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Hubble Sees Stars As They're Born
Artful Yankee writes "Space.com is reporting that the Hubble telescope revealed stars as they were being born. The article explains, 'The stars have yet to condense into small enough packages to trigger thermonuclear fusion, which is what powers stars, but they appear to be on the verge, astronomers said today.' All these amazing discoveries from Hubble and people still talk about abandoning it."
The talk of abandoning the satellite often is because it is less expensive to send up better, newer satellites than maintain this one.
People just aren't willing to spend money purely in the name of Science. There needs to be a concrete reason for it. Personally, as a space buff, I find things like this mind boggling. But to the average american, this means nothing.
When politicians talk about funding for the Hubble, or for the ISS, or any other project, it's typically because the funding would directly profit their constituents. In the rare case, they believe in the science of the project, but if it doesn't garner them votes, there's no point in voicing their opinion.
Basically, if something doesn't have military signifigance, there's little interest in the government for funding it. If something doesn't have commercial value, there's little interest in the commercial sector for funding it. It all comes down to dollars, and pure science typically comes last.
Government's view of the economy: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving,regulate it. If it stops moving, subsidize it.
Enough of this crap about "star formation theory" and "gravitational lense theory" and all that other tripe!
We need to start teaching Intelligent Astrology in our schools. The stars were put there BY GOD for our use. That is why we have constellations like Libra and Virgo: they are part of God's plan.
We don't need no stinking Hubble Telescope, named after some queer godless astronomer, when we have books like Of Stars and People, which spells out exactly how God's plan is better than man's godless theories.
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I've RTFA (read the article) and looked carefully at the picture.
. Looks like a star field to me with a bunch of nebular (sp?) gas around it. It would really help if they had some kind of analysis, some additional picture with the stars in question circled or with arrows to them or something.
I've had 2 semesters of college astronomy. I understand some (rough concepts of) stellar dynamics. This article didn't go into the ways in which they determining what was going on. Does a star start fusion reactions only in the center of the star and this is hidden for some time? What does it look like then, a ball of glowing gas? How long does it take to be identifiable as a distinct object, where 'there's the star' and 'there's the edge of space' (plus or minus the coronasphere which flings off stuff like mad, IIRC).
if anyone knows how this stuff happens, in detail, can you give a pointer to it or explain here (a) what exactly does the process of stellar birth LOOK like, and (b) what did we discover about it recently...? And, Please, use all the technical terms that are appropriate, I'm both capable and interested and can look up terms later if need be... Thanks!!?!?!?!???
Unitarian Church: Freethinkers Congregate!
Ooo man the floppy drive is broken. No wait. The computer is just upside down.
uh huh. But here's the problem. Hubble has four gyros. They are absolutely vital to its operation. Without them, you can't point at the star you want to see, but more importantly, you can't point the solar panels at the sun when it's time to recharge.
Two of the gyroscopes have already broken. If the other two break, hubble will be space junk - and we just don't allow that to happen anymore. It's better to de-orbit something than to allow it to stay up there, risk having peices fall off, and just generally adding to the clutter that already makes low earth orbit dangerous. With me so far? You cannot allow a broken HST to remain in orbit. You have to clean up your trash.
Well guess what. You need a gyro in order to align the thrusters retrograde in order to deorbit. You *cannot* keep using the telescope until that last gyro goes bad, because then it will be stranded up there and pose yet another hazard to future missions to LEO. Guess what that means... it means that when the third gyro breaks, when you are down to only one gyro left, you have to deorbit the HST right then and there.
So... there are two gyros left. The third one could break today or tomorrow or next year. But when it does, that's it. Do you understand? That's why there is talk of getting rid of the HST.
We could use the shuttle to replace the gyros, but after the columbia accident the public is just too much of a collective pussy to allow a manned mission for something like that. I don't agree with it either, but basically the only two options for hubble are, 1. a manned mission. 2. throw it away.
You can say, "I'd like to adopt it" if you want to. That's fine. But unless you have a space shuttle in your garage, you cannot extend the life of the thing.
Here is a better plan: take the $500 million that we would have to spend on a shuttle mission, and spend that on a newer, better telescope. Doesn't that sound like a good idea?