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Is launch capacity the thing that holds back more space-based telescopes, and are those telescopes going to have the same availability to researchers as terrest

Is launch capacity the thing that holds back more space-based telescopes, and are those telescopes going to have the same availability to researchers as terrestrial ones? If either answer is no, then the brag about capacity isn’t really relevant.

fastball 3y ago
Absolutely launch capacity is holding back more space-based telescopes. More telescopes means more availability to researchers.
- ethanbond 3y ago
  Sure, in the same way that Ferrari doubling its production means more people can get their kids to school conveniently.
  - jbm 3y ago
    Isn't Starship the cheap option for orbital launch?
    - ethanbond 3y ago
      But the whole point is if you ruin thousands of terrestrial telescopes used (successfully) by thousands of researchers, and in exchange you get a promise of one day maybe having tons of orbital telescopes, you aren’t really addressing the concern.
      - zpeti 3y ago
        Come on, you are arguing in such bad faith its ridiculous. Everyone knows space based telescopes are orders of magnitude better, and will be better for research than thousands of earth based telescopes. Even the researches, unless very selfish, should know that ideally you want many more very powerful space based telescopes if you actually want to do research and not just marvel at the stars from your patio. We obviously want larger launch capacity in the long run. It's not even a question. Falcon 9 is already the most successful rocket ever on almost all stats of usefulness, why shouldn't we have at least SOME faith that spacex will be able to build starship and use it?
        ethanbond 3y ago
        > Everyone knows space based telescopes are orders of magnitude better, and will be better for research than thousands of earth based telescopes Real terrestrial telescopes are better than hypothetical space-based ones. And I didn’t say we don’t want more capacity nor that Falcon 9 isn’t the most successful rocket ever, nor that I don’t have faith in SpaceX’s ability to create Starship, nor that Starship won’t eventually add space-based telescopes. I said that none of that actually addresses the current concerns of people who currently need to do their work, as GP implied their complaints are totally irrelevant because “someday we’ll launch more.”
    - ben_w 3y ago
      It's a steam-liner in an age of sailing galleons, hopefully it will make an orbital ring (analogous to budget airlines) affordable.
  - fastball 3y ago
    I don't think I understand the analogy.
    - ethanbond 3y ago
      Adding capacity at the tippy top of the market, while destroying capacity at the much larger middle/bottom of the market, is very unlikely to be net positive.
      - fastball 3y ago
        Gotcha, a couple points: - Starlink interferes with terrestrial telescopy much less than the baseline issues such as weather, atmosphere, etc. - SpaceX has already done great work in ameliorating these issues anyway with better non-reflective coatings and design. - Telescopes in space are orders of magnitude more useful than terrestrial ones, so it would not be a surprising net positive at all. - Even if the previous point weren't true, telescopes are not really equivalent to taking kids to school. One is a necessity, the other is a nice to have. The truth is that most of the low-hanging astronomical fruit that can be gleaned from the "middle/bottom of the market" has already been picked anyway. Almost all new/significant astronomical discoveries/research are happening with space-based telescopes for exactly this reason. People aren't unraveling the secrets of the universe with a telescope in their backyard anymore. - This entire situation has really nothing to do with Starship being a good thing. You can argue that Starlink is a net negative (for all the above reasons this seems hard to justify in practice), but that argument is orthogonal to whether or not Starship is good. This isn't really your fault because the parent comment is the one that initially conflated the two, but I felt this point should be made.
        ethanbond 3y ago
        These seem like good points! I personally don’t have a super strong idea of how destructive Starlink is, so totally open to the idea that “the astronomers don’t know what they’re talking about.” Just that’s a very different argument than “astronomers should shut up because some day we hope to put up telescopes they’ll probably never be able to use,” which is basically GP’s argument. In any case the degree of interference thing isn’t too comforting since I would assume these issues are additive to one another. Thank you for the good counterpoints! Would love to hear an astronomer’s take on whether the terrestrial-hanging-fruit has been picked, so to speak. It would not surprise me for sure.
  - theodric 3y ago
    In this case, Starship is really more akin to a bus than a sports car
- imtringued 3y ago
  Compare the cost of the payload and the launch vehicle. Those aren't even comparable. Worst case estimate for a single Ariane 5: 200 million €. Average launch cost for Space X: 50 million € (poorly researched I know) The cost of the James Webb space telescope? 50 worst case Ariane 5 launches or 200 Space X launches. I don't think the launch vehicle matters here.
  - ethanbond 3y ago
    Great way to approach the problem. As someone else mentioned, cheaper launches might adjust the overall risk/cost dynamics in the long run but yeah, this data point makes that seem like a stretch.
  - max51 3y ago
    A big part of the high cost of the project is that they know they only get one and they want to get the most bang per kg of payload. Most of the cost was research, development and testing of new technologies. Building 10x JWST would not cost 10x what we paid for a single telescope. A single launch also means everything has to be perfect, there is no prototype in space, no second try and no learning from mistakes. The project would also probably have made drastically different design and management decisions if they knew in advance they were sending >5 units instead of one.
    - ethanbond 3y ago
      Wouldn’t most of that cost be baked into the launch rather than the payload though?
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
junofan 3y ago
You could probably do a swarm type of telescope. I thought the limiting factor with JWST was expertise.
soperj 3y ago
When you can design space telescopes to be heavier, and they don't cost as much to launch, then you can design them cheaper. If one fails then you can more easily replace it. Initial designs of the James Webb began in 1996 and it didn't launch until 2021 and cost $10 billion. If they could use more off the shelf parts and didn't have so many design constraints it would have been quicker and cheaper.
- ethanbond 3y ago
  None of which is relevant to astronomers who depend on terrestrial telescopes to do their work today, so it’s not really a meaningful response to their complaints.
  - nickik 3y ago
    I'm so sick of people acting like Starlink is the end of terrestrial telescopes. Fucking insane. Actually inform yourself. A very low number of terrestrial telescope sometimes lose a slight amount of information. Terrestrial astronomy is fine and will continue to be fine.
    - cmsj 3y ago
      It would, however, be foolish to assume that Starlink will be the only constellation of low orbit satellites.
    - ethanbond 3y ago
      How would you recommend informing oneself? From all the searching I’ve done and the conversations I’ve had, it’s basically: space agencies and astronomy groups are saying this project (and similar) will end up destroying billions of dollars of equipment, discourage further investment, create a ton of space debris, etc etc, then on the other side mostly people who get emotional about defending every Musk project and make arguments like “that’s okay because we’ll hopefully put up space telescopes in the future that will somehow satisfy the same demand for telescope time.” I am not an expert at all but that at first blush that seems like bullshit. I’m 100% open to sources of info I should check out on this though. Edit: FWIW another more believable argument than hypothetical future capacity satisfying the same demand would be “global internet is more important than terrestrial astronomy.” Not quite ready to say I agree with it but it seems very compelling!
lmm 3y ago
> Is launch capacity the thing that holds back more space-based telescopes Everything holds back more space-based telescopes - launch capacity, manufacturing capacity, research ideas. But the cheaper launching becomes, the more funding can be devoted to other parts (although something like Amdahl's law will apply), and may even trigger a virtuous cycle where cheaper launches mean you can get away with more standardised, less hardened hardware, which in is then lighter and can be launched more easily, and... > are those telescopes going to have the same availability to researchers as terrestrial ones? No, of course not, space telescopes are massively oversubscribed and difficult for even superstar researchers to get time on. That's exactly why we want to launch more of them.
- ethanbond 3y ago
  Right so basically “we’ll maybe have more space telescopes someday” is not actually relevant to “you are effectively destroying terrestrial telescopes today.”
  - radu_floricica 3y ago
    You managed to get exactly the opposite conclusion from what the parent said. This exchange should be on the wikipedia page for "confirmation bias". Funny af, honestly. Just for fun: what exactly could the parent have said to change your mind? Because if the answer is "nothing", then you're a rock.
    - ethanbond 3y ago
      Sure: SpaceX projects are putting up more space-based telescope capacity than they’re removing from terrestrial capacity, with either no variation or a good variation in the types of capacity (i.e. wavelengths). It’s actually super straightforward. The response seems “opposite” what was said because if you read between the lines, the whole comment was about hypothetical future improvements to the cost dynamics.
      - radu_floricica 3y ago

fastball 3y ago

Absolutely launch capacity is holding back more space-based telescopes. More telescopes means more availability to researchers.

ethanbond 3y ago
Sure, in the same way that Ferrari doubling its production means more people can get their kids to school conveniently.
- jbm 3y ago
  Isn't Starship the cheap option for orbital launch?
  - ethanbond 3y ago
    But the whole point is if you ruin thousands of terrestrial telescopes used (successfully) by thousands of researchers, and in exchange you get a promise of one day maybe having tons of orbital telescopes, you aren’t really addressing the concern.
    - zpeti 3y ago
      Come on, you are arguing in such bad faith its ridiculous. Everyone knows space based telescopes are orders of magnitude better, and will be better for research than thousands of earth based telescopes. Even the researches, unless very selfish, should know that ideally you want many more very powerful space based telescopes if you actually want to do research and not just marvel at the stars from your patio. We obviously want larger launch capacity in the long run. It's not even a question. Falcon 9 is already the most successful rocket ever on almost all stats of usefulness, why shouldn't we have at least SOME faith that spacex will be able to build starship and use it?
      - ethanbond 3y ago
        > Everyone knows space based telescopes are orders of magnitude better, and will be better for research than thousands of earth based telescopes Real terrestrial telescopes are better than hypothetical space-based ones. And I didn’t say we don’t want more capacity nor that Falcon 9 isn’t the most successful rocket ever, nor that I don’t have faith in SpaceX’s ability to create Starship, nor that Starship won’t eventually add space-based telescopes. I said that none of that actually addresses the current concerns of people who currently need to do their work, as GP implied their complaints are totally irrelevant because “someday we’ll launch more.”
  - ben_w 3y ago
    It's a steam-liner in an age of sailing galleons, hopefully it will make an orbital ring (analogous to budget airlines) affordable.
- fastball 3y ago
  I don't think I understand the analogy.
  - ethanbond 3y ago
    Adding capacity at the tippy top of the market, while destroying capacity at the much larger middle/bottom of the market, is very unlikely to be net positive.
    - fastball 3y ago
      Gotcha, a couple points: - Starlink interferes with terrestrial telescopy much less than the baseline issues such as weather, atmosphere, etc. - SpaceX has already done great work in ameliorating these issues anyway with better non-reflective coatings and design. - Telescopes in space are orders of magnitude more useful than terrestrial ones, so it would not be a surprising net positive at all. - Even if the previous point weren't true, telescopes are not really equivalent to taking kids to school. One is a necessity, the other is a nice to have. The truth is that most of the low-hanging astronomical fruit that can be gleaned from the "middle/bottom of the market" has already been picked anyway. Almost all new/significant astronomical discoveries/research are happening with space-based telescopes for exactly this reason. People aren't unraveling the secrets of the universe with a telescope in their backyard anymore. - This entire situation has really nothing to do with Starship being a good thing. You can argue that Starlink is a net negative (for all the above reasons this seems hard to justify in practice), but that argument is orthogonal to whether or not Starship is good. This isn't really your fault because the parent comment is the one that initially conflated the two, but I felt this point should be made.
      - ethanbond 3y ago
        These seem like good points! I personally don’t have a super strong idea of how destructive Starlink is, so totally open to the idea that “the astronomers don’t know what they’re talking about.” Just that’s a very different argument than “astronomers should shut up because some day we hope to put up telescopes they’ll probably never be able to use,” which is basically GP’s argument. In any case the degree of interference thing isn’t too comforting since I would assume these issues are additive to one another. Thank you for the good counterpoints! Would love to hear an astronomer’s take on whether the terrestrial-hanging-fruit has been picked, so to speak. It would not surprise me for sure.
- theodric 3y ago
  In this case, Starship is really more akin to a bus than a sports car
imtringued 3y ago
Compare the cost of the payload and the launch vehicle. Those aren't even comparable. Worst case estimate for a single Ariane 5: 200 million €. Average launch cost for Space X: 50 million € (poorly researched I know) The cost of the James Webb space telescope? 50 worst case Ariane 5 launches or 200 Space X launches. I don't think the launch vehicle matters here.
- ethanbond 3y ago
  Great way to approach the problem. As someone else mentioned, cheaper launches might adjust the overall risk/cost dynamics in the long run but yeah, this data point makes that seem like a stretch.
- max51 3y ago
  A big part of the high cost of the project is that they know they only get one and they want to get the most bang per kg of payload. Most of the cost was research, development and testing of new technologies. Building 10x JWST would not cost 10x what we paid for a single telescope. A single launch also means everything has to be perfect, there is no prototype in space, no second try and no learning from mistakes. The project would also probably have made drastically different design and management decisions if they knew in advance they were sending >5 units instead of one.
  - ethanbond 3y ago
    Wouldn’t most of that cost be baked into the launch rather than the payload though?
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]

junofan 3y ago

You could probably do a swarm type of telescope. I thought the limiting factor with JWST was expertise.

soperj 3y ago

When you can design space telescopes to be heavier, and they don't cost as much to launch, then you can design them cheaper. If one fails then you can more easily replace it. Initial designs of the James Webb began in 1996 and it didn't launch until 2021 and cost $10 billion. If they could use more off the shelf parts and didn't have so many design constraints it would have been quicker and cheaper.

ethanbond 3y ago
None of which is relevant to astronomers who depend on terrestrial telescopes to do their work today, so it’s not really a meaningful response to their complaints.
- nickik 3y ago
  I'm so sick of people acting like Starlink is the end of terrestrial telescopes. Fucking insane. Actually inform yourself. A very low number of terrestrial telescope sometimes lose a slight amount of information. Terrestrial astronomy is fine and will continue to be fine.
  - cmsj 3y ago
    It would, however, be foolish to assume that Starlink will be the only constellation of low orbit satellites.
  - ethanbond 3y ago
    How would you recommend informing oneself? From all the searching I’ve done and the conversations I’ve had, it’s basically: space agencies and astronomy groups are saying this project (and similar) will end up destroying billions of dollars of equipment, discourage further investment, create a ton of space debris, etc etc, then on the other side mostly people who get emotional about defending every Musk project and make arguments like “that’s okay because we’ll hopefully put up space telescopes in the future that will somehow satisfy the same demand for telescope time.” I am not an expert at all but that at first blush that seems like bullshit. I’m 100% open to sources of info I should check out on this though. Edit: FWIW another more believable argument than hypothetical future capacity satisfying the same demand would be “global internet is more important than terrestrial astronomy.” Not quite ready to say I agree with it but it seems very compelling!

lmm 3y ago

> Is launch capacity the thing that holds back more space-based telescopes Everything holds back more space-based telescopes - launch capacity, manufacturing capacity, research ideas. But the cheaper launching becomes, the more funding can be devoted to other parts (although something like Amdahl's law will apply), and may even trigger a virtuous cycle where cheaper launches mean you can get away with more standardised, less hardened hardware, which in is then lighter and can be launched more easily, and... > are those telescopes going to have the same availability to researchers as terrestrial ones? No, of course not, space telescopes are massively oversubscribed and difficult for even superstar researchers to get time on. That's exactly why we want to launch more of them.

ethanbond 3y ago
Right so basically “we’ll maybe have more space telescopes someday” is not actually relevant to “you are effectively destroying terrestrial telescopes today.”
- radu_floricica 3y ago
  You managed to get exactly the opposite conclusion from what the parent said. This exchange should be on the wikipedia page for "confirmation bias". Funny af, honestly. Just for fun: what exactly could the parent have said to change your mind? Because if the answer is "nothing", then you're a rock.
  - ethanbond 3y ago
    Sure: SpaceX projects are putting up more space-based telescope capacity than they’re removing from terrestrial capacity, with either no variation or a good variation in the types of capacity (i.e. wavelengths). It’s actually super straightforward. The response seems “opposite” what was said because if you read between the lines, the whole comment was about hypothetical future improvements to the cost dynamics.
    - radu_floricica 3y ago