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Thirty Meter Telescope Likely Never Gets Built ... In Hawaii
An anonymous reader writes: After years of its backers of doing everything the state of Hawaii demanded in order to get permission to build the Thirty Meter Telescope, a state judge today ordered that the whole process should start over again. Since this order was instigated by the protesters, and that it appears the government favors those protesters, it appears that there is no chance TMT will ever get approval to build in Hawaii. We've been following the back and forth, back and forth story of this telescope for a while.
Hippie burnouts. Luddite native simpletons. There are already 4 observatories near the sacred summit of Mauna Kea. What harm would one more do? Whose state is it anyway?
an ill wind that blows no good
"Historically marginalized people are now getting their legitimate say in the process" translates to "they want to be paid a bribe, at which point the construction will stop being blasphemous". It's a shakedown.
We have no business as a society stopping building on the basis of blasphemy anyway.
... that it likely never gets built, when the article says that officials have said that they'll continue the process? You're basically just changing actual reporting into an opinion piece, and presenting said opinion as if it's in the reporting.
It's times like this I wish I had a friend named 'The Professor'.
I consider Mauna Kea sacred ground that should be used only for telescopic exploration of the heavens. How can these heretics deny me my constitutional right of freedom of religion? Thomas Jefferson had a telescope, and it was obviously his intent when he wrote the First Amendment that people should be free to practice telescopy in sacred places such as Mauna Kea.
Another victory of religion and superstition and the self interests of a few people who have appointed themselves as religious leaders over science and reason and public interest.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
No, you need to grow up. If this was a fight over some land with significance to Christians you'd like be all "fuck them."
Those of us with a fairer eye on the question of religion don't play the denomination game. Fuck these savages. Stop your PC bullshit and grow a set. The idea that people identify themselves with something that they had no hand in from their ancestors is simply bullshit.
Science: 0
superstition: 1
greed: 4.
I should use this sig to advertise my book ISBN-13 : 978-1501515132.
"A tiny pressure group can stop virtually any big project, by filing court action after court action,"
The real opposition to TMT came from the Deep Greens, who tried the same tactic in the Nineties to stop telescope construction in Arizona. Republicans (astronomy is a major "industry" in AZ) beat them back by the skin of their teeth, but the Green victory in Hawaii means that the US is through as a location for any major project of this kind, barring some major political reformation.
It's an election year, so write your candidate. It can't hurt.
Sounds a lot like what happened to the company that tried to run ferry service between the islands, the government supported the company and helped them start up, 2 years (and several lawsuits) later a judge shut them down because whatever law was passed by the government was against Hawaii's constitution.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
In December 2008, environmental groups and the company returned to court for an appeal of the previous ruling. On March 16, 2009 the Hawaii Supreme Court ruled that allowing the Superferry to operate prior to completion of the environmental study was unconstitutional.[37] The company immediately suspended service and laid off its 236 employees.
Hundreds of jobs and hundreds of millions of dollars of investment lost.... and probably hundreds of millions of future investments lost because investors won't invest in infrastructure when they have no assurance that when the government says "we need this, do it", that they really mean it.
I actually had tickets to ride the boat, but the company had already shut down before my trip.
This was actually the result of a proxy fight.
It was a proxy for the ke ea Hawai‘i movement, which is a movement that is demanding some form of sovereignty for Hawaii. they have been around forever, and they make themselves a pain in the ass wherever they can in order to attempt to draw media attention to their cause.
Their favorite hobby horses are self-determination and self-governance, for Hawaii as an independent nation, or for people of native Hawaiian ancestry to obtain "tribal sovereignty" similar to the relationship with Native Americans, for Native Hawaiians.
They generally don't care about "sacred spots" unless caring about them publicly will get major headlines.
Alphabetically, the organizations involved include: ALOHA, Hawaiian Kingdom, Hawaiian Kingdom Government, Ka Lhui, Ka Pkaukau, Mauna Kea Anaina Hou, Nation of Hawai'i, Nou Ke Akua Ke Aupuni O Hawaii, Poka Laenui, and Protect Kahoolawe Ohana (PKO).
Frankly, I'm surprised there is not a "Bring Queen Lili'uokalani Back From The Dead Society". They are unhappy with the 1893 U.S. Marine invasion that got rid of the hereditary monarchy, and they are unhappy with the U.S. annexation of 1898.
if Hawaii was still its own country, you'd have your own 1%ers
That was certainly the historical case, and going back into pre-Western-contact days, the ruling class (ali`i) were so elite that if a commoner even looked at them the commoner was subject to death.
Having said that, though, the situation, like everything here in Hawai`i, is complex. Certainly bad things happened back in 1893; it's hard to study the history and think otherwise. But that was a long time ago. What's right? I don't really have the right to be the judge of that.
However, most of the protesters overlook the fact that their ancestors were astronomers and skilled in things like celestial navigation. The ancestors might very well have supported something like the TMT. The ali`i seemed to believe in progress (a little known fact is that Honolulu was, in the days of the Kingdom, an early and enthusiastic adopter of the telephone, under the direction of King David Kalakaua).
Last spring I happened to be on the University of Hawai`i Manoa campus (the main campus, in Honolulu). There was a large group of TMT protesters spread along Dole Street. Granted, they were all very polite and behaved very well, which is a credit to their movement. But was it their movement? I stopped and listened to some of them talking; a number of them were speaking `olelo Hawai`i (the Hawaiian language). Very cool. But they really didn't know what was going on. I overheard them saying that they (at least many of them) were taking part because their UH Hawaiian Studies instructors told them they had to be there.
Sadly, you're both wrong. Keystone XL is private, is all about resource extraction (well, transportation of extracted resources) and is being eternally delayed in much the same way. In Canada, we have two more proposed pipelines that are experiencing the same opposition. ("Northern Gateway" and "Energy East")
"That was certainly the historical case, and going back into pre-Western-contact days, the ruling class (ali`i) were so elite that if a commoner even looked at them the commoner was subject to death."
And in particular, only the ali'i were permitted to go above the treeline on Maunakea. The kãnaka, or commoners, would be clubbed to death for venturing up to where the telescopes are now.
Yippee! Macrons work now. Thanks for the encoding fix, new owners!
> Fuck these savages.
I don't see why /. is losing their minds over this. It's just a straight up NIMBY issue. The people who live there don't want it, and obviously nobody has successfully explained why they should care. I don't even know if anybody has even tried. I certainly haven't seen an explanation here about why the TMT is so important, and why we must have it so bad that we should override the wishes of the local residents.
I don't know why everybody here needs to play up the pacific islander aspect, poking fun at their hokey religion and ancient weapons.
I'm in Arizona, where the real organizers of this protest tried the same tactics during the Nineties, when the telescope construction was on our Mt. Graham, with somewhat less success. You might want to read their manifesto:
http://dgrnewsservice.org/2015...
There are two possibilities. Either these lands are public or they are private (or could be sold to a private group). If I build a telescope on my private land, you have no right to interfere with that even if it offends your religious beliefs. If the lands are public, then trying to maintain them in a way that caters to the religious feelings of any group amounts to an establishment of religion; that's unacceptable as well.
And, of course, "native Hawaiian" is an ill-defined and corrupt concept to begin with, so "native Hawaiians" ought not to have any legal standing as a group at all. That isn't just a question of justice; if you let people retroactively interfere with property and ownership rights based on their membership in some racial group, you create so much risk and uncertainty that you scare away investments and business. Any sane businessman and investor is going to ask: if we build a new power plant or factory or dock or shopping center, how much risk do we face that some "native Hawaiian group" is going to claim that we are treading on their sacred ground and kill the project halfway through, or demand pay-offs?
That isn't just a question of justice; if you let people retroactively interfere with property and ownership rights based on their membership in some racial group, you create so much risk and uncertainty that you scare away investments and business. Any sane businessman and investor is going to ask: if we build a new power plant or factory or dock or shopping center, how much risk do we face that some "native Hawaiian group" is going to claim that we are treading on their sacred ground and kill the project halfway through, or demand pay-offs?
Especially since the Mauna Kea Telescope is just a proxy fight. This group of Hawaiians at core do not want white people on "their" islands at all. The native Hawaiians refer to anyone not of their race as Haole https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... , although it is mostly used as a racial epithet against Europeans.
From the article:
In 1944, Hawaiian scholar Charles Kenn wrote, "In the primary and esoteric meaning, haole indicates a race that has no relation to one's own; an outsider, one who does not conform to the mores of the group; one that is void of the life element because of inattention to natural laws which make for the goodness in man. In its secondary meaning, haole ... implies a thief, a robber, one not to be trusted.
In likewise manner, in Hawaiian schools, on the last day of school, they have "Kill Haole day", where natives are supposed to harass and attack the white students. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
The Southern Poverty Law Center has this to say about the incredibly racist Hawaiians:
https://www.splcenter.org/figh...
So sorry Hawaiians, I consider you to be just as racist as the southern preacher in the 1859's preaching how the bible condones owning black people, as racist as any group of KKK members, who lynch and burn crosses on lawns. As racist as any southern state you care to name.
And do not even attempt to hand me the idea that since some white people have been racist, that its okay with you being racist, because you are then condoning their racism. You are 100 percent as big a collection of racist scum as they were.
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
> We have no business as a society stopping building on the basis of blasphemy anyway.
Except the top of Mauna Kea was never a holy site. It was a rock quarry, there is evidence all over the top of the mountain. Before Westerners brought metal tools, the natives used stone ones, and the lava that erupted up there during an ice age cooled quickly, making it chip-resistant. So they set up mining camps and dug up the mountain top. They didn't live up there, not enough rainfall to grow things. That's also the reason it is a good telescope site. So the natives commuted from lower altitudes, dug up stone tools, and went back down. Not exactly a religious pilgrimage.
I've never seen it explained how a telescope (of which several are already up there) could possibly be a "NIMBY" issue, considering that it has exactly zero possible negative consequences for the locals. It's jot nuclear waste, it's not noisy - shit, it doesn't even block anyone's view. To say nothing of their "hokey religions and ancient weapons" being exactly what they, themselves cite in opposition: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wik...
Since you were fortunate enough to be under a rock for the last few decades, you've missed the rapid proliferation of "identity politics." The basic idea is to assert that you are a member of a sexual, social, religious or ethnic minority, so that you may characterize any criticism directed at you as inherently bigoted, racist, et cetera. It is a variant of "moral fiat high ground" argument style - the idea being to avoid debates one cannot win by making it impossible for anyone to speak against you.
You have probably seen articles/comments on /. about "gamergate;" this was simply a lot of 20-somethings with no prior interest in politics getting a crash-course in identity politics when they found a "game dev" trying to hype a very poor game on its merits as femenist-affiming art, or something. These same 20-somethings were also astounded to discover that journalists are neither honest nor principled (fancy that,) and they all got very excited. That entire fracas is a case study in how widespread exploiting identity politics has become - and how commercialized. You can reasonably expect to drum up undeserved hype (and sales) for a poor product if you cast it as pro-whatever; by writers seeking to establish their moral righteousness, or just seeking to head off accusations of bigotry or intolerance (i.e. character assasination.)
In this case, identity politics is stopping Science, which /. is fond of. Therefore many cnsider it a big deal. You may disagree with the above assesments (and you'd be a fool not to do your own research on all this and just trust my word, anyway,) but it is a description of the issue as I (and many others) percieve it.
It's all playing to hurt an indignation of white poor uneducated americans who feel left behind and carry a big grudge.
There's actually a name for it: "privileged panic." It refers specifically to people who honestly have no clue why the disenfranchised are angry, or that they even ARE disenfranchised. All they know is, they're suddenly under attack for things they've done all their lives and never thought twice about, much less been criticized for. The hue and cry is what happens when you shift a paradigm without a clutch. And as you say, it is playing to the panic - Fox news et al has a very simple model of journalism; i.e. the Jerry Springer one. They take one conservative, one liberal, and then lock them in a cage and give them knives - because clash sells. This is not the way with, say, MSNBC - or even Huffington Post compared to Breitbart.com. They are not seeking to push policy issues - or personal advancement - based on their religion being special. They're circling the wagons and barking at anything that comes close. Abuse of identity politics makes things hard for people looking for real change. You can't impose social change from the top town, no matter how hard you try - Reconstruction in general and Jim Crow in particular, for instance. You have to win hearts and minds. You have to communicate. And that's very difficult to do when the panicking privileged have become accustomed to seeing these issues wielded like just another political club.
I'm familiar with gamergate as well. a reactionary neckbeard riot
I'm a "gamergate" supporter, and a gamer. I also have a bachelor's degree from a four year university. Video games are now a 93 billion dollar global industry with development teams and budgets that rival Hollywood blockbuster movies in their scope, cost and sophistication - and are marketed much the same way. Long gone are the days when computer games were limited to two markets; kids (on consoles) and computer geeks (who were the only people really using personal computers back in the day.) "Gamer" has retained this stigmatic association well into the modern era, and the fact you feel no shame in using it to attack those you disagree with puts the lie to your earlier sneering at the " white poor uneducated americans." You feel no shame or hesitation in attacking their ethnicity, educational opportunities, socioeconomic status or even their intellect (rather ableist of you, chum,) because white males are fair game by dint of being born "privileged." This is, indeed, the beating heart of identity politics. You seek to elevate your voice above reproach - and discredit mine beyond consideration - by holding legitimacy to be intrinsic to socioeconomic status. Naturally, those that disagree with you are categorized as "reactionary neckbeards rioting," and thus, intrinsically, are stripped of legitimacy.
I am telling you all this so you will understand that not all of us "reactionary neckbeards" are stupid, nor are we uneducated. We have voices, and we vote. Think about that.
maybe they didn't want a large industrial installation on top of what the local community feels is a natural resource?
It most certainly is a natural resource - it's a really good place to build telescopes. I would understand completely if the locals were upset over 14 years of construction work going to offshore contractors rather than the locals, or something similar - or if they were lobbying for a rental tax, so the local population with a significant cultural claim to the land was receiving at least as much use of that public land as the astronomers from timbuktu were. Unfortunately, that's not how it has been characterized or argued.
Oh please. It's the left that wants to build the telescope. When was the last time you heard about right-wingers giving a shit about astronomy or basic science unless there's profit involved? There's no profit in astronomy.
As someone above stated, this is a fight between the pro-science left and the SJW wacky-left. And unfortunately it looks like the wacky-left is winning.
Astronomer here, I live and work on the Big Island. You are completely wrong to assume this means the end of TMT in Hawaii, it was pretty much what was expected to happen after the state supreme court vacated the permit last December. While the new permitting process is going to take more time (months or years, nobody knows for sure), TMT seem to be taking their time deciding on their next step and are still hoping to continue as planned. I have heard nothing that would suggest otherwise. Please understand a big project like that doesn't just up and leave after having so much invested. Supporters of the TMT here (of which there are plenty) are still hoping a new, watertight permit will come out of all this. Frankly, we're more shocked by the recent news about another batch of anti-TMT protesters being acquitted because they claimed to have "prevented a greater harm from occurring". But then again, this is Hawaii, and that's how things work here.
That's my point. Ours tend to be the types that can keep to themselves. Theirs are the kind that can't.
What? No. There is no kind of religious type that can keep to itself once it gets the power to start forcing other people to live like them. There are some kinds of religious, though, whose beliefs inherently prevent them from amassing such power. You're not going to see the Amish forcing anyone to live like them any time soon because their religion forbids them taking up arms. They don't have the means, and their lifestyle forbids them acquiring them, so it's not going to happen.
The only thing that stops any particular Christian sect from going bad (they all have the same book more or less, so they all can justify any kind of bad behavior if they cross their eyes just right when they read it) is other competing sects, and the fact that their numbers are all dwindling. The only religion growing right now is Islam, and IMO that's only because they have a large captive audience to which they can sell their story. Depressed people are easy targets for religion. Bring up quality of life in the places they're making inroads and you'll see them falter rapidly. Nobody happy needs religion.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"