What do Paris Hilton and two newly discovered planets have in common? They’re hot, fast and cause other stars to look dimmer when they’re around.

As far as the two new planets are concerned, they can’t help it. They are among the few discovered by a method which monitors the intensity of starlight, which can periodically decrease when an orbiting planet passes between its star and Earth. These new planets are so close to the stars they orbit that their orbits last only a few days and they’re superheated to over 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit. Paris would get this one right: “That’s hot.”

Anousheh Ansari became the first female space tourist today, and will be the first person to blog from space. In her blog, Ansari will tell us on Earth what her life is like in space, from space… If she posts in it. So far, all of the post-launch posts are from Earth-locked friends, but I imagine she can’t really blog until she gets to the International Space Station. It reminds me, however, of when I am leaving for trip and tell a bunch of people the night before I go that I’ll write, call, email, and even blog from there. And often, I just don’t do it as much as I had planned. Why? Because life can pass you by when you’re blogging. Would you rather spend your vacation pecking away on a keyboard, or eating Skittles from the air and doing space ballet? So, Anousheh, I will read your blog because I am here on Earth. But don’t worry about it - we can wait an extra few weeks to see the pictures after you get back.

I recently had the opportunity to attend a panel discussion by the crew of the STS-121 mission, which took off for the International Space Station (ISS) on July 4, 2006. (I watched the launch from Cocoa Beach.) Five astronauts of the seven-person crew were in the panel. The other two were busy with astronaut stuff (being astronaughty, haha). One was on the ISS, and the other is on the crew of the STS-115 mission, and may or may not launch tomorrow. But the panel of astronauts was great. They are smart, interesting, engaging and good-looking. Rather than being self-important about their elite status, they were humbled by their good fortune and thrilled with the experience of having been in space.

Several months ago, I did some research on what it takes to be an astronaut. It’s not that I am aspiring to be one. My space dreams were squashed young when someone told me in Elementary School that you needed perfect eyesight (which is not entirely true). But astronauts are fascinating. At the time, they had an open call for applications to the astronaut program. I looked over the application process. It’s like applying for graduate school increased by an order of magnitude. They aren’t accepting applications right now, but you can visit the site to see what it takes.

But the shuttle fleet retires in 2010, and the new Orion capsules aren’t targeted to launch until 2014, leaving four space-free years for US astronauts. I am assuming that we will have some deals with other countries to get people back and forth from the ISS, but it’s hard to find out what is going on. Maybe I should’ve asked the astronauts at the panel. But talking about going to space is way more fun than asking how NASA’s going to get us there.

California is now the first state to approve a plan to combat global warming. The plan will cap their greenhouse gas emissions in 2020 to the level of emissions in 1990. In accordance with this, Paris Hilton has announced that she will cap her media exposure to 1990 levels as well. Thank you, music gods.

Soon there will be even more ads in video games. Electronic Arts had teamed up with two online advertising firms to place ads in video games which will be constantly updated from the internet. Soon, when you’re beating someone up in GTA you’ll have your choice of which brand baseball bat to use, Nike or Rawlings, and you can listen to Top 50 hits in you stolen ‘08 Ford Mustang.

The SMART-1 probe, a European Space Agency (ESA) probe which orbited the moon collecting images and data for three years, will crash land there at 7,200 km per hour tonight around 2:00 AM EDT. Amatuer astronomers can watch this from earth - it’s like watching World’s Most Outrageous Car Crashes for geeks.

Let’s all show our solidarity for pluto by shaving our heads, thus turning them into little planetoid-esque balls. If you can’t do that, raise a fist to show solidarity for our dissed little “dwarf” planet. It might help to actually write “Pluto” on your hand to remind everyone.

I won’t be able to post much (if any) science news this week because I’ll be on the Olympic Coast of Washington State. While on the road, I plan to be updating my random photo and observational blog, Bad Nanobot, so check it out.

A few science stories from the road:
The US lags way behind on acceptance of evolution. Only Turkey ranks lower. But when it comes to acceptance of the evils of flag burning, we’re #1 baby.

Toxic dust storms on Mars may poison any forms of life as we know it. If Bush wants a manned mission to Mars, I’m all for it… If we all get to vote on who goes. (But no votes for Florida or Ohio unless they shape up.)

Bendable cat and dog toys issued by a library to student readers were recalled after they were found to contain lead. Perhaps the children were reading a bit too well? “Good reading, Timmy, now play with this kitty and it’ll all be better soon…”

Have some free time? Searching for stardust ain’t just for dreamers and astronomers anymore. NASA’s Stardust project has launched the Stardust @ Home Project (be patient - the site may fail due to heavy traffic). At this site, volunteers can search the electron microscope images of comet dust captured in a foamy matrix called aerogel by the January 2004 mission. The challenge? The researchers estimate that there are about 45 dust particles in nearly a million images. And they’re not even sure what they’ll look like. The reward? If the thrill of scientific discovery isn’t enough for you, the lucky dust particle discoverers will be published as co-author on the resulting scientific paper. And maybe you’ll get to go on The Today Show … Or The Colbert Report … Or The Tyra Banks Show … Okay, I was just kidding about that last one.

After seeing the July 4 shuttle launch from Cocoa Beach, FL last week, I have yet to extract the photos from my cell phone. Most of them look a lot like this.

The coolest shuttle footage I’ve seen so far is from the solid rocket booster camera. There is no audio, so I recommend listening to something spacey while watching. The video is 12.5 minutes long, so here are the highlights: Liftoff @ 1 min, separation of booster and shuttle @ 3 min, plummet towards Earth resolves @ 5.5 min, booster passes through clouds @ 7 min, impact with water @ 7.5 min. The booster and parachute float in the water for the rest if the video; this is uneventful but oddly meditative (especially if listening to said spacey music).

Or, if you think the booster cam is a total drag, check out this footage from the Korean Taepodong missile cam, which is shorter and has lovely audio. If you prefer a CG version, check out this optimistic video showing the US shooting down an Alaska-bound Taepodong 2 long range missile.

That’s a healthy dose of rocket science. Next time I’ll have to get back to nanobots and booze…

A new study shows that drunk people were less than half as likely to see a dude in a monkey suit than sober people. In the test, people were given drinks (or not) and asked to count how many times a ball was tossed in a video of people playing a ball game. During this engaging film, someone in a monkey suit comes to the center of the screen, beats his chest and leaves. Eighteen percent of drinkers and 46 percent of sober people noticed this.

Firstly, less than half of the people noticed the monkey to start with. I’ve heard of this before. It is called “inattentional blindness” and results from focusing too much attention on a single thing, preventing one from noticing unexpected items right in front of you. The Bush Administration knows a lot about this. They might try to get us to focus on, say, flag burning, while diverting our attention from, say, everything else (the war, loss of civil liberties, the national debt). But that’s nothing new.

Secondly, who’s to say the drunks cared about a dude in a monkey suit? Did the monkey have more booze? Were the people in the film throwing around Jager bombs? The drunks were probably like, “Who’s this boring psychiatrist dude trying to make me watch this stupid movie? I bet he never gets laid.” Yeah. Drunks rule. And pirates. Yarrrr.

P.S. Pardon the lack of posting over the past week or two.  I was in Cocoa Beach, FL and I saw the (1st ever 4th of July) shuttle launch from there!  It was awesome.  I will post pictures once I manage to extract them from my not-so-awesome camera phone.

The main camera on board the Hubble telescope has shut down. One of the likely theories: the memory was wiped out by a “cosmic event”. “Cosmic event”? We all know what that means. Clearly the hubble has been decommissioned by evil aliens who didn’t want us using Hubble observations to uncover their world domination plot. NASA doesn’t want you to see this photo, which is the last thing recorded by Hubble’s camera:

Oh, we’re onto you Mr. Alien. You and all of your evil, mind-infesting nano-bot friends.