How do we keep Hubble up there?

Great idea,.

DustyFree
"Ralph Hertle" wrote in message
...
Impact9:

Impact9 wrote:

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So the question is what can we do to keep HST running till a new space
telescope is in place?

Thoughts?



In the spirit of Free Enterprise I say that NASA should begin a program of
auctioning off its programs and assets.

Auction the Hubble Space Telescope.

Prior to that private firms such as Ebay or the New York Times or the Los
Angeles Times or other firms could be selected consultant bidders to
administer the auctioning process.

Use the funds to provide a little seed money for the next program.

NASA probably won't get peanuts for it in the market. Its the spirit of it
that counts. I say that they might get $100k, and there might be a
separate
channel for donations. Beneficent donations could add to another $100k.

Ultimately, the HST would be left in orbit, disintegrate in the
atmosphere,
or go into a hyperbolic open orbit. If it is ultimately owned by or
retrieved there should be some proviso that the related intellectual
property be kept by NASA, and that NASA property not be sold to any of a
long list of tyrannical governments.

NASA could initiate a program of selling off its other business
enterprises
at auction. For example, the print/email/internet publication, NASA Tech
Briefs, should also be sold to private enterprise. The funds could be used
for the continuation of some lost programs that need funding until they
expire. The publication should get a nice piece of change.

NASA has a huge store of patents and secret technology. All the stuff that
is, or is potentially, of a military nature should be placed and protected
at at a new agency: e.g., NASA/Military, e.g., for spy satellites and
military programs. Peaceful stuff, e.g., medical, electronic, nutritional,
utility, aerospace, or chemical intellectual property should be sold. Or
give the rights to the employee or contractor-employee(s) who created the
ideas, or sell the rights to private assignees for a price.

NASA should scrap its manned Mars mission plans. Plans to explore or
settle
the solar system by Christian conservatives or the USA should be scrapped.
The Moon base and private projects are plenty of work for all.

If the military needs Moon for bases, antennae, weapons, or intelligence,
NASA should go there. Thats year 2050 at least. Forget any quick and dirty
cheap shots at Mars. Pick up the Hubble on the way and place it in orbit
at
the Moon. Better - shove into the Sun. Bring along a suite of multi-mirror
multi-wavelength (whatever) reflector telescopes to install on the Moon.
That would be a more useful and exciting path for science than a manned
Mars.

The Moon has far better lighting for photography and exploration.

The USA and NASA could set up a geodesic survey grid system with a few
accurately placed surveyor's monuments. Individuals, private firms and
private universities from free nations could bid for the land and own and
develop the land or build businesses. Private firms from all nations
except
listed tyrannies could bid on or homestead the land parcels of varying
triangular or square sizes. Foreign nations could buy land for their
consulates, and they could see after the interests of their own private
citizens.

Local laws could be set up, and that opens a number of new chapters in
law.
Local legislators could start with a ban on vocational licensing, e.g., on
the educating, testing, licensing and bonding of Ornamental Art Plasterers
such that the Texas legislature attempted to cast into law.

The USA administration pragmatist Conservatives (read neo-liberals) should
be prevented from setting up socialist, e.g., government owned and
operated
business enterprises on the Moon or anywhere else for that matter. The USA
should develop the government of the Moon as place where protected liberty
should be the norm.

A true free enterprise trading system could be set up, and that is based
on
non-coercive taxation and private ownership. In a tax-free environment
that
uses only volitional means of raising exclusively Moon-related government
revenues private investment would flow freely to the Moon-related
enterprises.

The amount of science that would be done would be stupendous.

What about the HST? What's its orbit, and could it be repaired years
later?

By the time the politicians could possibly complete a grandiose political
schedule and land pragmatist-socialist-creationists on Mars, the greatest
free enterprise telescopes and scientific apparatus ever created could be
in place on the Moon.

Multi-terabyte images in GA, XR, UV, VL, IR, and RF wavelengths could be
made. A new term may be needed for spectral depth per pixel. Could VL iron
lines be found at extreme red-shifted wavelengths in the RF wavelengths?
Oops. That would be politically incorrect and such experiments would never
be funded by the current politicians. Iron in the RF?...that's extending a
concept by application in the Euclidean straight line way...however,
that's
too stressful and that is probably also to no avail.

We respect the achievement of the HST, and its creators are our friends.
Give its creators new funding, hopefully private enterprise, for Moon
based
super telescopes, and lets get all their names in the press as heroes.
Movie producers do it, and so why not science?

The reader may recognize the fact that the Moon is the best solid
geological telescope base and has the clearest telescopic seeing of any
place yet found in the universe.

Ralph Hertle

Tim Killian wrote:

Despite all the nostalgia around these parts, IMO Hubble is an
antique that needs to be retired.

And you know more than these people?:
http://www.nap.edu/catalog/11169.html

Interestingly, some members of the committee who were not initially in
favor of saving Hubble came to see the value of the science it produces
and, most importantly, the value of the science it could produce if
serviced.

I say take the money that NASA would use for Hubble servicing and
instead design and launch modern hardware to replace its functions.

Too late. Game over. The anti-HST brigade has lost. NASA has now
committed to saving HST. The money has already been allocated in the
budget. They haven't yet decided whether it will be via human or
robotic means, but it will be saved. Congress and the public will
ensure that NASA keeps its committment.

Dusty wrote:
Maybe the "majority of working astronomers" could get a job and get off the
Fed dole and support the HST from their profits and give back some tax cuts
on their own. BTW, who are these "working astronomers"?


Me, for one. If we're making "profits" from astronomy, doesn't
that mean we're shortchanging all those university students
that most of us are trying to educate at minimal cost? I know
of one astronomer in the last 20 years who's been able to afford his own
sizeable research-grade telescope - and that's because he went
to grad school after several decades as a Wall Street financier...

It is possible to argue consistently that such fields as astronomy have
no place in federal funding. But then one must deal with the probable
outcome of the fact that this is clearly not a position that will be
taken in some technologically advanced countires, and that brain
drains do have collateral effects. I'm not sure it would cause
anything but heat (as opposed to light) to have the "how many astronomers
is enough" argument.

Bill Keel

You must have missed the post-election edict out of OMB. NASA's budget
is going to be cut by 5%-10%. Watch as the Hubble servicing mission is
one of the first projects with its neck on the chopping block.

wrote:


Too late. Game over. The anti-HST brigade has lost. NASA has now
committed to saving HST. The money has already been allocated in the
budget. They haven't yet decided whether it will be via human or
robotic means, but it will be saved. Congress and the public will
ensure that NASA keeps its committment.

Old bird? How many of us keep our scopes for 15 years? A lot, I would
bet, especially if we like them.

Gotta write your congressmen and senators on this one. That is the only
thing that can save the Hubble.

Dusty wrote:
So the question is what can we do to keep HST running till a new space
telescope is in place?

At this stage, all it takes is money.
Talk to your local congressman.

In the spirit of Free Enterprise I say that NASA should begin a program of
auctioning off its programs and assets.

Who's going to buy it?

NASA probably won't get peanuts for it in the market. Its the spirit of it
that counts. I say that they might get $100k,

You are right. The Gov is very bad at auctions. The bureaucrats want it
to be over quick, so they ask a few pennies or less on the dollar. It's
a bad decision unless the satellite was really pure junk which Hubble is
NOT.

What is missing is insight and intuition. There are many institutions
around (e.g the Arizona telescope that even OSU throws money at every
year). A consortium is required to be formed to fund it. I say HST is
NOT dead, just an orphan waiting for a foster family to chance by.
Go for it, folks!!

Ultimately, the HST would be left in orbit, disintegrate in the
atmosphere,

The clock is ticking.
Anyone know its hypothetical decay date? Does it need a boost in the
near future?

at auction. For example, the print/email/internet publication, NASA Tech
Briefs, should also be sold to private enterprise. The funds could be used
for the continuation of some lost programs that need funding until they
expire. The publication should get a nice piece of change.

Consortium is better.

NASA should scrap its manned Mars mission plans. Plans to explore or settle
the solar system by Christian conservatives or the USA should be scrapped.

Let the Pope fund that one!

If the military needs Moon for bases, antennae, weapons, or intelligence,
NASA should go there. Thats year 2050 at least. Forget any quick and dirty
cheap shots at Mars. Pick up the Hubble on the way and place it in orbit
at the Moon.

A generation from now.

Better - shove into the Sun.

No way!

Local laws could be set up, and that opens a number of new chapters in
law.

Money first, then Law.

Local legislators could start with a ban on vocational licensing, e.g., on
the educating, testing, licensing and bonding of Ornamental Art Plasterers
such that the Texas legislature attempted to cast into law.

Keep the politicians out of it. They will destroy it!

The USA administration pragmatist Conservatives (read neo-liberals) should
be prevented from setting up socialist, e.g., government owned and

see what I mean!

By the time the politicians could possibly complete a grandiose political
schedule and land pragmatist-socialist-creationists on Mars, the greatest
free enterprise telescopes and scientific apparatus ever created could be
in place on the Moon.

ditto.

We respect the achievement of the HST, and its creators are our friends.
Give its creators new funding, hopefully private enterprise, for Moon
based super telescopes, and lets get all their names in the press as heroes.
Movie producers do it, and so why not science?
The reader may recognize the fact that the Moon is the best solid
geological telescope base and has the clearest telescopic seeing of any
place yet found in the universe.

interesting observation!


Angelo Campanella
--
--------- www.CampanellaAcoustics.com ---------

"Every day, we perform on the stage that we set yesterday." AJC.

Gil wrote:
Old bird? How many of us keep our scopes for 15 years? A lot, I would
bet, especially if we like them.


It's not the optics that fail in Hubble, but many other little things.
And you don't keep your scope in outer space.

Gotta write your congressmen and senators on this one. That is the only
thing that can save the Hubble.


Ah .. but can they, or will they, read those writings?

Phil

Phil Wheeler wrote:
Gil wrote:

Old bird? How many of us keep our scopes for 15 years? A lot, I would
bet, especially if we like them.


It's not the optics that fail in Hubble, but many other little things.
And you don't keep your scope in outer space.

The current problem Hubble has is its gyro's. They are the weak link in
the instrument. I think that one has current failed.


Gotta write your congressmen and senators on this one. That is the only
thing that can save the Hubble.


Ah .. but can they, or will they, read those writings?

Phil

In article ,
Phil Wheeler wrote:

Old bird? How many of us keep our scopes for 15 years? A lot, I would
bet, especially if we like them.

It's not the optics that fail in Hubble, but many other little things.
And you don't keep your scope in outer space.

And now it's the other things that need fixing. What's your point?
Hubble remains a uniquely capable resource; no replacement for it has
even been planned. (JWST will work in the IR, assuming it doesn't get
axed next.)


Gotta write your congressmen and senators on this one. That is the only
thing that can save the Hubble.

Ah .. but can they, or will they, read those writings?

It seemed to get their attention sufficiently to save the space
transportation act at the last minute last year. Second to
conversations at townhall meetings, letters are the constituent
communication that get the most attention. Phone calls are not bad.
Email is too easy to send and thus is discounted. (I'm considering
communication from constituents here, not lobbyists.)

Tim Killian wrote:

You must have missed the post-election edict out of OMB.
NASA's budget is going to be cut by 5%-10%.

I'll wait until 07 Feb when the budget is actually released. A lot of
people are running around and making a fuss over a rumor originating
from unnamed sources, that NASA has yet to confirm the validity of.