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Wow. When I started reading this comment I thought it was a joke. We're going to keep operating a scientific instrument just for a reality show? Sofia, like a
by andjd 4y ago
Wow. When I started reading this comment I thought it was a joke. We're going to keep operating a scientific instrument just for a reality show?
Sofia, like any telescope, is a tool that we use to learn about the universe. It has a cost to keep running, and that cost needs to be weighed against alternative uses for that budget.
The primary benefit of SOFIA over ground-based telescopes is that you avoid a level of interference and distortion from our atmosphere. Space-based telescopes offer the same benefit, with the additional benefit of not subjecting the optics to turbulent air. With the advance of adaptive optics on ground-based telescopes and with private space companies competing to bring the cost of a launch down, there are probably more cost-effective solutions to the problems SOFIA was designed decades ago to solve.
- jacquesm 4y agoYou missed his point I think. We would not be keeping a scientific instrument 'just for a reality show', we would use the reality show as a way of preserving the instrument.
- Multicomp 4y agoCorrect, thanks, I will try to be more succinct and clear about my comments in the future. We are losing afaict unique scientific capabilities with this shutdown, the least we can do is document it well so the next multi billion dollar project to regain said capabilities has clearer acceptance criteria.
- Tarragon 4y agoSOFIA gets above most of the water vapor in the atmosphere allowing it to do IR astronomy that ground based telescopes can't. SOFIA is accessible in a way that space telescopes aren't. This allows switching instruments, upgrading instruments, and development of new instruments that can't be done in active space telescopes. Its development and maintenance cost to date is a bit over 1/10 the cost of Webb to date. Plus it's really cool to cut a hole in an airplane and stick a telescope out.