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Telescope Will Have Images 10X Sharper Than Hubble

jangobongo writes "After a 20 year struggle, the University of Arizona's $120 million Large Binocular Telescope was dedicated last week. This unique telescope will have twin 8.4-meter (27.6 foot) mirrors that sit on a single mount. Using methods similar to a medical CAT scan, a technique of "tomographic" image reconstruction will be used to produce pictures 10 times sharper (example) than the Hubble Space Telescope for a fraction of its $2 billion dollar cost."

24 of 315 comments (clear)

  1. First port by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    JEFF CLIFF sucks!

  2. ohhh by Ledora · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    Wow are x10 cameras that much better? .... oh wait 10x.

  3. Dear X10 by Letter · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Dear X10,

    I'm glad your telephoto lenses now let me see my neighbor's Venus, just like the Hubble!

    Letter

  4. FUCK YOU AMERICA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    I'm 24 years old. I don't want to go through the next 50 years of my life living in an international air of worry and uncertainty. I don't want to live in a permanent state of fear, generated by a megalomaniacal American government taking advantage of the majority low IQ populous' capacity for being brainwashed.

    I don't want to live like Israel, fighting militant Muslims round every corner. The problem of Muslim extremists exists and needs to be dealt with, not encouraged by invading innocent countries and waging war on people who have done nothing to deserve it. I want my children to grow up in a world free from military oppression and I want a government that understands that the wars of the future are guerrilla ones which can never be won, even if they are waged for noble purposes (which theirs never are).

    The world is fu*cked up enough as it is. The food chain has been poisoned so badly the average human is full of chemicals normally found in plastics and toxic waste. I'm sick of global warning and environmental damage to the planet and the fact the all this time the greenies were right. I'm sick of America being the biggest wilful contributor to the pollution of the planet.

    I'm sick of an American school system that produces children who are brought up to believe that America IS the world and anything that goes on outside is irrelevant. Children so stupid they think America invented the Internet, computer, motor car, light bulb, telephone etc ad infinitum....

    The Internet or it's successor is the future of entertainment and I'm sick of stupid low IQ, ignorant Americans infecting every corner of it with their insular, jingoistic mindsets, their whiny voices and manifestations of their low self esteem driven by the fact that despite it being their turn as the world's super power, no one actually takes them seriously or gives them the respect that the British or the Ancient Greeks got because a superpower best known for producing mass produced crap is never going to get the respect that one who gave the world Shakespeare, culture, philosophy or mathematics will get.

    I'm sick of hypocrisy and two facedness. I'm sick of Gangsta Rap and hamburgers, Political Correctness and TV programmes that begin with 'When' and end in 'go bad and attack people'. I'm sick of reality TV and I'm sick of news programmes that are more censored than accurate. I'm sick of tokens, token minorities, token universities, token degrees, token attempts at the truth, tokens. I'm sick of fat people, ugly people, stupid people, gay people, coloured people, female people, whiny people all complaining they don't have the opportunities in life they would like and it must be someone else's fault. I'm sick of women that act like men and femininity being a crime, unless you're a man in which case you're a new man which nobody ever wanted because there was nothing wrong with the old one. I'm sick of people falling over and suing the ground and people watching nipples and suing the TV and I'm sick of coffee cups with 'don't pour over yourself, you may get burnt' on the side to try and counter this.

    I'm sick of stupid Americans who don't know the difference between patriotism and jingoism and who think flag waving should be an Olympic event. I'm sick of Americans who cry that people hate them or are jealous of them or who are anti them because someone dares to point out that the America they've been programmed to believe in from birth bears no relation to the one that exists in real life.

    1. Re:FUCK YOU AMERICA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      You are not American. American's don't call them "programmes'. Nice try, though. Take it up with Tony Blair.

    2. Re:FUCK YOU AMERICA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
      Dude, I was with you up until you dissed Gangsta Rap and hamburgers. Do you also hate pizza? And before you think these are ignorant statements from an uninformed american retard, think again. I'm just not angry at everything like you are, there are some parts of american culture that don't suck. Gangsta Rap, hamburgers, and PIZZA; are among those.

      Peace.

    3. Re:FUCK YOU AMERICA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      So how do you spell "programmed"? "Programd"? "Programed"?

    4. Re:FUCK YOU AMERICA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Offtopic
      I'm 24 years old. I don't want to go through the next 50 years of my life living in an international air of worry and uncertainty.

      Talk like that in person to enough people outside your mom's basement, and you probably won't have to worry about that.

      ~~~

    5. Re:FUCK YOU AMERICA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      Programs are programmed by programmers.

      I shouldn't be correcting your spelling/grammer because I am not an American either, but usually nobody complains about my English.

    6. Re:FUCK YOU AMERICA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      Whereas you, sir, represent the culmination of thousands of years of European "civilization"? Thank the gods we have voices of reason such as yours to act as a beacon of hope in the Stygian dark of an American-dominated world.

      In fact, as an American, I find your stinging and accurate criticism to be the last straw. I go now to rid the world of my miserable presence. Fortunately, I happen to have a gun right here...

      [BANG]

      "dur..."

      This suicide brought to you by Concerned Europeans for a Happy, Cheerful World - So Long As There Aren't Any Other People In It, And We're Not So Sure About All Of Us.

    7. Re:FUCK YOU AMERICA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      Man, you really have a problem! You don't hate America, you hate the world! Lemme tell you something: I am not American, but believe me, I'd do anything I could to be one. I find Americans to be excelent people, I read Slashdot mostly because of its American centricity and if I ever had a chance to live and work in USA, I would accept it without thinking twice. Why? Because in the shitty contry where I live (Portugal) there really is ignorance and incompetence. People here don't know, don't do, and don't let others do. The only thing everyone thinks about here is new ways to screw everyone else and profit the most out of it!

  5. Re:Hubble Comparison? by Rares+Marian · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    By that logic a hot as a firecracker exploding in your hand P4 at 4.0Ghz (er oops discontinued) is better than the same Ghz on an Athlon.

    --
    The message on the other side of this sig is false.
  6. HST II+ for $10 million - Hey, that's easy! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Offtopic
    Dude, if you can build another Hubble for $10 million, you're a miracle worker.

    Just lay off everyone and outsource it.

  7. WARNING, goatse redirect by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Seems to be about 5%, as I only got it the first time I clicked

  8. I love McDonalds by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Ctrl-V --> Screw off, punk

  9. WormCams by krahd · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    I know this is a pretty offtopic but I am now reading Arthur C. Clarke and Stephen Baxter's "The Light of Other Days" where they introduce the concept of WormCams (*).

    The WormCams are worm holes stabilized with negative energy (!) which can be used (somehow) as video cameras... so they can have instant access to anywhere in the universe... (I won't tell more cos I've spoiled enough :))

    Anyway, I'm so immersed in the book that all this Hubble things now looks soooo outdated ;)...



    Actually the book is a remake, as stated here: Bob Shaw's small, perfectly formed story 'The Light of Other Days' has enjoyed a prolonged life. It appeared in Analog in 1966 to widespread acclaim, and Shaw cover scanlater wrote sequel stories and expanded the concept into a novel, Other Days, Other Eyes (1972).

    Based on the intriguing premise of 'slow glass', glass through which light takes years to travel, it remains one of the finest in 60s SF, and it is a small scandal that it is not now in print.

    --
    mod me up scottie!
    1. Re:WormCams by Jerf · · Score: 0, Offtopic
  10. Re:Hubble Comparison? by dtdns · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    "...a national sales tax..." - Ok, now I'll finally vote against W. I shed the tears of a clown.

    I know it's off topic, but I'm curious about what you have against a national sales tax? The currently favored "tax replacement" legislation is H.R. 25, otherwise known as the FairTax. It's actually quite interesting once you get to know more about it. Basically the current income tax and all of its burdens and loopholes would go away in favor of a flat national sales tax.

    Moderators feel free to reign destruction upon this post if you feel it necessary.

    And now back to your regularly scheduled discussion of galactic happenings...

  11. Re:Hubble Comparison? by sinergy · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Loopholes wouldn't just "go away." People that buy many things (viz. the poor, the middle class) in retail would have more tax burdon than somebody with tens of millions of dollars in stock revenue.

    I don't think you seem to understand that over 90% of wealth is controlled by a very small percentage of individuals in this country. Overtaxing the "poor" masses isn't going to do a bit of good.

    --
    ...
  12. Re:Hubble Comparison? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    I don't think that makes sense. Rich people buy more things than poor people; hence they would pay more. Stock revenue has nothing to do with the issue as a national sales tax is not an income tax but a consumption tax.

    Or was your problem with it that it doesn't tax the rich disproportionately?

  13. Re:Hubble Comparison? by Chrispy1000000+the+2 · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    The thing is, the rich class does not buy *enough* things, and a good deal of what they do buy, is not taxed due to one loophole or another. Also, one of the founding principles of tax is that it does tax the rich unfairly, because they are more able to suffer the penalty of that tax. This is not shown by putting a flat tax on goods. Now, a more reasonable idea would be to have a graduated tax based on price, but you would never be able to get re-elected if that went through, and it would be a pain to implement.

    --
    Sig
  14. Re:Hubble Comparison? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    That's not a "founding principle of tax", it's a founding principle of *progressive* taxation. There are a lot of people who think that progressive taxes are inherently unfair because they treat different people differently under the law. I think that the government should be blind in application of law.

    Also, I think that your argument about "loopholes" is actually an argument FOR such a flat national sales tax. It's very difficult to avoid a tax like that, so it would actually make it harder for rich people to escape taxation. The loopholes are really a result of how overly complex our current tax system is; the NST would stop that by using a very simple system.

    The more complicated you make the system, the easier it will be for people to worm out of it. This is one reason why you wouldn't want to bother with the "graduated" sales tax you were talking about: people and marketers would just come up with schemes to avoid it.

    And I still think it's really false to say that such a tax would cause rich people to not pay as much: it would make them pay as much as they spend. Not much use being rich if you can't spend it, so they would inevitably pay more. And this is all as it should be because it would directly link taxes to the amount of resources someone consumes rather than simply their ability to absorb the intrusion of government into their finances.

    And if what you're actually worried about is a lack of taxes on investment income, etc (even though any income people make from that would inevitably be taxed when they spend it) then you could always keep capital gains taxes and just scrap income tax. Although it's pretty stupid to punish the people who are actually feeding their money back into economic growth rather than consumption.

  15. Re:Hubble Comparison? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    I know it's off topic, but I'm curious about what you have against a national sales tax? The currently favored "tax replacement" legislation is H.R. 25, otherwise known as the FairTax. It's actually quite interesting once you get to know more about it. Basically the current income tax and all of its burdens and loopholes would go away in favor of a flat national sales tax.

    The thing I don't like the most about the current "Fair Tax" proposal is that there would be a monthly "guvmint" refund check to each household to refund the tax on necessities like food. Putting every house on the dole doesn't seem a good (or efficient) idea - just don't tax those items in the first place.

    The group pushing the Fair Tax proposal also seems a little devious. They talk about a tax where you'd pay $1.30 (not counting local sales tax) for $1.00 worth of goods as a "23%" tax, not a 30% tax as most of us would, the rationale being that $0.30 is 23% of $1.30. There is of course no guarantee that the tax would remain at 30%, either.

    There are also other issues, for instance I agree with something I read that if something similar to this is done we need a Constitutional amendment banning income taxes, period. We don't need this AND an income tax sometime in the future.

    Believe, I'd love to ban the IRS and get rid of filing income tax as much (or more so;) than anyone, but the Fair Tax proposal, as it sits, has problems.

  16. Another reason to vote against W.: by Futurepower(R) · · Score: 0, Offtopic


    Responding to your sig, another reason to vote against W.: Government data compares Democrat and Republican economics.

    (Slashdot should not allow sigs if it is not okay to comment on them.)