceptionalism and uniqueness, but this really is simply confirmation of something all intelligent people believe.

Can't blame the Kepler team for waiting until there was confirmation of the evidence they have. Now, if Kepler had showed no evidence of Earth-sized planets, that would be real news (or an indication of something wrong with our very expensive probe).

Well said, Keith. This type of "holding NASA accountable" is what I believe (IMO) your site should be primarily focused on. Idiots live and work everywhere, including NASA. Poor communicators are also everywhere. These alleged professionals are acting like children, trying to caveat and re-state what was intended. They need to grow up, stop maknig excuses, APOLOGIZE for what amounts to terrible communication to the public, and set the record straight. If they do not, and if they keep-up the "find someone else to blame" game which if rife throughout all government agencies, they are going to find themselves in MUCH hotter water! I guarantee it. People are watching, and making up their minds how important NASA is to them by how the people of NASA comport themselves.

There seems to be a high degree of defiance in Batalha and Sasselov's statements, genuine surprise that the impromptu announcement of "Earth-like" worlds caused a media frenzy.

What planet are they on?

These guys are gifted scientists, but there needs to be a better understanding about how the media will respond to news of this magnitude. Sure, the statistical preponderance of exoplanets of less than 2 Earth radii was published previously (accompanied by zero fanfare), but this was the first public statement about "Earth-like" worlds.

Although much of the science media understood this meant "Earth-sized" (rather than any exoplanet with the same physical characteristics as Earth), writing a response basically telling the public they should know better is wrong.

This statement is surprising in that there is no apology for the miscommunication, instead the Kepler team seem to be fighting against the media's misrepresentation of their results and justifying what was said. Admitting they could have handled things a little better would deaden the controversy. At the moment they're just adding fuel to the flames.

Due to the level of public interest, we need to adopt a better jargon term.

"Rocky planet" is obvious one, though people may imagine something like the Moon and exclude actual, living, Earth-like planets from that definition.

There's also "terrestrial planet". If someone hears "terrestrial planet", they will recognize it as jargon and Google it.

And if they do that, they'll find this page which gives a pretty clear definition of what we're talking about in the first paragraph with a great visual aide right next to it.

This is like a few user interface issues I've ran into before. Its not always preferable to make everything look as friendly and superficially simple as possible. Sometimes you don't want people to make assumptions, and it can be useful to make something look more intimidating so that the user reaches for the manual.

"Of course the galaxy is filled with Earth-sized planets, with quite a few containing biospheres and a number of intelligent civilizations."
Not yet a scientific statement.

We have to remember that it is entirely possible that every Earth-sized planet in our Galaxy is a dead rock.
And equally possible that some contain civilizations way beyond ours that seeded and/or shaped the life we now have on our world.
And equally possible that at least some of these civilizations are not benign and would rape our planet to death if they found us.
At this point we just don't know.

Hey, does this give more evidence of "dark matter" in the universe?

Followup to my last post: I did an informal survey and everyone assumed "terrestrial planet" means a planet that supports life, so, no that's even worse.

...Telluric Planet?

Why don't we call these things "solid planets"?

This teacup tempest will blow over. I remember when Hubble sent back its first blurry pictures and NASA was lambasted for a year long. That mess too did pass.

Kepler will soon earn its place next to Hubble and other great missions of exploration. It is going to be a treasure trove haul of interesting planets both terrestrial and gas giant.

It will be the first observatory to definitively confirm that Earth-size planets circle many other suns are in fact are preponderant.

It is still NASA at it's best, even with sloppy PR.

Tiny speech in a tiny venue, poorly chosen terminology, biggest topic in space astronomy, and bravo, tempest in a teacup.

Keith, finding another habitable, even inhabited planet like Earth is also a yearning and a passion of mine. I can see how this all seems like little-sibling teasing, a cat-and-mouse game with Kepler information. And it drives you crazy when something you want so bad is given and then taken away, especially by carelessness.

But really, I'm sure this will work out right, and soon, like February. And the Kepler team now has been taught to choose their wording carefully, no matter what the audience.

Meanwhile, there are many other things to get upset about, that won't necessarily work out right. I suggest we all focus on those instead.

"We could certainly use Carl Sagan right now"

Oh, yes. In so many ways, so true, so true.

Keith,
I remember Carl Sagan,
he did not win acceptance to the american academy membership for at least a decade during the period of Carl's PBS and science popularizer carrier.

Kieth, I was deeply influenced by his 1980, cosmos work, that got him alot of professional animosity.
this Kepler scientist with an obvious English as a second language just might have gotten his,
earth size objects in red dwarf orbits mixed up with earth size objects in sun sized stars Goldilocks zone orbits.
Kepler can not know yet the later as it will take three years( 1 AU orbit) to know.
or perhaps like Carl he does know something that needs to be verified but he wants to excite the public
Kieth please follow MR Gilters example over at Centauri Dreams and discuss the data release policy instead of this personal story over a TED speech.
Keith, after all TED is much like your NASA watch, we are supposed to encourage speech :):)
thanks

Jesus, he didn't say anything wrong. The blunder is Kepler's, not Ditimar's.

He referred to them as candidates. He also spoke to the statistical signal that can be inferred from the data. 700 candidates is a huge statistical signal. Even if some of them are noise, some of them are binaries, some of them are illegal aliens. It doesn't matter. So there's only 400 real ones. maybe 300. But at a very high confidence, there's more then 100, and that's the real story.

He's right on the money, and the Kepler team is completely off base. He just broke their team rule which is really unjustified, but he didn't compromise any scientific integrity here.

Keith, no matter who intended to say what-where are the adults in charge? Don't any of these PIs have a management chain to report to? Can't somebody higher up (you can imagine who I mean) pick up the phone and order up a statement or a briefing to clear it up? After all, isn't all of Kepler run on PUBLIC funds?

Phew! We are having a really slow week on Nasawatch aren't we. Keith, we get it. Kepler, you are forgiven. Move on... Please.

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen philosophers and divines. - R. W. Emerson

Natalie Batalha: "I can only say that I will take this PR blunder any day of the week over a work environment that does not give me academic freedom to speak within the reasonable agreements that I have with my colleagues. Any day."

Hear hear! I can't believe all the flak Keith is producing over this minor issue. What Natalie Batalha is saying is absolutely correct. When the media wines over petty things, usually from their ignorance (not talking about you here Keith, you should know better), then the policy makers inside Nasa tell their people to shut up. Have a little understanding and don't tie the hands of these people. That's how the dream slowly dies that you talked about in your other article "Video: Think Big Picture - For Just a Moment".

So what do you say Keith? How bout that big picture?

p.s.
Keith: "Millions of people stopped what they were doing to read these stories about "Earth-like planets" circling other suns. Such words have meaning. 99.999% of humans don't dwell on the nature of planetary cores and the other excuses offered in support of the use of the term "Earth-like" in this lecture."

The media should have this in mind when they write their articles. They should think about how their readers will interpret this. And the announcement that all these "Earth-like planets" are out there should prompt them to verify their source's statements. Isn't that journalism 101?

The media have given up a lot of responsibility these days in their reporting to get their story out fast or to sensationalize their stories. I read an article yesterday about an asteroid that had a 1 in a 1000 chance of striking the Earth in 2182. The asteroid is 1837 ft in diameter yet the picture accompanying the article displayed an asteroid about 1000 miles across striking the Earth.

Apparently these scientists, and most other NASA employees, are unaware of the fact the we have policy on these and all other types of communications that is intended to prevent such public blunders. NPD 1385.2 (Public Appearances of NASA Personnel) and NPR 2200.2 (Dissemination of Scientific and Technical Information) provide policy on public appearances and communication of STI with the public. This presentation required prior approval which I'm sure was not obtained. Not that those responsible for reviewing it would have prevented this fiasco.

I still think this is big news. The June 15th Paper said that the majority of the candidate exoplanets were of the size of Neptune or smaller. His slides says that 150 candidate planets are 2 Earth radii or smaller. There is a difference between the two statements.

He also has access to the 400 candidate planets that "were erased from the archive" so to speak (i.e. the candidate planets for which information has yet to be released by the Kepler team). Based on his presentation, it seems likely that many of those are also earth-size planets.