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Hawaii Supreme Court Approves Thirty Meter Telescope On Mauna Kea (hawaiinewsnow.com)
Applehu Akbar shares a report from Hawaii News Now: After years of legal wrangling and protests, the Thirty Meter Telescope got a green light Tuesday from the state Supreme Court. In a 4-to-1 decision, the state's highest court ruled in favor of the telescope's construction atop Mauna Kea, effectively ending all legal avenues for contesting the controversial project unless the U.S. Supreme Court takes up the case. In a statement, TMT International Observatory Board of Governors Chairman Henry Yang said the body is "grateful" for the ruling and "committed to being good stewards on the mountain."
Slashdot reader Applehu Akbar adds: "Green anti-science organizations, such as Deep Green Resistance and Sierra Club, have been trying to stop TMT construction for years, in an expanded version of an earlier campaign to halt the construction of large research telescopes in southeastern Arizona. As in Arizona, their excuse was at first endangered species on the construction site, and subsequently native rights.
"TMT is an advanced world-class telescope designed to investigate and answer some of the most fundamental questions regarding our universe, including the formation of stars and galaxies after the Big Bang and how the universe evolved to its present form. Native Hawaiians will also be included in other direct benefits from the TMT," the court wrote. "Thus, use of the land by TMT is consistent with conservation and in furtherance of the self-sufficiency of the state."
"TMT is an advanced world-class telescope designed to investigate and answer some of the most fundamental questions regarding our universe, including the formation of stars and galaxies after the Big Bang and how the universe evolved to its present form. Native Hawaiians will also be included in other direct benefits from the TMT," the court wrote. "Thus, use of the land by TMT is consistent with conservation and in furtherance of the self-sufficiency of the state."
Shaddap anti-science republican faggot
You've clearly never visited Hawaii OR obtained even a cursory understanding of the issue here. The anti-science ones in this issue are the green party and native Hawaiians.
What benefits will they gain from a big telescope being nearby?
It's basically the best location on Earth for a ground-based telescope due to local climate and air conditions.
Also.... it's literally just named Thirty Meter Telescope?
It was named by scientists, be glad it wasn't some absurd string of latin words translating roughly to "the glowy ring things from sonic the hedgehog."
I wouldn't call them anti-science so much as anti-progress of any type.
Strawman. Nobody is asking for a shopping mall on top of Moana Kea.
Moana Kea is uniquely adapted for the TMT. That some groups who claim to be "green" have tried to block the TMT using every excuse they could thus clearly and fairly defines these groups as "Green anti-science".
Democracy is a sheep and two wolves deciding what to have for lunch. Freedom is a well armed sheep contesting the issue
You'd think that "greens" would actually be pro-science, what with environmental issues mostly being understandable by actual science.
But think of all the so-called "greens" who are into essential oils, crystals, supplements and all the other esoteric unscientific nonsense. They want to align with Native Americans because they think it gives credibility to their new age bullshit to associate it with actual pagan religious practices, which while culturally legitimate are no less fantasy than new agers or Catholics for that matter.
And actual organized native opposition to something like a scientific observatory is really nothing more than a political shakedown for concessions somewhere else.
Here is the smoking gun, their manifesto on TMT:
https://deepgreenresistancegre...
The author of this piece, Will Falk, has been one of the earliest organizers of the protest movement in Hawaii, whipping up a native uprising against "Western science." Until the Greens got involved, Hawaiians had a long and peaceful relationship with research science, astronomy in particular. Their ancestors constructed star maps to navigate the Pacific, and King Kamehameha himself was an astronomy buff.
The whole summit of mauna Kea is a 114,000 - acre nature preserve administered by University of Hawaii. Within that preserve, a 52-acre patch near the summit was set aside for astronomy in 1960. The TMT would be the latest of about 13 telescopes that have been built in this area. It is the first one to become controversial.
Also.... it's literally just named Thirty Meter Telescope?
You can get more when you auction off the naming rights after you get the permit.
be glad it wasn't some absurd string of latin words translating roughly to "the glowy ring things from sonic the hedgehog."
I dont know ... "Splendida anulum de sonic ericius" has a certain ring to it
Actually its the best location on US soil, but hey, if thats what you consider earth...
The Antarctic has some pretty major advantages (and challenges), however has a somewhat restricted view..
Tibet has a few locations that are outstanding..
The Atacama Desert and Equador have some pretty good (better than Hawaii) locations.
However this is a good location, and the people blocking it should be denied medical science, since they want to live without progress..
(Of course thats rarely the locals, they just get caught up in it, its a bunch of nothing-better-to-do whackjobs who travel around trying to block science 'because' )
Are those the anti-vax, anti-GMO, or gluten-free republicans? Oops, wrong anti-science party.
Just another day in Paradise
Right, because the "scientific-industrial complex" just wants to spend ~$1B in a remote location to fuck up the view. This is on grounds that were set aside long ago for astronomy, which according to you has no value to humanity. Obviously, we don't need things like GPS, or cell phones. In fact, just go read this to find out what astronomy has done for humanity, then come back and apologize for your ignorance. Otherwise, we'll just know it was stupidity, which can't be fixed.
https://www.iau.org/public/the...
Just another day in Paradise
Telescopy McTelescopeface
You mean the Trump who wants to make a Space Force to proactively protect the Earth from asteroids - vs the green party who want to halt all progress and the left in general who want to defend the "rights" of native Hawaiians who don't even live/work anywhere near the peak of this volcano while telling the rest of the world "doesn't matter if it's the best place in literally the whole planet to build a telescope, because some politically correct garbage."
A small, but important, triumph.
Will Falk seems to fit right in with "fallists" that demand "de-colonization" of science (i.e. regarding voodoo and science to be on an equal footing).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Such folks really should adhere to their own standards and refuse any use of electronic devices.
"By the way if anyone here is in advertising or marketing... kill yourself." -- Bill Hicks
What benefits will they gain from a big telescope being nearby?
Telescopes are tended by a small crew of highly paid nerds. These are the kind of high-quality jobs that benefit every economy because they occupy the top of an economic pyramid. Each of those nerds needs a place to live, needs his/her lawn mowed, dog groomed, car washed, child care and education. Each of those techie jobs nourishes an expanding set of more humble jobs below it.
The users of TMT will be scientists, most of whom do not live in the area. They will make use of the same travel and hotel infrastructure as tourists, but will contribute a lot more to the economy than a week at the beach. Science enriches us all.
I wouldn't call them anti-science so much as anti-progress of any type.
Indeed: they are anti-science because they are anti-progress.
It blows my mind that such people can thing of themselves as "green". Bronze-age farmers clear-cut forests for farmland everywhere they lived. E.g., the Scottish highlands used to be heavily forested, but were almost entirely clear-cut. Meanwhile, thanks to progress, US forested area increased dramatically in the last hundred years. Even though it's a mix worldwide (third world nations are still clear-cutting in some places), worldwide forest corverage has increased more than 7% since the 1980s.
Progress makes life better. That's why we call it progress.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
Of course, your views assume that it's someone else who is affected. Soon as it's you, you get your friends to storm the nearest wildlife sanctuary in order to teach the Feds a lesson, like those Texans did.
So you're comparing a scientific endevour the whole species benefits from and a few people are pissed off about because they're racist as fuck and hate outsiders (but it's OK, they get a pass because they aren't white,) to a situation where hundreds of people worked land over generations and still actively use it but were being sold out by a corrupt politician who wanted to sell land to Chinese investors? Those two things are in no way shape or form related, and it really goes to show your bias that you even believe they could be.
Do you know where the Hawiians live or work? I don't and I've followed the story. I can be absolutely certain you know even less.
Lived there for years, actually. Native Hawaiians are easily the most racist and xenophobic demographic in the US, by a very wide margin.
The best place to build a telescope is in space. But you won't spend the money. Spoils your view, against your religion, etc.
Good luck getting a 30m telescope into space with modern technology.
You know, if it's an FU for the Hawaiians, it should be an FU for you too. Build in space a telescope of equal size. The government should take what it damn well pleases from you to build the telescope there. After all, you don't live or work there and it's the best place. Hey, your arguments. Not my problem.
The government isn't taking shit from them: they don't use it. It is literally the single best place on Earth to build a telescope, they don't get squatters rights on such a precious resource they don't even have any intention of using.
Biodiversity at the peak of Mauna Kea? Have you been there? I have, its beautiful. Its far above the tree line, freezing cold, and nearly barren. Ahinahina grows there occasionally in the more sheltered spots, but it grows elsewhere and the cultivation / reintroduction is going well. Unless you kill all the wildlife that jumps the fences to eat the remaining naturally occurring species then this interesting adaptation of California Tarweed might be sort of lost. There isn't really anything else of interest up there except volcanic tundra, ancient quarry sites, and a few shrines. And people who claim you shouldn't do astronomy there out of respect for people to whom its sacred either have no idea who its sacred to, or want to forget their own history. If Kamehameha was alive he'd probably have loved TMT. (google Kaneakanoowaha)
Also.... it's literally just named Thirty Meter Telescope?
That is a translation. The original name in Americanese sounded better: "Hundred Foot Telescope".
If only. The mountain is very broad and the slope shallow. The view is of the rock fields around you and the clouds far below. On a perfect day it may be nice, but ocean air hitting mountains tends to make clouds.
We could build a three hundred metre telescope in space today. Gentlemen, we can build it. We have the technology. We have the capability to make the world's first optical interferometer.
In all seriousness, it's child's play in terms of the science and technology. Ship some glass into space, melt it, cool it in roughly the right shape, we know microgravity forms purer crystalline structures so we've fewer defects than we could ever achieve on Earth, we can then use machines not impeded by either air turbulence or ground vibration to actually grind and polish.
That last bit is simulated on Earth. It's how large mirrors are made. They simulate space. So we already have all that experience and hardware.
Because you're not transporting a mirror to space, you've no problems with size restrictions or damage caused by launch.
The rest is assembly. There's probably not much more dust in space than in a clean room, so once the parts are packed up and shipped, the difference is that you're not competing with gravity over where the parts go.
The ISS has limited lifespan for science and America wants out anyway. Converting the American wing to a space telescope manufacturing facility requires a couple of modules for mirror manufacture and not much more.
That could all be set up within Trump's first term in office.
Less time than it would take to get the politics sorted out in Hawaii.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
A technical heads up. Not only are ground based telescopes many magnitudes cheaper than space based ones (and offer the ability to combine to synthesize larger aperture) they have actually overtaken Hubble in their individual resolution. Agreed the atmosphere prevents wide band infra red capability which is why the next space telescope the James Webb is an infrared telescope. The technical advance which has led to the giant leap in ground based telescope capability is adaptive optics. This uses a laser pointing star and a deformable mirror to eliminate atmospheric turbulence on the largest and best located ground telescopes. See this great lecture from yesterday for example on the state of the art from The Silicon Valley Astronomy Lecture Series by Dr. Claire Max (University of California Observatories)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
The comparison of the features on Neptune between the Keck 10M and the Hubble 2.4M thirteen minutes in makes this abundantly clear.
Facts are history now plebs have politics for religion on social media.
There's no quality of life at issue here. The location for the TMT is at the summit of a volcano. There's nothing there except the already-existing observatory to which this would just be an addition. No one lives there, unless staff or scientists are pulling "all nighters" (Or, would it be "all dayers" considering that astronomers need to be nocturnal to take direct observations?). It's above the tree-line, so any ecosystem disruptions would be negligible; and all but certainly already accounted for in the EIR. There's literally zero quantifiable negative impact to *ANYONE* from having the telescopes there, and a very real *positive* impact from the science done there. The "opposition" to the TMT is basically just a shake-down, nothing more.
Imagine all the people...
as the consensus amongst the right is that taking from others in the name of science is fine for Kea, I must assume they've no problems with the Feds taking everything past the first five million from the rich. It's just religion after that and we're all agreed that religion has no value. What's wrong with taking nothing?
wait, what?
Why does everything have to be reduced to a right/left dung throwing fest? I'd be shocked if the astronomical community designing/building/using the scope voted much differently than 1/3 R and 2/3 D. But, hey, you've got to have only two boxes to cram any policy decision into, so go ahead.
You’ve never visited the mountain, I’m thinking. I have, back when the very first telescopes were being built in the astronomy reserve area.
NIMBY doesn’t come into play at all her because nobody lives on Mauna Kea. The mountain is a desolate expanse of red cinder where no one lives. No one even lived there in pre-American times either, because the ali’i, the one-percenters of the Bronze Age world, reserved it for their rituals. Commoner Kanaka were punished by death for so much as visiting the place.
Today the upper part of the mountain is a specially designated natural preserve where every identified heiau (altar) of the ali’i are protected, as is every natural species that has been identified there, down to the humble wekiu bug. All of the telescopes occupy the small reserve within this area that has been approved since 1960 as non-infringing on culture or nature.
No worries: if the volcano gods have any real objections, I'm sure Mauna Kea is quite capable of looking out for itself :-)
"Moana Kea" is pretty funny.
No shit. Probably more than half of the the environmental movement is a Russian front. Especially the more than half that's about stopping fracking and oil and gas pipelines (but not so much LNG terminals), for the better to need to import Russian oil and gas with.