"Don't tell Public of Doomsday Asteroid", reads the headline in today's The Times, while The Independent warns: "Armageddon Asteroids best kept secret."

The Internet (Drudge Report, etc.) and fringe websites are already brimming with gloating links to this asteroid-cover-up story while doomsday prophets and conspiracy-theorists can't believe their good fortune: "We've told you so!"

What happened? How could a harmless NEO panel generate conspiracy- advocating headlines around the world that will seriously damage the integrity of the NEO community?

The international media coverage is dominated by statements by Geoffrey Sommer, a RAND researcher who has been studying the social and economic implications of the impact hazard.

At the root of the problem seems to be an AAAS press release that triggered most of the international 'cover-up' reports. According to the press release, Geoffrey "takes the controversial stance of advocating silence and secrecy in the event that a warning would come too late and not make a difference to the outcome."

This is, of course, a highly contentious proposal that has already backfired. The harsh reaction is not surprising since most interested observers are either dubious or even hostile to the whole idea. After all, how would we assess and who would decide whether or not an impact warning is "too late"?

Too late for what?

Geoffrey qualifies his strategy with reference to a hypothetical 'extinction-type impact' that cannot be averted: "If you can't do anything about a warning, then there is no point in issuing a warning at all. If an extinction-type impact is inevitable, then ignorance for the populous is bliss."

I find this hypothetical scenario absurd for a number of reasons. First of all, the likelihood of being confronted with such an event in the near future is as good as zero. But - for the sake of argument - let us say such an object would have been discovered. In such a case, we would be confronted with a host of complex problems and dilemmas:

For a start, after discovery, we would not know for quite some time (perhaps weeks, months or years) whether or not the object would actually hit the Earth. In fact, the impact probability might go up to 50% before plunging to 0%! I don't think any expert would seriously argue that a 5-10km asteroid may be spotted only weeks before impact. In all likelihood, we would have years of warning.

But even in the unlikely event that time for any deflection attempt were too short, how can we be certain that the impact would really cause mass-extinction, including the extinction of the human species?

After all, we might not have sufficient information about the object's size and composition. In short, even with little time left for mitigation, many activities could be undertaken by the world community to attempt human survival after a global disaster.

To tell the truth, the advocated secrecy, far from being 'cost-effective' as Geoffrey Sommer oddly claims, would most certainly preclude any such survival attempt.

Evidently, the 'extinction-type impact' scenario is a red herring. So what really lies behind this thinking? It would appear that Geoff Sommer is not so much concerned about the cost-effective handling of the apocalypse but about the future management of notoriously tricky impact risk uncertainties.

"When a problem arises with high uncertainty, there is an opportunity to spin the problem to avoid global panic." That's what this whole business is all about: Not the conjured certainty of Doomsday but the genuine uncertainty of potentially problematic future impact risk assessments!

That Geoff is not bothered whether we will meet our demise in an orderly or untidy fashion is palpable in other statements he gave to the press:

"If an asteroid or comet is found to be bearing down on Earth, what would you tell the populace to avoid widespread panic? One panelist, Geoff Sommer, wonders if authorities should say anything at all. Some elements of society would thrive off such knowledge, he said, including British tabloids, cultists long announcing the end of the world, and potential survivors who might want to buy up land for a future tourist attraction.

But limiting panic and avoiding the premature financial collapse of the stock markets would be additional benefits to secrecy."

Geoffrey seems earnestly concerned that British tabloids, the Southern Baptists and future property developers might benefit from too much NEO information.

While this whole argumentation looks utterly ridiculous to me, it does - unintentionally - raise one fundamental (while highly unlikely) question: Since there may be impact survivors, isn't it is our ethical obligation to do everything in our power to inform the public as soon as necessary so to increase the chances of human survival? I, for one, firmly believe it is!

Which brings me to my final point: Why bring up this conspiracy proposal given that any attempted secrecy is totally futile in the first place?

Astronomers from around the world can easily access and confirm observational data and calculations of any discovered NEO in any case.

The damage, however, of contemplating a cover-up stratagem will be immense: it will strengthen the erroneous but widespread suspicion that some members of the NEO community are more concerned about covering-up or "spinning" than explaining the facts truthfully.

The price we will pay for the increased mistrust this episode is causing is very high. In fact, it is much higher than any of the inadvertent asteroid scares of the last 4 years. I fear it will also be more difficult to repair the damage it has done to our integrity.

Dr Benny Peiser is a social anthropologist at Liverpool John Moores University, UK. He is the editor of the Cambridge Conference Network. Readers interested in the real rather than imaginary quandaries of dealing with future impact risk emergencies can read his careful analysis online.

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