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The FTE employee-count alone underestimates the impact of national-scale science infrastructure. naic.edu is down right now (I suspect they're busy at the momen

by ISL 6y ago

The FTE employee-count alone underestimates the impact of national-scale science infrastructure. naic.edu is down right now (I suspect they're busy at the moment), but their data is used by tens to hundreds of institutions, each partially employing faculty, postdocs, and students. For agencies like NSF, the science is sometimes almost secondary. What matters perhaps the most is that qualified and capable students continue to emerge from, and sustain, America's scientific institutions. Arecibo has been fighting for its fiscal life since I was an undergraduate in the early 2000s. I couldn't understand then why anyone would want to cut funding to it, as the facility is unique and capable. As a more-mature scientist, I now understand that older instruments sometimes must sadly make way for new endeavors. This collapse is a powerful moment for US radio astronomy. Will the community redirect the funds to promising new instruments, buck up and rebuild an upgraded Arecibo, or use the fleeting prominence of the moment find a way to grow the funding pie and do both? It is embarrassing for the planet's leading scientific nation to have China's larger modern copy of Arecibo (FAST) come on-line in 2016 and our venerable telescope collapse without replacement in 2020. We owe it to ourselves to do better than this.

Arubis 6y ago
Yours is a convincing argument. How do we get better optics on this for the public at large, so as to better present arguments for funding science?
- ISL 6y ago
  It never, ever, hurts to write to your federal representative and senators. They and their staffers do listen and their votes directly determine the funding and oversight for NSF, NASA, and DOE. I don't have great advice for direct advocacy (A billboard that says, "America's scientific infrastructure is collapsing -- fund science now!"?). At the grassroots level, providing opportunities for people to engage directly with science -- outreach, lab tours, science field trips, etc. help people to learn to understand the world around them, engage with science, see the infrastructure, and take ownership. Every time I have given a lab tour, I thank everyone who attends for underwriting the science with their tax dollars. Essentially all fundamental research in the US is funded by you, the taxpayer. We are really, really grateful for the opportunity to learn something new about nature and share it with everyone. Thank you.
- Frost1x 6y ago
  Not to digress too far but the general public at large won't even push to get funding for their own direct interests (e.g. COVID related stimulus right now). I don't know how we expect to get the general public to push for science. Much of our society runs on pure momentum and very few people have the power to slightly shift the direction of that momentum. One of the other large radio astronomy observatories in Greenback is also hurting for funding from what I understand. I've worked on a few collaborative research efforts utilizing the data and working with the observatory and the picture painted doesn't look promising there either. That may have changed more recently given the state of Arecibo.
- the8472 6y ago
  If it works for defense projects... Calculate how many jobs it takes to build a thing. Keep building things. Advertise job numbers?
  - skuhn 6y ago
    It would be nice to fix the societal issue that ties up people's self-worth, status and sheer survival with their job, but that's a much bigger ask. Now you're into things like universal healthcare, UBI, mental health, education, etc. Still, we should work towards improvements on all fronts. I think that in today's world, if you want science to get funded like defense projects, you'll have to embrace all of the grossness of defense projects. Lobbyists, sub-contractors, patriotic jingoism, fear, etc. Look at how we got to the moon.
- intended 6y ago
  Make a vocal, active, involved, interest group? Hacker News, /. for Science? Look - not everything is solved by collective action, nor everything solved by individual action. Your strategy is determined by your terrain. The terrain here is a competitive field for human attention. Arecibo has nothing against dying puppies. The beauty of the stars, the ambition of man? That has some scope. But its still easier to find a few people who will regularly email and talk to your elected representatives, create networks that will work this out. There MUST be some other people who want to contribute to this, and they may have resources other than cash to pool.
- Arubis 6y ago
  Far too late for me to edit, but why was this downvoted? It’s a pretty plain question.
claydavisss 6y ago
A new Arecibo would only generate mountains of more useless data. This isn't a troll. There is nothing we can presently do with incremental data from observatories beyond what we've already collected. We are centuries away from leaving the solar system - if we placed a moratorium on observatory construction for a century, we would still have fifty years to build new observatories in time for the data to be of use. The NSF should be focused on the immediate and pressing matter of environmental degradation.
skuhn 6y ago
I agree that the impact of Arecibo and these kinds of installations is actually very outsized relative to the number of FTE employees who directly work on it. The larger scientific community are the ones who booked time on the telescope after all. My point is that politically none of that matters. No one is getting elected because people got to book telescope time for their research. The incentives are not correctly aligned to support research and science. To go back to the F-35 comparison: the NSF has annual funding of $8.3 billion. The F-35 program is projected to cost $21.7 billion per year through its lifespan (2001-2070). I bet it winds up even higher than that, because nothing has yet changed to prevent endless overruns. So the F-35 makes jobs and maybe a little bit of interesting work gets done as a result of the project despite itself. We as a society could buy so much more than yet another war machine (and maybe not even a useful one) with that money and effort. What could NSF do with another $13 billion every year?
- mumblemumble 6y ago
  > So the F-35 makes jobs... I wonder about that. It's been a while since I studied, but the phrase "deadweight loss" looms large in what I remember of the one economics class I took in college. So I wouldn't be surprised if the program is actually a net negative for job creation. Only that doesn't matter, either, because the point is not to create more jobs; the point is to influence job creation in a way that benefits the people who hold the purse strings. If the cost of doing so outweighs the benefits, that's inconsequential. Those costs are so widely dispersed as to be invisible, immeasurable, and difficult to discuss except on theoretical grounds. They'll never be as compelling as a staged photograph of a senator in a suit and a hard hat, sticking a shovel in the ground.
  - skuhn 6y ago
    I haven't really looked into it all beyond a superficial level, but I certainly think that things like the F-35 program are a net negative to society when viewed at a distance. As another example, I wonder if Wisconsin's sweetheart deal with Foxconn actually had a negative impact on employment. Clearly Foxconn's promised jobs never materialized, but the threat of them coming to town to spend big money may have had a chilling effect on existing or prospective new employers in the area. Back to the F-35 program, the jobs it creates may be deadweight, deadend careers that don't produce real value. And then you can't just have these people unemployed and starving, so I guess we'll need an F-35+1 program for them and their descendents. And so on forever, until we break this cycle. Versus something else that you could buy with the same money that has a future and does create real value (like say, solar panels?). But you're right, its just about the perception of jobs and that photo op.
superkuh 6y ago
> China's larger modern copy of Arecibo (FAST) come on-line in 2016 China's is not really a copy. It does not have transmit capability. What is really missing now in US, and international science is asteroid radar imaging and ranging.
- njarboe 6y ago
  That is not good. Was Arecibo the best instrument for early detection of asteroids? What are we using now?
  - mturmon 6y ago
    Now, we use optical scanning telescopes with a wide field of view, and image differencing. Optical instruments have a wide field of view and don't have the inherent SNR problems that radar does. (I.e., using the Sun to illuminate objects is more efficient than doing it yourself.) As a side-effect, there are all kinds of other transient sources that these scanning telescopes pick up, like supernovae, relativistic jets from AGNs ("blazars"), exotic variable stars, etc. (http://crts.caltech.edu http://crts.caltech.edu) It's a zoo out there! Radar does play a role in orbit characterization, and recovery of object geometry, once the NEO gets close enough. But you can get orbits through optical techniques too. The NASA center for near-Earth objects (NEOs) is: https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/about/search_program.html https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/about/search_program.html NEO close approaches to Earth, tabulated: https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/ca/ https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/ca/. There was a really close one today, actually (a 5-meter object at 0.13 lunar distances). For more about the role of planetary radar in NEOs, search for "radar" in this FAQ: https://www.nasa.gov/planetarydefense/faq https://www.nasa.gov/planetarydefense/faq
- notabee 6y ago
  Yeah. And the transmitter piece has been broken since Maria hit, so we've already gone quite some time without that capability.
- nullc 6y ago
  I think fast is also limited to a much lower frequency than Arecibo due to trading off pointability vs surface consistency-- which it needs in part because its so much further from the equator.
detritus 6y ago
I'd like to think that the near future will allow large space-based solutions in place of Earth-based and increasingly radiowave-polluted ones. A far-side moon solution's probably still quite a way off, but I wonder if some sort of lagrangian or outward-facing satellites in geosynchronous orbit might work. I'm imagining satellites with large Earth-facing shields, sort of like a radiowave version of the sunshield on the James Webb Telescope. I'm probably missing some really obvious Physics 101-level reason that wouldn't work, but a girl can dream.

by ISL 6y ago

Arubis 6y ago

Yours is a convincing argument. How do we get better optics on this for the public at large, so as to better present arguments for funding science?

ISL 6y ago
It never, ever, hurts to write to your federal representative and senators. They and their staffers do listen and their votes directly determine the funding and oversight for NSF, NASA, and DOE. I don't have great advice for direct advocacy (A billboard that says, "America's scientific infrastructure is collapsing -- fund science now!"?). At the grassroots level, providing opportunities for people to engage directly with science -- outreach, lab tours, science field trips, etc. help people to learn to understand the world around them, engage with science, see the infrastructure, and take ownership. Every time I have given a lab tour, I thank everyone who attends for underwriting the science with their tax dollars. Essentially all fundamental research in the US is funded by you, the taxpayer. We are really, really grateful for the opportunity to learn something new about nature and share it with everyone. Thank you.
Frost1x 6y ago
Not to digress too far but the general public at large won't even push to get funding for their own direct interests (e.g. COVID related stimulus right now). I don't know how we expect to get the general public to push for science. Much of our society runs on pure momentum and very few people have the power to slightly shift the direction of that momentum. One of the other large radio astronomy observatories in Greenback is also hurting for funding from what I understand. I've worked on a few collaborative research efforts utilizing the data and working with the observatory and the picture painted doesn't look promising there either. That may have changed more recently given the state of Arecibo.
the8472 6y ago
If it works for defense projects... Calculate how many jobs it takes to build a thing. Keep building things. Advertise job numbers?
- skuhn 6y ago
  It would be nice to fix the societal issue that ties up people's self-worth, status and sheer survival with their job, but that's a much bigger ask. Now you're into things like universal healthcare, UBI, mental health, education, etc. Still, we should work towards improvements on all fronts. I think that in today's world, if you want science to get funded like defense projects, you'll have to embrace all of the grossness of defense projects. Lobbyists, sub-contractors, patriotic jingoism, fear, etc. Look at how we got to the moon.
intended 6y ago
Make a vocal, active, involved, interest group? Hacker News, /. for Science? Look - not everything is solved by collective action, nor everything solved by individual action. Your strategy is determined by your terrain. The terrain here is a competitive field for human attention. Arecibo has nothing against dying puppies. The beauty of the stars, the ambition of man? That has some scope. But its still easier to find a few people who will regularly email and talk to your elected representatives, create networks that will work this out. There MUST be some other people who want to contribute to this, and they may have resources other than cash to pool.
Arubis 6y ago
Far too late for me to edit, but why was this downvoted? It’s a pretty plain question.

claydavisss 6y ago

A new Arecibo would only generate mountains of more useless data. This isn't a troll. There is nothing we can presently do with incremental data from observatories beyond what we've already collected. We are centuries away from leaving the solar system - if we placed a moratorium on observatory construction for a century, we would still have fifty years to build new observatories in time for the data to be of use. The NSF should be focused on the immediate and pressing matter of environmental degradation.

skuhn 6y ago

I agree that the impact of Arecibo and these kinds of installations is actually very outsized relative to the number of FTE employees who directly work on it. The larger scientific community are the ones who booked time on the telescope after all. My point is that politically none of that matters. No one is getting elected because people got to book telescope time for their research. The incentives are not correctly aligned to support research and science. To go back to the F-35 comparison: the NSF has annual funding of $8.3 billion. The F-35 program is projected to cost $21.7 billion per year through its lifespan (2001-2070). I bet it winds up even higher than that, because nothing has yet changed to prevent endless overruns. So the F-35 makes jobs and maybe a little bit of interesting work gets done as a result of the project despite itself. We as a society could buy so much more than yet another war machine (and maybe not even a useful one) with that money and effort. What could NSF do with another $13 billion every year?

mumblemumble 6y ago
> So the F-35 makes jobs... I wonder about that. It's been a while since I studied, but the phrase "deadweight loss" looms large in what I remember of the one economics class I took in college. So I wouldn't be surprised if the program is actually a net negative for job creation. Only that doesn't matter, either, because the point is not to create more jobs; the point is to influence job creation in a way that benefits the people who hold the purse strings. If the cost of doing so outweighs the benefits, that's inconsequential. Those costs are so widely dispersed as to be invisible, immeasurable, and difficult to discuss except on theoretical grounds. They'll never be as compelling as a staged photograph of a senator in a suit and a hard hat, sticking a shovel in the ground.
- skuhn 6y ago
  I haven't really looked into it all beyond a superficial level, but I certainly think that things like the F-35 program are a net negative to society when viewed at a distance. As another example, I wonder if Wisconsin's sweetheart deal with Foxconn actually had a negative impact on employment. Clearly Foxconn's promised jobs never materialized, but the threat of them coming to town to spend big money may have had a chilling effect on existing or prospective new employers in the area. Back to the F-35 program, the jobs it creates may be deadweight, deadend careers that don't produce real value. And then you can't just have these people unemployed and starving, so I guess we'll need an F-35+1 program for them and their descendents. And so on forever, until we break this cycle. Versus something else that you could buy with the same money that has a future and does create real value (like say, solar panels?). But you're right, its just about the perception of jobs and that photo op.

superkuh 6y ago

> China's larger modern copy of Arecibo (FAST) come on-line in 2016 China's is not really a copy. It does not have transmit capability. What is really missing now in US, and international science is asteroid radar imaging and ranging.

njarboe 6y ago
That is not good. Was Arecibo the best instrument for early detection of asteroids? What are we using now?
- mturmon 6y ago
  Now, we use optical scanning telescopes with a wide field of view, and image differencing. Optical instruments have a wide field of view and don't have the inherent SNR problems that radar does. (I.e., using the Sun to illuminate objects is more efficient than doing it yourself.) As a side-effect, there are all kinds of other transient sources that these scanning telescopes pick up, like supernovae, relativistic jets from AGNs ("blazars"), exotic variable stars, etc. (http://crts.caltech.edu http://crts.caltech.edu) It's a zoo out there! Radar does play a role in orbit characterization, and recovery of object geometry, once the NEO gets close enough. But you can get orbits through optical techniques too. The NASA center for near-Earth objects (NEOs) is: https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/about/search_program.html https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/about/search_program.html NEO close approaches to Earth, tabulated: https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/ca/ https://cneos.jpl.nasa.gov/ca/. There was a really close one today, actually (a 5-meter object at 0.13 lunar distances). For more about the role of planetary radar in NEOs, search for "radar" in this FAQ: https://www.nasa.gov/planetarydefense/faq https://www.nasa.gov/planetarydefense/faq
notabee 6y ago
Yeah. And the transmitter piece has been broken since Maria hit, so we've already gone quite some time without that capability.
nullc 6y ago
I think fast is also limited to a much lower frequency than Arecibo due to trading off pointability vs surface consistency-- which it needs in part because its so much further from the equator.

detritus 6y ago

I'd like to think that the near future will allow large space-based solutions in place of Earth-based and increasingly radiowave-polluted ones. A far-side moon solution's probably still quite a way off, but I wonder if some sort of lagrangian or outward-facing satellites in geosynchronous orbit might work. I'm imagining satellites with large Earth-facing shields, sort of like a radiowave version of the sunshield on the James Webb Telescope. I'm probably missing some really obvious Physics 101-level reason that wouldn't work, but a girl can dream.