Ah, the Magnitude system for quantifying the apparent brightness of stars...a case of tradition trumping simple logic.

Usually, a higher number is assigned to something that's bigger, brighter, faster - whatever. But in the case of the system of magnitude, it's the opposite. The lower the number, the brighter the star (or planet).

I understand the idea of a hat-tip to the ancients, in this case Greek astronomer Hipparchus, who devised a system of noting brightness. Originally, the idea was that a brighter star was a "class one" object, a less-bright star a "class three" and so on. Fine and dandy.

But 19th century astronomers took this ball and ran the the wrong way with it. They expanded and refined it, but based it on the odd notion that smaller numbers should represent greater magnitude. Nice work, geniuses.

If you have a 40-watt bulb and a 60-watt bulb, which is brighter? So why couldn't scientists base magnitude on a scale that, logically, would assign a higher number to a brighter object?

Maybe they were afraid to offend a few dead astronomers.

 I'm undertaking a new study of astronomy, thanks to a college textbook, and of course there's the required measurements in metric units.

Sure, metric is easy, if everything is expressed that way and you're used to it. But I think in terms of the system used in the U.S., and trying to mentally picture metric units is difficult.

One thing about astronomy is that the distances usually discussed are so great that terms such as kilometers become rather insufficient anyway. Quite often, even an Astronomical Unit (the mean distance between the Earth and the Sun, 93,000,000 miles) is small potatoes in this big universe of ours.

Oh and by the way, that's 93,000,000 miles, not kilometers.

Gregg Easterbrook puts fears about a possible Avian Flu pandemic into perspective in this article.

Easterbrook points out that while we cringe in fear of a possible outbreak, 6 million of died from various diarrheal diseases, and we barely bat an eyelash. Rotovirus alone has killed an estimated 1.5 million people.

While it is better to overreact than underestimate any potential threat, we need to realize that comparisons to the Spanish Influenza outbreak in 1918 are not really accurate. In those days, as Easterbrook points out, the world was ravaged by several years of warfare. And of course, medical technology is not as advanced as it is today. In addition, subsequent large-scale flu outbreaks (1957, 1968) came during times of relative peace and prosperity and hence were far less virulent. Better health and nutrition also contributed to curb the effects of those pandemics, and would factor in muting any devastation wrought by a possible Avian Flu pandemic.