There are plenty of ways to become a virtual traveler in outer space. Second Life may be the simulation flavor of the week, and NASA may be carving out its own space there, but there's a long history of virtual worlds that give you the feel of the final frontier.

In the wake of last week's story about NASA's involvement in virtual worlds, I received several messages offering a second opinion about Second Life, and a sampling is provided below. Some correspondents rightly pointed out that online space simulations go back to an era when games were played with stolen mainframe moments.

Virtual space adventures have come a long way since Lunar Lander. You can't go wrong with Orbiter, a free sim program that's based on the real physics of spaceflight.

Among the more recent entrants in the field is Space Station Sim, which helps you build and populate a virtual space station. One reviewer called it "a rocket-boosted title that won't break the exploration budget," while another said that trying to build an orbital outpost that passed muster resulted in "more frustration than fun." I have the program at home but haven't yet tried it out myself - so I guess it's time to start launching and find out if I have the Right Stuff.

Another recently released program, Lunar Explorer, uses actual NASA data to create a virtual moon. And if it's interplanetary travel you're interested in, the NASA World Wind project virtually offers you the solar system (as well as Earth).

For an encyclopedic rundown of space simulators, check out the compendium at Clark Lindsey's HobbySpace Log.

Here's a sampling of the messages I've received about Second Life:

Don Mitchell: "Virtual reality is a success today, but I don't think Second Life has been an especially dramatic or innovative step.  Articles in The Register suggest that Second Life is greatly exaggerated (see: 'The phony economics of Second Life').  Personally I found it to be unattractive, and like most subscribers, I left after a couple hours and never returned.

"There have been many high-profile but unsuccessful approaches to Virtual
Reality: the VRML standard, head mounted displays, SIMNET, and a variety of failed 3-D social worlds before Second Life.  The true pioneers of Virtual Reality have been the inventors of computer games.

"Text-based multiplayer games (MUDs) showed that large communities could be built online, and that immersion in virtual reality is mostly a function of the user's mind.  Brilliant software developers like John Carmack ('Quake') and Tim Sweeney ('Unreal') developed efficient techniques for displaying complex 3-D worlds on the PC.  And products like Everquest and World of Warcraft were among the first really successful and compelling examples of multiuser 3-D virtual reality.

"Computer games have driven the high-speed computing and graphics technology of the PC and game consoles.  Along with motion-picture special effects, games are the most economically important application of 3D graphics thus far."

One correspondent dwelled on Second Life's dark side, which I admit I steered clear of during my SL sojourn as Boole Allen:

Tyrel (referring to Second Life and NASA): "Seeing those two phrases together bring tears to my eyes. Second Life is an abomination, explicitly showing all that is wrong with the Internet bundled into a package of pornography and sick fetishes. How the multitudes of reporters somehow don't see the sick sides of Second Life and see it worthy of any sort of reporting is beyond me. (If you want to be 'enlightened' to the true sickness of Second Life, visit somethingawful.com's Second Life Safari).

"What also makes me furious is that programs professionally written in lieu of space simulations barely get the gratification they deserve (such as this masterpiece of space flight simulation) ... while these poorly written, memory leak-ridden, crap programs with hardly enough physics actually programmed into the engine to make a ball bounce partially realistically get front-page articles on major Web sites. This shows that true journalistic research seems to be a thing of the past, or the highest bidder gets the front-page advertisement."

Another correspondent, however, saw a lot of things to praise in Second Life, and his reference to human modification reminded me of our series on the future of evolution: 

Maelstrom Baphomet: "...You are so fascinated with what we do with our environments in the virtual world that you haven't seen the most significant frontier; what we do with our bodies. If the avatars on this game are any hint at what is coming when men master genetics, I don't think the world will belong to what we constitute as humanity in about 1000 years. Instead, you will have a highly modified and modular intelligent life form. ...

"I'll show you places (PG) where dragons roam free and life cycles of their generations are determined by the sun. And we're not talking about human sized dragons.. we're talking about avatars 2-5 times the size of the default avatar in SL. They're built around primative objects that would normally be clothing for the body. Example, a hat is a head.

"Daryth Kennedy is the most dominant artist on the sims in question. She's a longtime friend. I came to her the first night I joined SL in 2005, and I wanted to bring one of my characters to life.  I provided her a picture and she helped me modify her other dragons to create a dragon we called the Maelstrom Dragon. It came packed in a nice little egg you can lay on the ground and grab the contents from. Now the eggs just pass you a pre-organized folder with your avatar and extras. The Maelstrom Dragon contributed to the later creation of the storm dragon, and the character is recognized as the grandfather of the species in a creative sense. The storm was redesigned to a far more aesthetic pure 3-D format with a much brawnier appearance. It now exists in three formats. Hatchling, Wyrmling, and Adult officially. Players, such as myself, have modified them to humanoid variants. I actually find it quite relieving to be something other than human when the opportunity presents itself - as that's what I do every day, be human. There's also a lot of gizmos and trinkets that can be collected and assembled through out SL that can lend an air of magic to the dragons, making them all the more fantasy come to life.

"What people fail to understand is that SL is not virtual reality. It is reality existing in a different state. It's still there, it's just comprised of electrons on a spinning disk, versus atoms on a spinning globe such as humanity is. The characters have souls, it's the souls of the players, giving the creatures on that world life and taking upon themselves a form reflective of their creativity. I am a Christian, and interestingly enough I find this a demonstration of a verse from Genesis where God creates man in his own image. But what is the image of God? God is all powerful, he can make himself whatever he pleases to be ... and true to the script, in this Second Life ... man makes himself in his own image, the manipulable one given by God."

For more about Second Life's religious angle, you'll want to check out today's story in USA Today about the virtual holy season. And if you want to weigh in with your own comments - about space simulations, or about good and evil in virtual worlds - feel free.

Sometimes all you have to do is point to a couple of items, then stand back and wait for the messages to roll in. I'm hoping that will be the case with these items.

• We're running this Associated Press story about the worries that NASA officials and members of Congress have about the "spaceflight gap" - the period between 2010 and 2015 when the space shuttle fleet is retired and the next-generation Orion spaceship is not yet ready for launch. The worry is that NASA might have to rely on (gasp!) the private sector or other countries to provide space services. To be sure, the United States should have its own spacefaring capability, but I'm betting that some people might say the best thing for NASA to do is to leave the spaceship-building business to the private sector. Others might say that the government has to take the leading role in such a risky business. What do you say?
• I was struck by this comment from John in Kansas: "I want to thank you for the occasional postings of amateur astronomy tools - if you could do more of that, I might be more prepared for next year, when I take my kids out to rural Kansas for the first time to look at the moon, planets and stars. So if an astronomy expert has some sound advice on the best (affordable ... which is subjective, I know) available tools and gadgets for seeing craters on the moon, keep 'em coming!" Now if that's not an invitation for feedback, I don't know what is. Do you have any suggestions for John? Leave them below - and if I think of anything, I'll do the same.

EIROforum / CERN

A hardhat worker is dwarfed by the inner workings of the Large Hadron Collider's ATLAS detector. The collider is due to begin operation in 2007.

Even though it's been judged Science's "Breakthrough of the Year," it's a safe bet that people won't be buzzing about the Poincare Conjecture in 2007. Instead, the coming year is bracketed by two paradigm shifts in science, having to do with politics and particle physics.

At the beginning of the year, control of Congress changes hands from the GOP to the Democrats. And by the end of the year, the Large Hadron Collider should be online at last at CERN's headquarters on the French-Swiss border.

You might not think of last month's midterm congressional elections as a science story, but the outcome is likely to have an effect on how a whole range of science policy issues are handled. Here are the three top examples:

• Climate policy: No longer will congressional hearings be used as forums to downplay the issues surrounding greenhouse-gas emissions - a fact of political life that sparked a humorous twinge of nostalgia from researcher Gavin Schmidt at the excellent Real Climate blog. As noted by Grist, Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., is due to take over a key committee on the environment and is planning extensive hearings on the issue - perhaps resulting in legislation modeled on California's greenhouse-gas cap. Even the prospect of change is leading industry executives to jump on the emissions-reduction bandwagon.
• Environment vs. energy: Beyond global warming, the congressional changeover should take the heat off Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Democrats have taken the lead role in staving off oil drilling in the 19.2-million-acre area - and as noted in the Kodiak Daily Mirror, the tide may well turn toward more environmental protection. There might well be more legislation to encourage conservation and renewable energy sources rather than promoting petroleum production. Who knows? Perhaps even the H-Prize, an initiative to boost hydrogen-based energy that has languished in the Senate, will rise again. 
• Stem cell research: The incoming House speaker, California Democrat Nancy Pelosi, says she'll aim to push through stem-cell legislation in the first 100 hours of congressional business - the very bill that President Bush vetoed last year. A measure to liberalize federal funding for research using human embryonic stem cells is a priority for the Senate as well as the House. It's likely that the new legislation would be vetoed again, of course, but will the changing political climate result in a changed outcome?

More generally, the Bush administration has come under criticism for sidetracking scientific assessments that run counter to its policies. In such cases, a Democrat-controlled Congress could offer a bully pulpit to make sure such assessments get a full airing.

Of course, there are two sides to every story when it comes to politics. For climate skeptics, the congressional changeover represents the triumph of "junk science" over sound science. I'm going to refrain from rendering judgment on that score; that's up to you to do in the comments section. But even the skeptics will have to admit that the rules of the science policy game have changed.

Then there's the Large Hadron Collider. If you're not keyed into particle physics or the hubbub over string theory, the name might not be familiar to you. But those who follow the field have been salivating over the LHC for years. (It even plays a bit part in "Angels and Demons," novelist Dan Brown's precursor to "The Da Vinci Code.")

The $1.8 billion LHC should be able to smash particles together with enough energy to unlock longstanding secrets about black holes, the cosmic balance of matter and antimatter, the nature of the Higgs boson (a.k.a. the God particle) and perhaps even the existence of extra dimensions. Virtually every story I write about the big questions in physics ends with the line that the LHC could provide the answer. Heck, some have even worried (needlessly, scientists say) that the LHC will gobble up our corner of the cosmos.

We won't find out about all this next year, of course - but this month, CERN said the collider is on track to start up operations by next December. To keep track of the LHC's progress, you can click on over to the nifty Web portal at Interactions.org, or go straight to the source at CERN.

Now you've got my two picks for the top science stories of 2007. MSNBC.com readers provided their own observations as a follow-up to Science's top 10 list for 2006, as well as my list of top five space stories. I'm afraid mathematician Grigory Perelman didn't get much respect for his topological proof of the Poincare Conjecture:

Jerry: "That's all cool and everything, but I really think that in the time it took for these 'smart guys' to figure out the doughnut and coffee cup math problem, they could have worked on something less important like a cure for cancer or alternate fuel sources. I am pretty amazed to find out that a beach ball has a chance to get a hole in it without ripping, tearing or stretching. I will sleep better tonight."

Jeffrey: "I have to echo Jerry's sentiment a bit in that the mathematical curvature of three-dimensional sphere in relation to the boundary of a four-dimensional sphere really doesn't accomplish any currently discernible effect on mankind. Global warming I believe is a much more noble quest for our science dollars. Now if he can find a way to use Poincare's Conjecture to develop a method for the Earth to act as a doughnut instead of a sphere to dissipate the heat of global warming, as the math has a direct correlation to thermal mechanics, then I will pat Perelman on the back for all the sleep I'll be able to enjoy.

"Aside from global warming, alternative fuel/energy sources would be my next scientific discovery of the year. With the political clout shifting to the scientists, and the adoption of ethanol-based fuels and the development of cellulosic fuel, this has been a landmark year. To think that since the Industrial Revolution we have been essentially using the same energy sources as we did 200 years ago. The years to come will prove to be exciting as we push to alleviate our dependency upon fossil fuels and non-renewable fuel sources.

"The future of science holds promise. I hope my grandchildren will be able to appreciate the distinction between a mug and a doughnut, because the significance is lost on me ... and I understand the math!!"

John G.: "I wholeheartedly disagree with the value or lack thereof we place upon the proof of Poincaré's Hypothesis. The reason I do so is we cannot predict the effect a discovery/accomplishment in one field of the science will have on another field. For instance, if Newton or Leibniz had not discovered/created calculus we could not have formulated classical physics. Without classical physics we could not have created the steam engine, without the steam engine no Industrial Revolution. In fact, without the proper formulation of classical mechanics we would not have automobiles, airplanes, radios, television, Internet, etc, etc.

"If calculus, linear algebra, complex analysis, real analysis and other more advanced math were not discovered/created it would be impossible to formulate quantum mechanics or atomic physics; we would not have MRI machines which help detect cancer, we would not have the physics necessary for chemists to analyze the behavior of molecules which may lead to new treatments for cancer. We would not have the physics necessary to create semiconductors which form the basis for the genetic engineering revolution (analyzing DNA requires computers). In, fact modern chemistry depends upon the results of atomic physics. Without modern chemistry we would not have the tools to create new fuels for our automobiles, and a whole host of other modern amenities.

"So you see, sometimes something as insignificant as a mathematical result may have profound influence upon our world, through physics. In addition we can never predict which mathematical result may lead to a useful discovery in physics, so let us view this result with admiration for one day it may play an important role in our society."

Neal: "I have to agree that until practical use of the proof of Poincaré's Hypothesis develops, we may never know if it's just a footnote or the foundation of future science.

"The movement on alternative fuels was more economics than science. The price of fuel simply rose to pass the 'break-even' point for some of them (until gas prices rise past the alts' production costs, or their production cost drops below that of gasoline, they're only 'interesting' at best).

"But I gave up on these platitudes when the work Professor Frink did on the pickle/condiment matrix as it related to hamburger earmuffs was virtually ignored by the Nobel committee.

"Just call me jaded, I guess."

Meanwhile, regarding the top space stories:

Denis: "[I vote for] the idea of getting more people involved this year in space projects [such as Stardust @ Home]. Also, more countries with the technology and means to do more work is good news. More, please, for the future. Can we have a virtual lab on the space station?"

Fred Richards: " 'Return to Flight' ... There were many extraordinary efforts made to make the phrase a reality. I think passing on the effort and achievement to make this possible is now becoming an assumed norm. Many individuals and companies worked extremely hard (and at little or no pay) to make this possible."

Finally, in light of all the comments that our Science and Religion Symposium generated, I'm going to wedge in this waning month's selection for the Cosmic Log Used Book Club: "God in the Equation: How Einstein Transformed Religion" by Corey Powell. Reviews of the book have been mixed: Some have called the book an understandable, readable account of physics' deepest mysteries, while others have criticized it as giving the science too much of a mystical spin. In any case, Powell's exploration of "sci/religion" seems to fit quite well with the tone of the past week's discussion.

The CLUB Club regularly highlights books with cosmic themes that could conceivably be found on your local library's shelves or at the secondhand-book shop. If you have suggestions for future CLUB Club selections, let me know ... I just might send you a brand-new book.

The mystery over former Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko's death by radiation poisoning is getting curiouser and curiouser, with Russian prosecutors pointing the finger at the managers of a now-bankrupt business empire. It's yet another bizarre twist in a tale that has already entangled the Russian government. But even though the murder investigation is getting murkier, it's no mystery that the murder weapon, radioactive polonium-210, could be produced in virtually any chemistry lab.

Last month we noted that polonium-210 can be found in many walks of life - usually in forms that don't threaten the public. However, some Cosmic Log correspondents observed that the polonium from innocuous products such as anti-static brushes could be extracted to produce a potentially harmful dose.

Over the holiday weekend, self-styled radiation watchdog Walter Wagner said this was indeed the case. I got to know Wagner years ago because of his work with uranium-glazed tiles as well as his concerns about the "Big Bang machine" (a.k.a. the Relativistic Heavy-Ion Collider) at Brookhaven National Laboratory. Here are some excerpts from his letter on polonium-210.

"I began writing about polonium-210 circa 1980. You can find a letter I wrote to the New England Journal of Medicine regarding polonium-210 in cigarette smoke (as naturally occurring radioactive fallout from radon gas in the air that falls onto the leaves of plants such as tobacco) if you Google my name, and Po-210, which should result in [this] Web page. You have to scroll down a ways.

"That article was written, of course, long before I taught myself about uranium tiles. I also point out in that letter the fallacy of statutorily asserting that the RBE (relative biological effectiveness) of alpha emitters is 20 (as the EPA, NRC and DOE regs assert), when at low doses it is closer to 1,000. I won't go into why that is so in this brief e-mail, though I've well-detailed how that error arose in other writings, not yet incorporated into the regulations.

"Anyway, I also read the responses to your article, which were quite interesting, and some from very knowledgeable persons.

"It is true that static eliminators can be used to extract polonium-210 in deadly amounts. The larger eliminators contain millicurie amounts, and 3 millicuries is a nominal lethal dose. Polonium-210 is one of the most lethal materials on Earth if ingested or inhaled (about 63,000 times worse than plutonium; it's simply roughly the ratio of the half-lives), yet it is ubiquitous in the form of static eliminators. Here's a Web site for one source. ...

"I suspect that the regulations will be tightened in the future to provide better control over dissemination of such radioactive sources.

"However, it is not certain that that was the origin of the polonium-210, since Russian reactors make the polonium-210 for the international static eliminator market, and they have worldwide distribution. ..."

I've left out some of the technical material about how nuclear reactors help increase the neutron output - as well as Wagner's detailed instructions for turning $200 worth of static eliminators into a hazardous dose of polonium-210. However, I will pass along Wagner's comment that "anyone with a smidgen of a chemistry background, and some nuclear science background, would be able to do this."

Authorities tend to dismiss Wagner as being too alarmist, about uranium tiles as well as mini-Big Bangs. I have a feeling the same might hold true for polonium-210. But if you ever spot someone suspicious buying up cartloads of static eliminators - consider yourself warned.

Science-fiction tales often fast-forward the pace of evolution to create the big-brained humans of the future - or, for that matter, the big-brained chimps of "The Planet of the Apes." Research published this week in the journal PLoS Biology, however, argues that the more complex your brain gets, the harder it is to evolve further. The subject could have implications for speculation into the future of intelligence.

More than a year ago, we built that kind of speculation into our special report on "The Future of Evolution." Yes, we included a big-brained egghead as one of our options for future human evolution - even though the mere mechanics of having a huge head sitting on your typical human spine would be problematic, to say the least.

The argument against accelerated brain evolution laid out in PLOS Biology has more to do with genetics than mechanics: Researchers compared the pace of evolutionary change in humans and chimpanzees as well as macaque monkeys and mice - and they found that the brainier species exhibited a significantly slower rate of change in genes expressed exclusively in the brain.

"The more complex the brain, it seems, the more difficult it becomes for brain genes to change," the University of Chicago's Chung-I Wu said in a university news release. Why is that? The researchers speculate that with a system as complex as the human brain (or, for that matter, the chimp brain), a mutation is more likely to screw something up than to make it better.

Does that mean that we're pretty much stuck with the brains we have? Well, we can always use them more efficiently - and perhaps even augment them electronically. (Imagine a Bluetooth-enabled Google/Babelfish brain implant, for example.) Come to think of it, the same situation might hold for chimpanzees.

Over the years, scientists have gone back and forth on the genetic similarities between chimps and humans. Last year, geneticists determined that the two species' genomes were 96 percent identical - while last month, another research group said the earlier study overestimated the similarities somewhat.

Could the intelligence of other species be enhanced? Should humans help? Such were the questions I posed almost four years ago in an item titled "Chimp Encounters of the First Kind." Here's a follow-up, sent recently by a Cosmic Log correspondent named Jim:

"I believe higher intelligence is well-documented for those who don't presume otherwise.

"Check out the work done at the CHCI - the Chimpanzee Human Communication Institute at Central Washington University, in Ellensburg, Wash. There humans and half a dozen chimpanzees have been communicating via ASL American Sign Language for decades.

"It's not at all a question of 'if.' The students are researching subtle aspects and context details or somesuch (I'm not into the details). Meanwhile, in the ordinary process of daily caretaking, the staff regularly 'converse' with the chimps. One younger chimp was taught ASL, by the matriarch chimp, with no human intervention.

"I've heard anecdotal stories of interactions which indicate high levels of intelligence and awareness within the chimps. I'm sure this is much better documented in the professional literature from there."

I'm wondering what will happen when someone develops software to translate a chimp's ASL automatically into speech. Would more communication lead to brainier apes? Or are there genetic and neurological reasons for expecting that a chimp could say nothing more cogent than "give orange me give eat"? Feel free to add your observations or citations below.

Ten years ago today, I was muddling through this new thing called online news at MSNBC - while just a few miles away, at a Seattle cancer center, one of science's most eloquent spokesmen was dying. At the time, astronomer Carl Sagan's death was another blip on the news screen. But since then, his influence has, if anything, grown for me and for others - as evidenced by the outpouring of reminiscences on this 10th anniversary.

Cornell Univ.

Carl Sagan, 1934-1996

Many commentators have touched upon Sagan's legacy for scientific skeptics - for example, the idea that in this "demon-haunted world," extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, whether those claims relate to the existence of extraterrestrials or the existence of God. Not so many have addressed his legacy for believers. And that's what I'd like to touch on here.

Throughout Sagan's career, there were frequent parallels between his search for signs of extraterrestrial intelligence and the traditional search for transcendent truth. "Carl thought it was part of the same question," Sagan's widow, Ann Druyan, noted during a recent interview. And indeed, Sagan addressed this in an exchange documented in "The Varieties of Scientific Experience," a recently published collection of lectures:

Questioner: "I'd like to ask you about why you think any omnipotent being would want to leave evidence for us."

Sagan: "I think I entirely agree with what you say. There is no reason I should expect an omnipotent being to leave evidence of His existence, except that the Gifford Lectures are supposed to be about that evidence. And I hope it is clear that the fact that I do not see evidence of such a God's existence does not mean that I then derive from that fact that I know that God does not exist.

"That's quite a different remark. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. Neither is it evidence of presence. And this again is a situation where our tolerance for ambiguity is required. The only thrust of these remarks is for those - and it's by far the greatest majority of contemporary theologians - who believe that there are natural pieces of evidence for the existence of God or gods. And so I have no problems with any of that. And, as you say, if a god existed who gave us free will or merely noted that we had free will, and wished to let our free will operate, then he or she or it might very well give us no evidence of his, her, or its existence for just that reason.

"And this is connected with one of the many little tangents in the extraterrestrial-intelligence problem. In fact, there is a perfect parallel between the two cases. ..."

I'll leave that discourse over the philosophical equivalent of the "Star Trek" Prime Directive for readers of the book to explore (it's on page 238). The point I want to make relates to Sagan's tolerance, his humility, his willingness to keep the quest going. Some skeptics nowadays even question whether Sagan might have been too tolerant of ambiguity. But I think that was a big part of his charm, and a big reason why he was able to prevail over the "wedge strategies" that often crop up in the science-and-religion debate (whether from the Darwin-doubting Discovery Institute or from firebrand evolutionist Richard Dawkins).

Sagan's tolerance shines through in the writings of those most deeply touched by his legacy, starting with Druyan. She reflects on her husband's passing today in the inaugural posting of her own Web log, The Observatory, as well as in this month's issue of The Planetary Report:

"We have traveled ten times around the sun since Carl's death, and our little world is much changed. With his dazzling mind and vast knowledge, what would he have thought of the direction we, as a civilization, have taken in the years since? How might he have campaigned against the forces of darkness and brutality? How many minds might he have opened? During the last ten years, I have longed for the personal Carl of our love, family, and work together, but I have also keenly missed the man who was a global voice for science, exploration, reason, and democracy. Carl's ecological niche has remained tragically untenanted for all this time - and in my opinion, the consequences have been profound."

In his wide-ranging ecological niche, Sagan posed a challenge for believers to act more as if they really believed. At the time, the world was facing an apocalyptic nuclear threat that loomed at least as large as the apocalyptic terrorist threats that hang over us now. He noted that Christianity taught that redemption was always possible and that you should love your enemies, while "an anti-Christian would be someone who argues to hate your enemy and that redemption is impossible, that bad people remain forever bad."

"So I ask you, which position is better suited to an age of apocalyptic weapons?" he said. Or, for that matter, an age of terror threats?

Sagan went on to observe that out of the more than 140 nations on Earth, "not one of them takes a Christian point of view," a situation that Sagan found remarkable:

" 'Do unto others as you would have them do unto you' has a corollary. Others will do unto you as you do unto them. And that encapsulates, among other things, the history of the nuclear arms race. If this can't be done, then I think politicians who are practitioners of such religions ought to confess and admit that they are failed Christians or aspirant Christians but not full-fledged, unqualified, unhyphenated Christians."

Sagan was anything but dogmatic - about belief as well as skepticism. It is his openness to new ideas, his sense of wonder, his quest for justice as well as knowledge, that will keep his legacy alive decades and centuries after his passing. At least the tributes marking today's anniversary give us hope that it will be so.

Which brings us at last to our blog-a-thon bonus. In Tuesday's Log item, I offered up a copy of "The Varieties of Scientific Experience" to recognize the most fitting tribute to Sagan's legacy.

When it comes to pithiness, it's hard to beat this comment from John Forde: "If our intellects are candles, Dr. Sagan is the match that lights the wick." However, in my view, Chris Eldridge should take the top prize - not only for his personal reflections on Sagan's impact, but also for his continuing contributions to the Cosmic Log community. Here's an excerpt from his comment:

"... Science is a contagious inspiration. It affects us in ways we don't even realize. Carl's take on it - his intuitive and timeless perspective - has been a guiding light throughout my life.  His fear of nuclear war…  His disappointment with our caretakership of earth…  The backdrop of history, which added still more perspective…  oh, and dare I forget that damn hypnotic opening music [for "Cosmos"] that would calm Godzilla into placidity…  whatever the magic was…  IT WORKED!"

I'll be sending the book to Chris, and an MSNBC.com goodie bag to John Forde for his contribution. Graze through the comments section of Tuesday's item for the full treatment, and feel free to add your follow-ups below.

As a metaphor for the process of seeking out the truth, the idea of "separating the wheat from the chaff" goes back at least as far as the Gospel of Matthew. Over the past couple of days, readers have stirred up their share of wheat and chaff in response to my report on the apocryphal tales surrounding the biblical accounts of Jesus' life.

Most of those tales - highlighted in the National Geographic documentary "Secret Lives of Jesus" - are definitely chaff, created in the first four centuries of the Christian era. As scriptural scholar Ben Witherington told me, they're the ancient equivalent of Harlequin romances, or you might compare them to the popular "Left Behind" series of novels: that is, riffs on Christian scripture that flesh out the basics with plenty of fiction.

So are such also-ran gospels a fit subject for religious study - or scientific study, for that matter? Read on for a sampling of opinions from believers and skeptics:

Bill: "Are you purposefully trying to provoke Christians? Your statements in this piece are inflammatory and, in my opinion, flat-out wrong. For instance:

"'A lot of these ancient stories have come to be considered heretical.'

"This implies that it took a long time for these errant works to be considered aberrant, when the earliest church fathers didn't at all consider them correct.

"'...illustrates that the gospel story has been added to, fine-tuned and pruned through the centuries.'

"Again, this is flat-out wrong. The earliest scrap of the Gospel of John dates from about 125 A.D., a papyrus fragment from Egypt with five verses on it. You are merely restating the standard Christian-bashing position that our text is unreliable. And that just isn't so. It's one of the most reliable texts in all of history, based on the amount of evidence and copies available. I suggest you read 'The Case for Christ' by Lee Strobel. Claiming that the Gospel story underwent any significant change since about 100 A.D., let alone 'for centuries,' without any countering viewpoint, is reprehensible.

"At this point in your story, your bias and inflammatory language stopped me from reading any further. True, Fox News is probably biased, but MSNBC shouldn't be one to cast stones. Come on, at least once in a while why not give the opinion of a knowledgeable, articulate expert who holds the opposing view."

Ned Goldreyer: "With all due respect, what are the gospels doing as a topic in a science column?  Granted, this is the time of year when journalists either pander to the fairy-tale crowd or face losing eyeballs, but even so, couldn't you have chosen something even slightly closer to what we generally regard as scientific?  I love your clarification of the three kings as 'actually, astrologers.'  Actually, they are characters in piece of fiction and quite probably did not exist at all.  Or did they?  That would be a scientific question.  Hypothesis - The three kings did not exist.  Prove or disprove.  What exactly is your scientific training?  It is not mentioned in your profile.  I would bet good money that you have no scientific credentials at all.  Although I feel fully justified in asking you issue a public apology for this misuse of your position, at the very least, I would appreciate a response defending your reasons for writing on this subject."

I told Ned in an e-mail that I've chatted over the years with a fair number of scriptural scholars - admittedly, on hot-button topics such as the Gospel of Judas and the rehabilitation of Mary Magdalene - and that we've historically put these stories in the Science section (along with stories about the founding of Rome, and so on). The intersection of textual and archaeological studies with popular culture is part of our bread and butter here, whether we're talking about the Bible or Newton. I also said I make no claim to being a trained scientist - just a trained journalist (whatever that means).

My use of the word "actually" is just meant to say that Matthew was actually referring to astrologers rather than kings in Matthew 2:1. Yet another reader focused upon that reference to the Three Kings in his comment:

L. Mark Thomasson: "The Bible does not mention how many 'Kings' or 'Wise Men from the East' there were, simply that the gifts were gold, frankincense and myrrh. Some assume that there were three Kings because of the three gifts - not likely.  Another common misconception is that an 'eye for an eye' justifies retribution, but is actually meant to limit the punishment imposed.  Many other misconceptions abound - but God said it best: 'For a lack of knowledge (ignorance) my people perish.' We are responsible to seek God out and study his Word."

Terry Brandli: "With all this talk about the season, and historical Jesus, too bad at least one of these shows doesn't explain the facts that Jesus Christ wasn't born on December 25th. And that the most accurate date is April 19.  The early Christian church was more worried about gaining members then about being truthful. They picked a prominent pagan Roman holiday as the day to celebrate the birth of Christ, hoping that would help entice more people into their church. Another thing I think that is bad about the way the Christmas holiday is celebrated is the fairy tale about Santa Claus.  To tie the birth of mankind's savior with a big commercial lie like Santa Claus and teach it to every little kid in the country, is not a good way to teach the message of Jesus Christ and the Bible. Evidently, the commercial interests and organized religion can't handle the truth."

Greg Charles: "Every few years, people like to drag out these so-called new truths about the Bible. The fact is they aren't new and there are few facts to be found in them. There were lots of weird people back then, like there is today, who like to twist the scriptures to make them conform to what they want to believe. That is why these teachings were rejected at the Council of Trent. They are not true. A true follower of Jesus not only believes what is written, but obeys it. When we do what the Bible says, great things happen. I have seen lots of phony things, but I have also seen the true power of God. I have seen and experienced many miracles, healings, casting out of demons, etc. Some of the things I've seen are medically documented. I bring this up because in the book of Mark it says that these signs will follow those that believe. They will lay hands on the sick and they will recover, they will cast out demons, etc. Jesus meant what he said."

Matthew: "Have you ever read Irenaeus' 'Against the Heresies'? I wish you would before you make assertions of this nature:

"'Did we say four Gospels? Actually, in the early centuries of the Christian church, there were quite a few more than Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.'

"Yes, there were other, heretical gospels that circulated, but they were written by Gnostics, not eyewitnesses and associates of the apostles.  Please read this book. If you would like more information you can contact Concordia Theological Seminary in Fort Wayne, Indiana."

Reading Irenaeus is tough sledding, but scholars have used such critiques to date the ancient apocryphal works. For example, Irenaeus' scornful reference to the Gospel of Judas in "Against the Heresies," which dates to about A.D. 180, has been cited as evidence that the controversial Gnostic work is at least that old.

Even the evangelist Luke says that "many" people drew up accounts of New Testament events, based on information "handed down to us." That would imply there were plenty of secondhand stories floating around even in Luke's day.

Here's a little equal time for the Gnostics:

Kathleen Mary Hensley: "To base my spirituality and religion on a book and/or a church solely is not something I can choose to do; while a lay person scientifically and religiously, I have thought deeply about the nature of the universe and have come to conclusions about the nature of reality due to reason, science, intuition, religion and spiritual experiences. For me, the universe is a vast puzzle wherein both spiritual consciousness and physical matter/energy co-exist. We do not yet have or see all the pieces nor understand all the connections, but time will tell - and someday we will understand our nature, the nature of the universe (cosmos) and God's nature (which is bound to be far more surprising than any of us can now imagine!).  Someday, the entire puzzle will fit together and make a whole picture - this puzzle is our very lives, our meaning and we must fill in all the blank spaces between matter, energy and spirit to understand who we truly are, what our souls are and what God is. This will take centuries to happen. We are yet children in grade school who think ourselves adults.

"As a Gnostic Christian, not only in philosophy but in experience, I do not believe it is the historical Jesus that matters to me, for the physical universe does not matter, it is an illusion, a matrix of energy and matter that is both interesting and distracting - and very, very temporary. It is the spiritual reality of Jesus fascinates me ... does he still exist, can he influence me now? what is his nature ? I found he does exist, he does influence and his nature is sublime and divine.

"It is the spiritual realms that I find fascinating, and it is the experience of his presence, mystically, that proves his love and mercy for me - He is in all things, my friend and companion on the road. This experience I have had time and again.

"You, as a scientist, will say there is no such thing as mysticism or mystical experience - but are you sure ? do you know all the laws of the universe and consciousness, do you know how to weigh the spirit of a woman and measure the depths of my soul? Can you say with certainty that there is no spirit, no consciousness outside of the mind?  It is foolishness to think you do understand everything that is and can be ! We are a evolving species, evolving physically, emotionally, mentally and spiritually towards what end we do not know. No one person has all the facts, all the possibilities, all the truth.  It is not what we know in the 21st century that amazes me, it is what we do not know and what we can not yet even imagine that fascinates me. ..." 

Even Pontius Pilate asked the question, "What is truth?" The gospel truth was brought up by several of the correspondents:

Leroy: "It's always interesting to hear rationalizations and explanations from those whose futures would be better served were there no Jesus the Christ.  They simply can't afford for the true Gospel to be what it actually is - true. For, if it is true, then their fiery disposition is a certainty and not a myth.  Somehow, those odds just don't add up to common sense - do they?"

Harold Thomas: "I read your article entitled 'How the Gospel Story Grew in the Telling.' If I understand it correctly, it expresses what most of the liberal biblical scholars have said for years in reference to Christ and the origin of the Bible itself. That 'drum' has been beaten long and loud for many many years. But it reflects only one view of the issues. Why? Could it be that the alternative view places those that hold the liberal position squarely in the camp of infidels, agnostics and atheists - all of whom never believed one iota of the Bible for even one split second and all of whom never wanted to believe that there ever was a literal historical character called Christ in the first place? Many people have believed that if you repeat a lie long enough and with enough fervor it will come to be accepted as the truth by the masses of the human race. So the liberals shout the idea that the gospel story 'grew' (i.e., developed over many years) as the story was repeated from generation to generation.

"But history reveals that the gospel records that the early church accepted as 'inspired' and 'historically accurate' were all written within less than 100 years of the time the events they depict and describe actually took place. The authors of the four gospel narratives were known and recognized by the early church that received their writings. The Apostle John, speaking for himself and for the other apostles and inspired writers, says in reference to Christ and what had been written about Him this: 'That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our own eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life.'

"A significant number of the members of the church were 'eyewitnesses' along with the authors of the gospel narratives, and doubtless would have raised serious questions about any material in those narratives that might have been less than accurate accounts of the facts. In addition to this there were many nonbelievers alive who witnessed a significant amount of what the gospel narratives contained. Their writings support the accuracy of the biblical text and provide independant verification of the gospel narratives' historical reliablity.

"All in all, I would suggest that before you take it upon yourself to tell your readers 'How the Gospel Story Grew in the Telling' that you devote a little time and a little research in the area of biblical inspiration as well as works that deal with how we got the Bible and the current state of the biblical text. I would be willing to recommend a few works dealing with these issues by recognized competent conservative scholars. But even if you did consult these, I would still not feel very comfortable about a 'science editor' commenting on issues clearly outside his field of study."

At the end of all this winnowing, I was desperate for some redemption - and thankfully, a longtime Cosmic Log correspondent provided some welcome words:

Dennis McClain-Furmanski: "I've been a fan of Jesus history for most if my life. In fact I turned down a scholarship to the Methodist seminary at Valporaiso to follow a path that eventually led to becoming a scientist. It is very difficult to present the viewpoints of both belief and history without either attempting to reconcile them, or risk saying something that one side or the other finds insulting. Your article accomplishes this superbly. I can hardly recall ever seeing such a masterful presentation of even-handedness on this topic, and certainly never in the 'popular' media. More than ever, I applaud your work."

Feel free to continue the discussion in the comments section below, or by joining in the discussion in our online forum on the history behind religion.

The results are in: This year's top gift for science geeks, decided by a decidedly unscientific survey, is the spinthariscope - one of the few toys out there that's truly nuclear-powered.

The Wikipedia entry calls the spinthariscope a "now almost entirely disused scientific device for observing individual nuclear disintegrations." The principle behind the palm-sized contraption was discovered by accident more than a century ago by William Crookes, who noticed tiny sparks of light when he looked at the interaction of radium and zinc sulfide under a microscope. That observation led him to create a palm-sized device that takes its name from the Greek word for "spark" ("spintharis").

Nowadays, the spinthariscope is basically an educational toy: If you take the sealed container into a darkened room and look through the magnifying lens, you'll see the same sparks that caught Crookes' attention way back when. The flashes are created by alpha particles, the same type of radiation involved in the continuing polonium poisoning mystery. But don't worry: The toy spinthariscope is considered safe.

Some people claim to have constructed homebrew versions of the device, and the occasional antique item does come on the market. But United Nuclear - yes, the same company that sells tiny samples of polonium-210 - appears to be the primary source for spinthariscopes nowadays. That's the outlet recommended by the winner of our "Geek Gift" contest, Mnementh of Callahan, Fla.:

"The gift for the No. 1 Geek on my list this year is the Spinthariscope. Nothing says "Merry Christmas" like a nuclear-powered toy. For the younger geek (geekling?), I'll get some of the nifty phosphorescent powder and make a seriously funky nightlight. Beats the heck out of Barbie."

Mnementh's suggestion not only came out on top of the Live Vote runoff, but it earned high praise from one of the other Geek Gift competitors, Brian Glanz of Seattle:

"Even I wanted to vote for the Nuclear Spinthariscope! Put the fun back in science and encourage hands-on learning. It's only too bad United Nuclear can't process more orders in time for the holidays, but it'd be worth the wait. Nice find, Mnementh, and congratulations."

Mnementh's victory earns the big geek grab bag, filled with geeky T-shirts, gewgaws and software. And for putting in such a great effort (as well as being so sportsmanlike in defeat), Glanz will get a scaled-down version of the grab bag containing MSNBC.com trinkets.

I should mention that some of our correspondents sent in great Web links to more geek-gift resources - including ThinkGeek, Ken Murphy's "Best of the Moon 2006," the build-it-yourself Science Toys Web site and Nick Greene's About.com gift guide for space and astronomy enthusiasts.

But wait ... there's more: My blogging colleague here at MSNBC.com, Gael Fashingbauer Cooper, has provided some fantastic change-of-pace suggestions with her gift guide for entertainment junkies. Sign me up for that Homer Simpson talking-head cookie jar!

With that, I'd like to wish the winners, the also-rans and the readers here a happy Hanukkah, a merry Christmas, a peaceful Hajj ... and a wonderful holiday season.

Sometimes it takes a geek to buy a gift for a geek. Well-meaning friends and family members may be thinking along more traditional lines for that special someone - say, a nice sweater or a diamond pendant - when what the science junkie really wants is a glow-in-the-dark planisphere watch or a Foucault pendulum. That's why we put out the call last week for science geeks to send in their favorite gift suggestions - with a geek goodie bag offered as an enticement. I've put together a selection of nine suggestions, and now it's your turn to pick the winner.

Check out the descriptions below, then click on over to our thoroughly unscientific Live Vote to cast your ballot. Your criteria could include what you'd like to get as a gift (assuming you're a science geek), what comes off as the most novel (or most bizarre) suggestion, what seems to be the best buy, what stands out as the most educational gift, or what promises to be the most fun.

The top gift suggestion as of noon PT on Friday will earn its submitter a selection of trinkets that only a geek could love, including an MSNBC.com baseball cap, T-shirt and pen; a "Geek" T-shirt in hacker black; a selection of gaming software and relativity-related multimedia; Einstein's "Relativity" and other geeky books; a SpaceX Falcon T-shirt and a Rocket Racing League pin.

As you can see, a lot is riding on your choice - so choose wisely from among these nominees:

• Aerogel jewelry: I'm willing to bet that, on a pound-for-pound basis, aerogel is rarer than diamonds. Aerogel is the bizarre glassy material that's 99.8 percent air, and Aerogem has encapsulated little samples of the stuff in pendants as well as keychains and other gewgaws. The material has been used in space probes such as the Stardust comet-sampling spacecraft and the Mars rovers. If you're getting some for me, I favor my aerogel unadorned (say, from United Nuclear or The Aerogel Store on eBay) - that's the best way to experience just how weird this "solid smoke" really is.
• Nuclear-powered toy: United Nuclear's spinthariscope contains tiny flecks of zinc sulfide and radioactive thorium ore, sealed inside an aluminum-and-plastic capsule fitted with a viewing lens. Alpha particles released by the ore interact with the zinc sulfide to create flashes of blue-white light that can be seen through the lens. Yes, alpha radiation plays a role in the headline-grabbing spy-murder mystery, but the spinthariscope "is completely safe for both children and adults to use," United Nuclear says. As our Cosmic Log correspondent noted, "Nothing says 'Merry Christmas' like a nuclear-powered toy."
• Metal-detector rover: M.D.G. from San Francisco suggests a magnet-equipped toy robot from Target. A "treasure alert" lets the rover operator know when the contraption has come across something metallic. "It's a metal detector!  It's a remote-control vehicle!  This metal detector rover looks like way more fun than putting a magnet to something to learn about the magnetic properties of different materials," M. writes.
• Build-it-yourself robot: If you have visions of robots dancing in your head, it may be because you can't get this video of the Robonova dance team out of your brain. A correspondent from Idaho says robot-building is the true mark of geekhood. For some, that means jumping into the LEGO Mindstorm maelstrom. "But if you truly have the need to freak your geek, then the ultimate build your own automaton would be Robonova-1 from Hitec Robotics," our geekworthy Idahoan writes. "Although it is on my list, I will be hoping it does not decide to take over my job or become our new robot overlords! Speaking of which, you can buy your RoboGeek in your family some light reading material - "How to Survive a Robot Uprising: Tips on Defending Yourself Against the Coming Rebellion" by Daniel H. Wilson - and then hope you survive!"
• Dot-matrix wallet: Why go with a ho-hum leather wallet, when you can stuff that geeky Christmas stocking with a genuine Tyvek wallet modeled after that vintage blue-and-white computer paper we all know and love? Dynomighty has designed this wallet without stitching and promises that the look "will get your old daisy wheel spinning again." The wallet is covered with dot-matrix-printed numerals "so you'll always have a reference to the first 3,000 digits of pi," writes our correspondent, A.B. Chalmers.
• Video watch: "If you don't have a watch that plays videos, how geeky are you?" writes Paul, a correspondent from New York City. It's hard to take issue with that. This USB-enabled offering from ThinkGeek plays videos on a 128-by-128-pixel screen, plays and records audio - and oh yes, it even tells time.
• "Genius phone": The next suggestion is from Seattle's Brian Glanz, who already deserves some sort of prize for thoroughness. He recommends the UTStarcom XV6700 or PPC6700, a phone that combines Wi-Fi with EV-DO cellular service and Bluetooth device connectivity. "At long last, your geek will be completely (un)wired," Glanz declares. It's also an MP3 and video player, a camera, a handheld computer, etc., etc. "They can be expensive, depending on the plan you choose, but other phones can be even more expensive," he writes. Check out the comments section of the original "Geek Gift Guide" item for details and other recommendations from Glanz.
• Pop-can cooling pad: This beverage cooler plugs into a USB port on your desktop computer and keeps your Jolt Cola (or any other canned drink) at a cool 45 degrees Fahrenheit while you tap away. A Cosmic Log correspondent from Montana called the offering from Perpetual Kid to our attention. "They have other USB gadgets that are slightly less useful - such as heated gloves!" the correspondent writes. "Are people working on their PCs outside??"
• Light-up moon: L. Stremler from San Diego says he plans on "giving the moon" this Christmas. The What On Earth Catalog says the "Light-Up Moon in My Room" is "a lunar model that moonlights as a night light. An authentically detailed moon with craters and dark and light patches automatically begins to glow when the sun sets." It could be just the thing for the next generation of lunar explorers.

Review the suggestions, then head on over to our Live Vote and register your choice. We'll recognize our top Santa Geek on Friday.

Now we have learned that James Kim, the CNet senior editor and occasional MSNBC cable-TV guest, did not survive his Oregon wilderness ordeal - and many of the messages coming in to MSNBC.com are in the nature of condolences for the family. CNet has set up its own "In Memoriam" Web page, but in light of the interest that you all have shown in the saga of the Kim family, we thought it appropriate to provide another opportunity, right here, to express your sympathy.

Over the past couple of days, we've debated what the Kims did - or might have done - to survive, and you're certainly welcome to continue discussing the best ways to be prepared for a road emergency by adding your comments to our "Saved by a Cell Phone" item. This particular posting, in contrast, is expressly for offering condolences. Please don't submit critical comments. In this case, they will not be approved.

Update for 9:40 p.m. Dec. 6: Friends of the family have established a Web page -  http://jamesandkati.com/ - which provides an address for e-mail to be forwarded to the family, as well as information about donations. Here is a statement issued to the media by the people who put together the Web site:

"The friends and community of the Kim family are deeply saddened by the news received today about James Kim. We want to send out our utmost thanks to the Search and Rescue teams who risked their lives in the efforts to bring James back to us, they are true heroes to risk their own lives for a stranger. As friends we know that we did everything we could to help in the search for the Kim family, which is our only comfort now. We thank the Oregon authorities, the media, and everyone who sent us their thoughts and prayers for their support through this very difficult time. Please continue to keep Kati, Penelope, Sabine and the rest of their family in your thoughts."

- Scott Nelson Windels, friend of James and Kati Kim and family

What part did Albert Einstein's first wife play in the origins of E=mc² and all that? First we had the allusion to the years-long debate over mathematician Mileva Maric's role ... then we had the argument against Maric's involvement from physicist/author Allen Esterson ... then we had the other side of the argument from Senta Troemel-Ploetz, speaking up for Maric ... and now we have a closing rebuttal from Esterson:

"I have only just seen Senta Troemel-Ploetz's response to my comments posted on Cosmic Log and my critique of her 1990 article, so my response is a little belated.

"Troemel-Ploetz writes that John Stachel is in a tradition that 'always attributes achievements to men even if the men themselves claim their wives were the authors.' She evidently knows nothing of Stachel's writings, which show that he is far from being the kind of person she characterizes in this way. His concern in relation to Mileva Maric is that 'exaggerated claims for her role on the basis of the present evidence can only do a disservice to her memory' ('Einstein from B to Z,' 2002, p. 37).

"In her comments Troemel-Ploetz fails to address what she is purportedly responding to and merely repeats arguments that have been rebutted by Stachel and me. Her omission of a crucial part of Stachel's argument makes her statement amount to a caricature of his position. On Cosmic Log I wrote: 'Leaving aside the work they did together on heat conduction, the topic they both chose for their diploma dissertations at Zurich Polytechnic, John Stachel has documented a score or more instances of Einstein's writing "I" or "my" in regard to the material in question. For instance, against the one occasion that Einstein wrote of "our work on relative motion" there are a dozen instances of his writing "I" or "my" in regard to the same subject matter - which, in any case, at that time involved classical Galilean relativity, not the groundbreaking special relativity principle he arrived at only in 1905.'

"Why does Troemel-Ploetz never mention the following sentences in Einstein's letters?

• "'I also wrote to Professor Wien in Aachen about my paper on the relative motion of the luminiferous ether against ponderable matter' (28 Sept 1899)
• "'I'm busily at work on an electrodynamics of moving bodies, which promises to be a capital piece of work' (17 Dec 1901)
• "'I spent all afternoon at [Professor] Kleiner's telling him my ideas about the electrodynamics of moving bodies.' (19 Dec 1901)

"Summarizing Stachel's full argument, whereas on the numerous occasions on which first-person singular pronouns are used in relation to this topic Einstein is alluding to specific ideas or work, the single use of 'our' in reference to 'relative motion' is unspecific (letter 27 March 1901). It occurs in a context in which he is seeking to reassure Maric about concerns she has that acquaintances might be saying 'bad' things about her, and reflects his desire at that time to draw his beloved in to his extra-curricular ideas that dominate his activities. Furthermore, in not one of her surviving letters does Maric respond with any mention of any extracurricular work or ideas of her own, nor in the two instances where we have her letters responding directly to Einstein's containing his ideas on physics does she so much as mention what he had communicated to her. On this issue it is important to examine all the evidence in its entirety, and draw conclusions on that basis, not simply select whatever items provide some support for one's position.

"Please note that Stachel and I are not downplaying Maric's role at that time as an eager and valued listener to his ideas, a companion when reading physics books he had sought out, and an occasional assistant in this process. But in the absence of a single document in which Maric mentions any ideas of her own on extracurricular topics, we don't believe there is any hard evidence that she made substantive contributions to his work, and certainly no evidence that she contributed to the celebrated papers of 1905.

"For a full response on this particular issue, see the comprehensive discussion in Stachel (1996, PDF file) and in my online article "Mileva Maric: Einstein's Wife."

"Troemel-Ploetz quotes Einstein: 'How happy I am to have found an equal in you (eine ebenbuertige Kreatur) who is as strong and independent as I am.' Does Troemel-Ploetz really think that a sentence like this in a letter by someone passionately in love with his beloved can be taken literally? (The 'strong and independent as I am' part was, unfortunately for Maric, not subsequently borne out, demonstrating that the sentence has no evidential value.) Einstein saw himself and Maric as nonconformists who rejected conventional views. Significantly, the two immediately preceding sentences refer to his pleasure at what he sees as their joint rejection of 'the philistine life,' so the context does not justify taking the sentiment in question to refer to academic ability.

"Troemel-Ploetz quotes Einstein: 'Until you are my dear little wife, we want to eagerly work together scientifically so that we won't become philistines...' In the overall context of the documentary evidence, with its complete lack of indications of independent ideas in physics by Maric, this is consistent with Einstein's fond hopes for their life together to be a joint pursuit of science rather than any reflection of actual joint achievements already attained. Furthermore, Troemel-Ploetz omits a single word at the end of the sentence that puts a slightly different complexion on it. Einstein finishes with '..., gellst' [as reproduced in Collected Papers, vol. 1, doc. 131]. This adds a note of tentativeness to the sentence [it roughly translates as 'right?' as given in the Collected Papers translation] missing in Troemel-Ploetz's version omitting that final word. She also fails to mention that in the immediately preceding letter Einstein writes, 'Soon you'll be my "student" again, like in Zurich,' which gives some indication of their actual roles when they were both at Zurich Polytechnic.

"Troemel-Ploetz writes: '[Maric] had the same training and more than Einstein.' Presumably she means by this that they both studied for a diploma for teaching mathematics and physics in secondary school. Many thousands of people of that age had the same 'training' as Einstein, but this says nothing of their capabilities or achievements. (What she means by 'and more' is anybody's guess - unless she is referring to the fact that Einstein was in the habit of skipping classes to follow up his ideas in physics.) One relevant fact that Troemel-Ploetz omits to mention is that, whereas Einstein was precociously gifted at mathematics, and later obtained grade 11 in the mathematics component of the final Diploma exam despite his neglect of the subject, Maric's early promise was unfulfilled, and she obtained only grade 5 on a scale 1-12, less than half of the grade of the other four candidates in their group. And despite Troemel-Ploetz's attempt in her writings (and in the 'Einstein's Wife' documentary) to play down Maric's Diploma failure in 1900, the fact remains that on the grading system 1-6 her overall final Diploma average grade approximated to some 18 percent less than Einstein's, whereas his was only some 11 percent below the candidate with the top overall grade average (though as the latter majored in mathematics they were not strictly comparable). Of course exam marks are far from everything - but in Maric's case we have nothing else to go on but her Polytechnic grades as a measure of her abilities.

"In historical investigations such as this one must be guided by the hard evidence, not (as Troemel-Ploetz writes) by what is 'plausible,' or 'for all we know.' Nor should we take (as Troemel-Ploetz does in her 1990 article) as serious evidence the mostly third-hand statements obtained many decades after the event from interested parties taking nationalist pride in what they fondly believe to be a Serbian achievement.

"In his book 'Don't Believe Everything You Think' (2006), Thomas Kida reports the research of two psychologists who secretly recorded a meeting held in Cambridge, England. Two weeks later, the participants were asked to write down everything they could remember. Among other gross inaccuracies in their memories, many participants 'remembered' hearing comments that were never actually made. That puts into perspective the utter unreliability of thirdhand reports provided decades later, largely on the basis of which Troemel-Ploetz wrote in her 1990 paper that 'If it were not for the cultural imperialism of the U.S. academic establishment, it might be known in Princeton what is known in Novi Sad [the Serbian home town of the Maric family] - that Einstein-Maric was the scientific collaborator of her husband.' (Troemel-Ploetz, 1990, p. 415)"

This all may sound like a tempest in a teapot of scientific history, but the debate takes on extra interest in light of more contemporary debates over women in science. Are the days of gender discrimination in science and education far behind us, or do women still need to break through the glass pipette ceiling?

We've gone back and forth over the role that Albert Einstein's first wife, Mileva Maric, may have played in the development of the special theory of relativity. Did she help her husband with the concepts or mathematics behind the theory? Or was Albert simply being generous when he referred to "our work"? We've heard from Allen Esterson, a physicist and historical author who's skeptical that Maric had much of an impact, and now I've gotten the other side of the story from Senta Troemel-Ploetz, a German linguist and author who has championed Maric's role:

"Dear Mr. Boyle: I am very sorry to be so late in answering - I was in Israel, actually reading the newly released Einstein correspondence and being the first person to do so, and then on a lecture tour in Germany. Your e-mail reached me when I could not read all my mail.

"As to your question: I do not know Esterson. Is he a historian of science, or just another physicist or journalist turned Einstein expert, without being able to read German or knowing anything about the historical context of women studying in Switzerland around the turn of the century?

"A case in point is [John] Stachel, who explains the "our work / our paper" in Einstein's letters with Einstein being in love, i.e., not meaning what he says. He is in a tradition that always attributes achievement to men even if the men themselves claim their wives were the authors. John Stuart Mill was still said to be in love when he argued his wife was a co-author - his wife was long dead.

"More importantly it seems that neither Stachel nor Esterson take Einstein at his word when he says even stronger things:

• "How happy I am to have found an equal in you (eine ebenbuertige Kreatur) who is as strong and independent as I am."
• "Until you are my dear little wife, we want to eagerly work together scientifically so that we won't become philistines...."
• "When I look at other people, I realize what I have in you / what mettle you are made of."

"Einstein-Maric was Einstein's first critic, a most important function for anyone, but especially a dialogic creature like Einstein. She was with him 24 hours from January 6, 1903 on, i.e., during the most important years before the so-called annus mirabilis. She had the same training and more than Einstein. It is plausible that she was his collaborator, his intellectual and emotional support. For all we know, she may have done what Sophie Taeuber-Arp did for Jean Arp: 'to translate his ideas into reality.'

"It is quite possible that the 'our,' written very early in their collaboration, is an understatement rather than an overstatement for what happened once they were married. ..."

Later, Troemel-Ploetz wrote an addendum:

"Sophia Yancopoulos, an American physicist, speaks of the 'subtler issues of collaboration,' and we are far from knowing much about them. What we do know is that again and again the work of creative women was appropriated by men in the arts and the sciences, and men who fairly give credit to their female collaborators are the exception. Einstein was a very normal man, as I said in New Orleans anno 1990."

Feel free to add your further comments about Mrs. Einstein and her math below.