Voice from the past

On Wed, 12 Sep 2012 22:30:48 -0600, Chris L Peterson
wrote:
On Wed, 12 Sep 2012 23:02:43 +0200, Paul Schlyter
wrote:

It's really weird that the amateur has "plenty of time". It's the
pro
who can devote himself full-time bto bastronomy. Most amateurs
must
make their living on something else and only have their free time
to
do astronomy, a fre time where.most find other competing
activities,
like family and friends.

Not so. Professional astronomers have MUCH less observational time
than amateurs. The number of amateur astronomical instruments
observing the sky at any time is several orders of magnitude greater
than the number of professional instruments. Professionals continue
to
rely on amateurs to detect many sporadic events, as well as to
monitor
many things which require significant observation time but not very
large apertures (things like occultations, asteroid rotation data,
and
the occasional Jupiter impact).

The number of amateur instruments actually used is unknows. True,
there are many of orders of magnitude more amateur instruments than
pro instruments, but most amateur instruments end up being stored in
a closet or a garage. A lot of pro instruments are mostly unused too,
of course, but I'm positive the utilization rate is considerably
higher for pro instruments.

Then we have the case of amateurs using a pro telescope which
otherwise would have been unused. Does that count as an amateur or a
pro telescope?

On 13/09/2012 11:41, Paul Schlyter wrote:
On Wed, 12 Sep 2012 22:30:48 -0600, Chris L Peterson
wrote:
On Wed, 12 Sep 2012 23:02:43 +0200, Paul Schlyter
wrote:

many things which require significant observation time but not very
large apertures (things like occultations, asteroid rotation data,
and
the occasional Jupiter impact).

The number of amateur instruments actually used is unknows. True, there
are many of orders of magnitude more amateur instruments than pro
instruments, but most amateur instruments end up being stored in a
closet or a garage. A lot of pro instruments are mostly unused too, of
course, but I'm positive the utilization rate is considerably higher for
pro instruments.

Depends on the pro instrument. There are long observing waiting lists on
the high end kit, but you could probably find an old 1m class instrument
with no technical support lying idle somewhere most nights.

I don't doubt that a lot of telescopes end up as glorified door stops.

Then we have the case of amateurs using a pro telescope which otherwise
would have been unused. Does that count as an amateur or a pro telescope?

It is even more ambiguous for university astronomical societies and
nearby clubs which frequently do get to look after long retired former
world class professional grade telescopes of one sort or another.

Some have even been advanced amateur, professional, amateur like the one
at Salford Observatory that was built by the owner of Alvin cars for his
hobby, then later donated to Manchester University at Jodrell Bank and
finally rehoused to Salford as an amateur instrument.

--
Regards,
Martin Brown

On Sep 13, 6:27*am, Chris L Peterson wrote:
On Wed, 12 Sep 2012 19:41:31 +0200, Paul Schlyter

wrote:
Not even close. Amateur imagers with modest equipment regularly
produce images that rival or exceed the best that professional
observatories can create. Amateur cameras are as good as
professional

Does that include the best professional images from the Hubble Space
Telescope?

It does. The HST is just one telescope, and there are tens of
thousands of interesting targets it has never been aimed at- targets
for which the best aesthetic images in existence are from amateur
imagers. It doesn't matter how good the capabilities of an instrument
are if they aren't applied.


You almost believe what you say yet when the HST clearly shows that a
planet turns in two ways to the central Sun with the lessons applied
to the Earth for climate and seasonal purposes,there is not an
astronomer in sight !.

http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/arc...99/11/video/b/

Is there some person who can enact a simple analogy using a broom
handle to imitate constant axial alignment while walking/orbiting a
central object as a point of departure for applying lessons for
discriminating Earth's largely equatorial climate from the polar
climate of Uranus with the clear distinction falling along the lines
of little latitudinal fluctuations in annual temperature (equatorial)
as opposed to large fluctuations over large areas of the planet
(polar) with the Earth tending towards the equatorial end of the
spectrum.

With the Earth's polar coordinates approach the circle of illumination
as the North descends into polar darkness while the South polar
coordinate turns into a polar dawn and more than 6 months of
daylight,this concept doesn't need the idea of amateur/professional -
it is just a part of life on this planet.

Setting meaningless agendas for 'amateurs' is really an exercise in
empirical self-congratulation,astronomy is so vibrant that even those
who thought themselves clever by staying out of the forum are
returning because there isn't anything else out there as productive
and creative that this newsgroup.

On 12/09/2012 22:02, Paul Schlyter wrote:

When was a scientific paper last published which was mostly based on
visual astronomical observations?

Best I can find on a quick search of ADS is 2000 with

http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2000JAVSO..28..116T

But it is in JAVSO rather than a major astrophysics journal.

"Naked eye" as a phrase turns up a bit more often eg

http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2012ApJ...753L..31A

And in ApJ too but in the context of how bright the GRB was.


--
Regards,
Martin Brown

On 9/8/2012 8:54 PM, Davoud wrote:
Jan Owen:
It's been a long time, but I thought I'd just drop in here, & see how many of
the old gang are still around... I never intended to leave SAA; but my ISP
dropped newsgroups, and I didn't really try hard enough to find alternative
ways to get back on board... I'm just as involved in amateur astronomy as
ever; just in somewhat more isolation than when on SAA. Sure miss those old
days...

Nice to "see" you.

For better or worse, I'm still here, more as a lurker than as poster
these days. I've got the flat-earth/geocentric Solar System/human
fossils-on-Mars psychopaths kill-filed, so I see very little traffic.
The problem is that too many of the good and knowledgable folks cannot
resist responding over and over again to the nut cases as if a rational
explanation were a magical cure for a psychosis.

I also don't post so often any more because if one says something
offensive or controversial such as "My, isn't this a lovely day. I hope
you enjoy it and may all your skies be clear," one will come under
relentless attack and receive elegant mathematical proofs that this not
a lovely day, and, in fact, it is the kind of day that only an idiot
like me could enjoy.

If I post a link to an astrophoto that I have made someone who doesn't
know a filter wheel from a Barlow lens will be quick to inform me that
it is the worst astrophoto that ever could be, even though someone said
the same thing about my last astrophoto. So I don't do that anymore,
either.

Actually, I still prefer to see the imperfect works of amateurs. It's
the effort that really matters. It also keeps it real for those who are
thinking about getting into, or back into imaging, with modest equipment
under imperfect conditions.


In fact, even though climate change is a hoax, and the climate in the
Mid-Atlantic states has not changed in the 6,000-year history of the
Universe, /something/ is taking away my clear nights and I haven't even
made a night-time astrophoto in about a year. I blame the /perceived/
change on gay marriage and women having the right to vote.

I would venture to guess that you will disappear again for your own
good, and continue to remember the good old days.

FWIW, I apologize. I've taken steps to stop my senselessness.

In article ,
Paul Schlyter wrote:
On Wed, 12 Sep 2012 22:33:49 -0600, Chris L Peterson
wrote:
On Thu, 13 Sep 2012 05:27:16 +0200, Paul Schlyter
wrote:

I agree with that. I merely argued against the claim that amateur
pictures are better than any picture which a professional
observatory
**can** create. Such a claim is clearly absurd.

I was referring to aesthetic images from ground based telescopes.
And that claim is not absurd.

Why are professional telescopes unable to create aestetic images?

1) Narrow fields of view

2) You won't get a telescope-time grant to take images in extra
filters for aesthetic reasons; if you can get by with one image in the
FW814 filter on Hubble then that's what you have. It's fortunate that
the (narrow-band) filters you want for looking at the chemistry of
nebulae are reasonably close to RGB so you can get a reasonably
colourful result. Likewise you'll have great difficulty getting
grants for pictures of uninteresting space around an object to end up
with an attractive composition for the mosaic.

Telescope time allocation committees may well say 'the galaxy is
basically radially symmetrical, we'll give you two lines through the
nucleus rather than a mosaic of the whole galaxy'

3) Professionals are more interested in, say, proper motions or
colour-colour diagrams or weak-lensing measurements than in producing
aesthetic images


A solution to 3) is that the Hubble Legacy Archive lets anyone
download the FITS files associated with any observation done more than
six months ago, and some gifted amateurs have assembled really very
beautiful images from the scientific data: see something like
http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/arc...eases/2012/40/ . I think
the people doing that are amateur astronomers in any meaningful sense,
even if they don't own a pair of binoculars and couldn't star-hop to
NGC3607 to save their lives.

Tom

On Thu, 13 Sep 2012 12:16:31 +0200, Paul Schlyter
wrote:

Why are professional telescopes unable to create aestetic images? I
can see no reason why it should be that way. True, pro astronomers
don't focus on aestetics, because that's not their job. But it cannot
be impossible!

Where did I suggest that professional telescopes can't be used to
create aesthetic images? What I said is that they are no better at
doing so than amateur equipment. Amateur imagers are not being
outclassed by professionals.

On Thu, 13 Sep 2012 12:26:05 +0200, Paul Schlyter
wrote:

Claiming the opposite extreme is no better. Of course there is some
value to amateur contributions. But to claim that amareur images are
"better" (in some undefined way) than **all** professional images
just doesn't make sense!

I agree. Of course, I made no such claim.

If he's hoping to discover new planetary satellites visually, he's
definitely wasting his time.

Who suggested that was their goal?

On Thu, 13 Sep 2012 08:36:32 -0600, Chris L Peterson
wrote:
If he's hoping to discover new planetary satellites visually, he's
definitely wasting his time.

Who suggested that was their goal?

Nobody afaik. It was just an example of a field where visual
observations have become hopelessly obsolete. No-one does this even
for pleasure anymore.

On 13 Sep 2012 13:30:51 +0100 (BST), Thomas Womack
wrote:
Why are professional telescopes unable to create aestetic images?

1) Narrow fields of view

Narrowb field images aren't always ugly.


2) You won't get a telescope-time grant to take images in extra
filters for aesthetic reasons;

True, you won't get a science grant for artistic purposes. But it can
still happen, by accident and if the astronomer also has an eye for
aesthetics. It's not completely impossible.

There are also a number of completely or partially abandoned
professional telescopes with plenty of free time available, where you
could take any additional images you might want.