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Struck by this part about the island’s sense of loss of the telescope: > Arecibo’s prowess at astronomy was a source of pride in Puerto Rico, and many have bee

Struck by this part about the island’s sense of loss of the telescope: > Arecibo’s prowess at astronomy was a source of pride in Puerto Rico, and many have been disappointed with the NSF’s decisions. Such a contrasting view compared to the long fight in Hawaii over the Thirty Meter Telescope project [1], where locals have continually fought and protested. It’s tied up in the Hawaiian sovereignty movement, and a lot of cultural connotations, but I can’t help feeling like the Arecibo case should be a lesson for the TMT movement: you’d miss the telescopes if they went away. [1] https://www.npr.org/2022/07/31/1114314076/hawaii-mauna-kea-telescope-space-observatory https://www.npr.org/2022/07/31/1114314076/hawaii-mauna-kea-t...

runako 3y ago
This isn't confusing. It's totally rational to not want limited, unspoiled land to stay that way on the one hand, and then on the other hand having lost that battle it's fair to prefer a working telescope over the wreck that's at Arecibo now. It's not an obvious conclusion from those two perspectives that one would therefore prefer to have a pristine environment spoiled with concrete.
- jameshart 3y ago
  There are 13 telescopes on Mauna Kea already - and some are already due to be decommissioned. It’s not unspoiled and pristine. If they don’t continue to develop the site, the telescopes there will fall into obsolescence, and ultimately disuse. Pushing back against continued development on the site is, ultimately, pushing for it to go the way of Arecibo.
  - petsfed 3y ago
    Or they could perform an explicit reclamation project, to try to restore the land as best they could to the way it was prior to 1893. There are more options than just "build more telescopes" or "let the existing telescopes rot". Of course, just letting them rot would be playing to the standard colonial practice of extracting value, then leaving consequences of that extractive effort to the remaining indigenous people.
    - hokuula 3y ago
      >Or they could perform an explicit reclamation project, to try to restore the land as best they could to the way it was prior to 1893. That is exactly what they are doing. It is a condition of the conservation district use permit [1] and has already begun [2]. 1. https://dlnr.hawaii.gov/mk/files/2017/09/882-BLNR-FOFCOLDO.pdf https://dlnr.hawaii.gov/mk/files/2017/09/882-BLNR-FOFCOLDO.p..., p. 30, sec. E; p. 66 #351 2. https://www.hawaii.edu/news/2023/08/28/removal-of-caltech-telescope-underway/ https://www.hawaii.edu/news/2023/08/28/removal-of-caltech-te...
burkaman 3y ago
> It’s tied up in the Hawaiian sovereignty movement, and a lot of cultural connotations I mean I think this is underselling it a little. It seems like the main difference is that Puerto Rican colonization and subjugation started like 350+ years before Hawaiian overthrow and annexation, so there are just very few descendants of indigenous people left in Puerto Rico. Conversely, a significant portion of Hawaii is descended from indigenous people, and some of them probably had grandparents who grew up in an independent nation and remember them talking about it. The wound is still relatively fresh. I think what happened with TMT would have also happened with Arecibo if the Spanish hadn't already killed nearly all of the indigenous people, to be blunt. It's definitely about sovereignty and not about a distaste for telescopes. There's a lot of infrastructure I'd like to see built in my own country, but that doesn't mean I want another country to invade and then build it.
- dotancohen 3y ago
  Where should I read more about how the US invaded Hawaii?
  - burkaman 3y ago
    Wikipedia is pretty good, I'd start here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overthrow_of_the_Hawaiian_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overthrow_of_the_Hawaiian_King... I'm sure there are plenty of good books on the subject but I don't have any recommendations unfortunately. Edit: Actually maybe the US government's own account is a better place to start: https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-107/pdf/STATUTE-107-Pg1510.pdf https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-107/pdf/STATUTE-... > Whereas, in pursuance of the conspiracy to overthrow the Government of Hawaii, the United States Minister and the naval representatives of the United States caused armed naval forces of the United States to invade the sovereign Hawaiian nation on January 16, 1893, and to position themselves near the Hawaiian Government buildings and the lolani Palace to intimidate Queen Liliuokalani and her Government;
    - jameshart 3y ago
      And while you’re learning about this stuff, make sure you follow the rabbit trail far enough to get to this little historical backstory: > In 1899, industrialist James Dole moved to Hawaii. James was the cousin of Sanford B. Dole, who had helped overthrow the Kingdom of Hawaii in 1893, and became the governor of Hawaii in 1898. Two years after James Dole's arrival, he formed the Hawaiian Pineapple Company (HPC). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dole_plc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dole_plc
TaylorAlexander 3y ago
> I can’t help feeling like the Arecibo case should be a lesson for the TMT movement: you’d miss the telescopes if they went away. Generally when people are fighting for their sovereignty I don't presume to know what is best for them. That's kind of the whole point of fighting for one's sovereignty.
- jameshart 3y ago
  Oh, I get it. I just find the parallel stories draw attention to the different experiences of Hawaii and PR (as the sibling post elucidates).
petsfed 3y ago
Insofar as I'm aware, Arecibo is not a sacred site to indigenous Puerto Ricans. Nor was there any concern about barring local access to the site, which had been available for literally centuries (excepting, of course, the historic bans of all but the most senior members of Hawaiian society - again sacred site). I'm generally pro-telescope, and I've worked with people who have spent a lot of time at Mauna Kea (Keck, especially). But the more I learn about this, the more the Mauna Kea telescopes feel an awful lot like Mt. Rushmore: colonists moving in and saying that the natives' claim to a place is less legitimate than whatever "progress" the colonists have planned.
- coldbrewed 3y ago
  I'm really torn about this. Mauna Kea is the best place on the entire planet to observe the galactic center; it has the best seeing (minimal humidity and low atmospheric turbulence) that's not matched in the northern hemisphere. The ESO already has an equivalent observatory planned in the southern hemisphere so there's less value in relocating the TMT down to Chile, so effectively either Mauna Kea or nowhere. Simultaneously, Hawaii has an ugly history of colonization that's not talked about enough. The area is sacred to native Hawaiians and indigenous people deserve say in how their ancestral land is used. The TMT is also a comparatively easy target for activists to push back on colonization compared to large corporations with continents of lawyers, or the tourism economy that provides revenue for the island. Folks know that chaining elderly folks across construction access works, and it would be a PR nightmare to forcibly remove them. Scientific progress should be something that transcends politics but we're stuck with the legacy of colonization, and that makes us all a little poorer.
  - jameshart 3y ago
    Torn is right. Mauna Kea is sacred to the world’s scientists too - it’s a perfect observing site; a spectacular volcano; a unique glacial environment; an isolated habitat for plant and animal life; it feels like there ought to be some way to share the gift of this improbable piece of land with the world. But yes, the way things have been done in the past affect the relationships we can have now.
jjav 3y ago
> Such a contrasting view compared to the long fight in Hawaii In Hawaii the location is the top of the mountain and considered sacred land. The small natural dip where the Arecibo telescope was built did not have particular society-wide historical significance so it's not comparable.
aylmao 3y ago
> you’d miss the telescopes if they went away. This is simplifying the issue too much. Mauna Kea is the most sacred mountain in Hawaiian culture, Arecibo wasn't built in particularly special land as far as I know.
- idontpost 3y ago
  [dead]
- gorlilla 3y ago
  What are you basing your _most_ sacred claim on?
Hooray_Darakian 3y ago
> where locals have continually fought and protested. It’s tied up in the Hawaiian sovereignty movement A vocal minority of locals. There are less noisy groups in favor of the TMT https://www.imuatmt.org/ https://www.imuatmt.org/
idontpost 3y ago
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runako 3y ago

This isn't confusing. It's totally rational to not want limited, unspoiled land to stay that way on the one hand, and then on the other hand having lost that battle it's fair to prefer a working telescope over the wreck that's at Arecibo now. It's not an obvious conclusion from those two perspectives that one would therefore prefer to have a pristine environment spoiled with concrete.

jameshart 3y ago
There are 13 telescopes on Mauna Kea already - and some are already due to be decommissioned. It’s not unspoiled and pristine. If they don’t continue to develop the site, the telescopes there will fall into obsolescence, and ultimately disuse. Pushing back against continued development on the site is, ultimately, pushing for it to go the way of Arecibo.
- petsfed 3y ago
  Or they could perform an explicit reclamation project, to try to restore the land as best they could to the way it was prior to 1893. There are more options than just "build more telescopes" or "let the existing telescopes rot". Of course, just letting them rot would be playing to the standard colonial practice of extracting value, then leaving consequences of that extractive effort to the remaining indigenous people.
  - hokuula 3y ago
    >Or they could perform an explicit reclamation project, to try to restore the land as best they could to the way it was prior to 1893. That is exactly what they are doing. It is a condition of the conservation district use permit [1] and has already begun [2]. 1. https://dlnr.hawaii.gov/mk/files/2017/09/882-BLNR-FOFCOLDO.pdf https://dlnr.hawaii.gov/mk/files/2017/09/882-BLNR-FOFCOLDO.p..., p. 30, sec. E; p. 66 #351 2. https://www.hawaii.edu/news/2023/08/28/removal-of-caltech-telescope-underway/ https://www.hawaii.edu/news/2023/08/28/removal-of-caltech-te...

burkaman 3y ago

> It’s tied up in the Hawaiian sovereignty movement, and a lot of cultural connotations I mean I think this is underselling it a little. It seems like the main difference is that Puerto Rican colonization and subjugation started like 350+ years before Hawaiian overthrow and annexation, so there are just very few descendants of indigenous people left in Puerto Rico. Conversely, a significant portion of Hawaii is descended from indigenous people, and some of them probably had grandparents who grew up in an independent nation and remember them talking about it. The wound is still relatively fresh. I think what happened with TMT would have also happened with Arecibo if the Spanish hadn't already killed nearly all of the indigenous people, to be blunt. It's definitely about sovereignty and not about a distaste for telescopes. There's a lot of infrastructure I'd like to see built in my own country, but that doesn't mean I want another country to invade and then build it.

dotancohen 3y ago
Where should I read more about how the US invaded Hawaii?
- burkaman 3y ago
  Wikipedia is pretty good, I'd start here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overthrow_of_the_Hawaiian_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overthrow_of_the_Hawaiian_King... I'm sure there are plenty of good books on the subject but I don't have any recommendations unfortunately. Edit: Actually maybe the US government's own account is a better place to start: https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-107/pdf/STATUTE-107-Pg1510.pdf https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/STATUTE-107/pdf/STATUTE-... > Whereas, in pursuance of the conspiracy to overthrow the Government of Hawaii, the United States Minister and the naval representatives of the United States caused armed naval forces of the United States to invade the sovereign Hawaiian nation on January 16, 1893, and to position themselves near the Hawaiian Government buildings and the lolani Palace to intimidate Queen Liliuokalani and her Government;
  - jameshart 3y ago
    And while you’re learning about this stuff, make sure you follow the rabbit trail far enough to get to this little historical backstory: > In 1899, industrialist James Dole moved to Hawaii. James was the cousin of Sanford B. Dole, who had helped overthrow the Kingdom of Hawaii in 1893, and became the governor of Hawaii in 1898. Two years after James Dole's arrival, he formed the Hawaiian Pineapple Company (HPC). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dole_plc https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dole_plc

TaylorAlexander 3y ago

> I can’t help feeling like the Arecibo case should be a lesson for the TMT movement: you’d miss the telescopes if they went away. Generally when people are fighting for their sovereignty I don't presume to know what is best for them. That's kind of the whole point of fighting for one's sovereignty.

jameshart 3y ago
Oh, I get it. I just find the parallel stories draw attention to the different experiences of Hawaii and PR (as the sibling post elucidates).

petsfed 3y ago

Insofar as I'm aware, Arecibo is not a sacred site to indigenous Puerto Ricans. Nor was there any concern about barring local access to the site, which had been available for literally centuries (excepting, of course, the historic bans of all but the most senior members of Hawaiian society - again sacred site). I'm generally pro-telescope, and I've worked with people who have spent a lot of time at Mauna Kea (Keck, especially). But the more I learn about this, the more the Mauna Kea telescopes feel an awful lot like Mt. Rushmore: colonists moving in and saying that the natives' claim to a place is less legitimate than whatever "progress" the colonists have planned.

coldbrewed 3y ago
I'm really torn about this. Mauna Kea is the best place on the entire planet to observe the galactic center; it has the best seeing (minimal humidity and low atmospheric turbulence) that's not matched in the northern hemisphere. The ESO already has an equivalent observatory planned in the southern hemisphere so there's less value in relocating the TMT down to Chile, so effectively either Mauna Kea or nowhere. Simultaneously, Hawaii has an ugly history of colonization that's not talked about enough. The area is sacred to native Hawaiians and indigenous people deserve say in how their ancestral land is used. The TMT is also a comparatively easy target for activists to push back on colonization compared to large corporations with continents of lawyers, or the tourism economy that provides revenue for the island. Folks know that chaining elderly folks across construction access works, and it would be a PR nightmare to forcibly remove them. Scientific progress should be something that transcends politics but we're stuck with the legacy of colonization, and that makes us all a little poorer.
- jameshart 3y ago
  Torn is right. Mauna Kea is sacred to the world’s scientists too - it’s a perfect observing site; a spectacular volcano; a unique glacial environment; an isolated habitat for plant and animal life; it feels like there ought to be some way to share the gift of this improbable piece of land with the world. But yes, the way things have been done in the past affect the relationships we can have now.

jjav 3y ago

> Such a contrasting view compared to the long fight in Hawaii In Hawaii the location is the top of the mountain and considered sacred land. The small natural dip where the Arecibo telescope was built did not have particular society-wide historical significance so it's not comparable.

aylmao 3y ago

> you’d miss the telescopes if they went away. This is simplifying the issue too much. Mauna Kea is the most sacred mountain in Hawaiian culture, Arecibo wasn't built in particularly special land as far as I know.

idontpost 3y ago
[dead]
gorlilla 3y ago
What are you basing your _most_ sacred claim on?

Hooray_Darakian 3y ago

> where locals have continually fought and protested. It’s tied up in the Hawaiian sovereignty movement A vocal minority of locals. There are less noisy groups in favor of the TMT https://www.imuatmt.org/ https://www.imuatmt.org/

idontpost 3y ago

[dead]