On Saturday, August 30, 2014 10:38:28 PM UTC+1, Stephen Paul wrote:

I'm not convinced that anyone, anywhere has a clue what turns other

people on for any endeavor. All we really do is share our stories and

look for patterns. But more importantly we need to be honest about

whether we are amateur astronomer, or merely hobbyist star gazers.



That displays an enormous amount of dignity which is uncommon for not all see existence through the same eyes as another . It is no less astronomy to identify celestial objects,magnify them and photograph them than it is to translate observations into a coherent narrative whether it is the actual structure of the solar system and galaxy or cause and effect relating our own planet's motions to terrestrial sciences.

We, as a race, have come out of a very dark place where there were people who imagined horrible things such as 24 hour days and rotations falling out of step across the annual cycles but that has more or less been fixed and will remain so as long as the purpose of the leap day/rotation is put in context of the planet's orbital motion and the number of rotations within 4 annual circuits.


After years of poking around the sky, doing some imaging, and trying

every type of mount and finding system there is, I don't presume myself

an astronomer. I'm just a mere mortal sky-watcher, who in the infamous

words of someone here in SAA years ago, "just likes to look at stuff and

say 'neato'".


Do so with pride however leave room for those who condense long term imaging into more accessible form where long term motions are put in context.

Life is immortal in that nothing is lost when the spirit inside us engages with the bigger picture and lights up areas of study and observation that turns life into something much bigger than our physical senses can separately deal with,it is,in fact - Musica universalis.

This is a balanced view.