When authorities and psychologists get the opportunity to examine the thoughts of a criminal mastermind, they normally jump at the chance.

That's why the FBI should allow the release of the papers of Ted Kaczynski, better known as the Unabomber.

Kaczynski recently asked the FBI to release personal papers, a bomb and other materials seized in his arrest. He wants the items sent to a University of Michigan archive which already has more than 15,000 of his papers.

Kaczynski was sentenced to four consecutive life sentences. He is serving them out in a federal maximum security prison in Colorado without the possibility of parole.

As long as the FBI approves the release of the materials, which include an autobiography, scholars should be able to examine the papers and see what made this man mail out bombs from 1978 to 1995, killing three people and injuring 23 others.

An educational institution such as U-M and the community around it can benefit greatly by adding Kaczynski's personal items to the university archive.

Criminal justice students can use Kaczynski's manifesto to see what makes some criminals tick. Psychology students can make case studies out of it. Historians can examine pieces of history up close. And government officials can use it to examine the mind of a terrorist.

And if people are afraid some person would use the manifesto to emulate Kaczynski, police can read it and predict how the criminal will react - best defense is being prepared.

Besides, if some crazed person wanted to make a bomb, he or she could easily get their hands on a copy of "The Anarchist's Cookbook,", a book that shows one how, regardless of whether Kaczynski's bomb is released.

The fact of the matter is Kaczynski was a criminal. But he was well-read and well-educated, with an undergraduate degree from Harvard and a doctorate in math from U-M. To see why he committed his crimes would be a huge advantage to people who investigate crime.

It also is a part of U-M's history.

His actions are quite deplorable, but the university should be able to study the writing of one of its graduates.

It would be sure to draw visitors, too. People are fascinated by the man known as the Unabomber, along with other serial killers.

Books have been written and movies have been made about killers such as Jeffrey Dahmer and Jack the Ripper.

Many people still remember the police sketches of a white man in a hooded sweat shirt, sunglasses and a scraggly beard identified for so long only as "the Unabomber".

And for those who don't, this is an opportunity for the younger generation to learn about Kaczynski and why he kept a nation on edge until the FBI captured him in his cabin.