The telescope madness must stop
Scientific American had a good article recently on the absurd doubling-p of telescopes, built by rival universities in the USA with a consortium of me-toos for each side. The projects would benefit from being rolled into one, where the money could build something great. The observatories in Hawaii and Chile seem remote and minimal, but in fact they have a hell of a footprint, and the tops of mountains (former) and the fragile ecosystem (latter) are brutalised by a petrochem attitude: bulldoze and to hell with anything else.
'Sacred' is often invoked to say 'quite wrecking our beautiful areas and reserving these special places for your private purposes'. The sacred might be attended to, as 'quite riding roughshod over us and thinking that your scientific purposes trump everything else'. I love astronomy, but it's not the only thing of value in the world.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
