No anagrams please! I am neither pleased nor amused by them.

This is not a game.... we are talking about getting real answers to questions this species has had since we first had minds to appreciate the sky.

Craig

My edit in the post you are quoting (and which you left out) was made within the hour of my first posting it, and addressed both those issues.

Any true detection at this point is only going to be regarded as a candidate detection, but as was previously pointed out, all the true and false detections together, at some point early on, will add up to a number higher than just the statistically anticipated false detections. Without being able to say exactly which detections are real, the Kepler team will be able to say about how many planets they have in the data. Whether they share this information any time soon, or only want to release confirmed planets at a later date, remains to be seen.

We're less than two days away from the first science data downlink! I don't think anyone expects the data to be released for quite some time. But hopefully we'll have confirmation that it was at least received.

First, everything is OK, and the first precious load of science data is safely on the ground.

Back on June 15th, there was a hiccup when Kepler went into safe mode for a day and a half. Some science time was lost, but they anticipated having this happen a few times during the mission.

Download occurred on scheduel, and the quarterly spacecraft roll was executed successfully.

I expect that somewhere in download number one, there are a few small golden nuggets to pan for. But it'll take some more buckets of data to sort out the "fools gold" from the real.

Mission managers report

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/kepler/n...m-20090707.html

.

latest update

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/kepler/n...m-20090723.html

Sadly, this latest "update" tells us nothing except that there hasn't been another safe-mode event. I realize they have their reasons (as I've said before) but it's a pity they can toss us a bone or two.

--Greg

Patience, Grasshopper. (And no more safing events sounds mighty good to me!)

Thank you, wise and quiet neighbor. :-) Perhaps I should invite you and Van over for a beer sometime.

--Greg

Hey - I totally understand the impatience. I think Kepler is my fave mission right now (and isn't it cool that we have so many to choose from?!), but it's definitely not an instant-gratification mission. Cassini, Messenger, half-a-dozen (well, close enough) Mars missions... lots of pretty pictures to just go ooh! and aah! over as soon as they're downlinked. Kepler... not so much. But when the missions scientists get done massaging the data into something they can release - man-oh-man! In a way, Kepler's a thousand (or more!) planetary missions in one. Just thinking about it gets the salivary glands going. Now where's my drool bucket?

Yes, patience is a necessary commodity here. I do not want hints, or anagrams (with due apologies to the great Galileo, living, as he did, in a time when the truth could get you killed).

I want the data and the truth that delivers.

Will be interesting in a year to compare Kepler results to Corot. Are the lack of planet detections by Corot a factor of instrumental effects or obervational hindrance, or real? Kepler will weigh in on that.

RV studies predict approximately 30% solar type stars have terrestrial mass planets in inner regions.
Why does Corot refute that?

The truth is what matters The universe does not care what we want.

Fascinating times ahead.

Craig

It also gives us what we don't expect!

See KEPLER forum where I stand partly corrected... looks like instrumental effects limited COROT's yield.

page 6 of..
http://fr.arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/0907/0907.5150v1.pdf

Craig

Should have said COROT above, not KEPLER.

Craig