Giant Telescope Project Stalled By Hawaiian Natives (khon2.com) 177
Fudge Factor 3000 writes: The Hawaiian Supreme Court has pulled a construction permit for the Thirty Meter Telescope project. A vocal minority of Hawaiians has vehemently protested the construction of the telescope for religious reasons. Now, they have been successful in contesting the construction permit. The ruling reads in part: "The process followed by the Board here did not meet these standards. Quite simply, the Board put the cart before the horse when it issued the permit before the request for a contested case hearing was resolved and the hearing was held. Accordingly, the permit cannot stand."
I support the telescope (Score:5, Insightful)
But the hypocrisy that will come from the complaints about the "Vocal Minority" will be over the top. All I have to say to both sides on this is, "Welcome to the rule of law and individual rights"
Re:I support the telescope (Score:5, Insightful)
Section 7. The State reaffirms and shall protect all rights, customarily and traditionally exercised for subsistence, cultural and religious purposes and possessed by ahupua’a tenants who are descendants of native Hawaiians who inhabited the Hawaiian Islands prior to 1778, subject to the right of the State to regulate such rights. [Add Const Con 1978 and election Nov 7, 1978]”
It may be law, but it makes me uneasy when a religion becomes enshrined in law. I guess we're lucky they're not cannibals.
Re:I support the telescope (Score:5, Insightful)
This ruling has nothing to do with religion. Due process was not followed when the permit was granted. The university is free to apply for a permit again.
Re:I support the telescope (Score:4, Interesting)
"The State reaffirms and shall protect all rights, customarily and traditionally exercised for subsistence, cultural and religious purposes"
Well, if by "nothing" you mean "everything"...
Due process was not followed when the permit was granted. The university is free to apply for a permit again.
Does the state intend to reimburse the university for expenses already incurred as a result of the state's negligence in failing to follow their discriminatory religion-favoring "due process" rules?
Re:I support the telescope (Score:5, Insightful)
It doesn't matter on which grounds the protest group objected to the permit. They were not heard, and that's what the Court ruled on.
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They were not heard, and that's what the Court ruled on.
The real problem is that they were not paid off. Some native groups were paid off to abstain from protesting, but not all of them. UHH should have invested more time and money upfront to keep the right people happy. Now they are going to have to deal with bruised egos, and it is going to cost them even more.
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Freedom of religion only says that the state won't explicitly promote or persecute any particular religion; or, more directly, that it won't do shit like codifying religious protections into zoning laws.
It says fuck-all about whether or not a private entity has to give two shakes of a rat's dick about building a brothel on top of your holy meteorite or the bones of your ancestors or the spoooky places where your gods like to chill.
Re:I support the telescope (Score:5, Interesting)
Anyone who has ever worked with Hawaiian natives can tell you this has nothing to do with religion and everything to do with money. Basically, whoever is trying to build this telescope must not have realized that building anything big in Hawaii requires a big kickback to the natives.
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I spent a month in Hawaii learning about the native culture. The people are nice enough but as for the culture: I can hardly blame the plantation owners for considering them pagan savages. There is nothing of value to preserve there.
It's an unpopular thing to say but the Hawaiins are infinitely better off as a result of gentrification than they were while they were still killing each-other for offending their royalty.
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That said, I don't think his "pagan savages" remark was called for. Civilization doesn't really reduce cruelty all that much, it just hides it much better.
Re: I support the telescope (Score:5, Interesting)
Jared Diamond calls it something like the noble savage fantasy. Many people insist on believing that native cultures were all peaceful utopias who called up mother Earth every Sunday. The truth is that premodern cultures, including white European cultures, were almost all incredibly nasty. Occasional, isolated, exceptions existed, until they met their bloodthirsty enslaving, often cannibalistic neighbours. Those neighbours were sometimes English, Spanish, Carib, Iroquois, Viking, Ottoman, or pretty much anybody else. Modern societies aren't perfect, but they're far, far better than anything that existed even a couple hundred years ago.
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Dam, that was beautiful sarcasm. Mod +1.
It is gems like this that prove /. isn't completely crap these days.
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If you wanted to return them you should have done it within 30 days.
Signed,
Britain.
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"Melting pot" refers to the idea that people come and bring their cultural heritage to form something new. Claiming someone else's land for yourself is conquest, not melting pot. Stop smearing a good idea just to defend an obsolete one.
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Most organized anything, religion included, is ultimately about money. I'm just not comfortable with government granting special privilege to people based on their affiliation, as the duty of the state should be to ensure fair access to public lands, not to let some minority of citizens extort the rest.
Aside: Is there any example of 'ancestral claims to land' not ending in a giant mess?
Re:I support the telescope (Score:5, Informative)
From the perspective of the natives, a mere kickback is probably a tiny fraction of what they feel is owed to them for basically stealing their country.
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White settlers from the U.S. who wanted to use it for agriculture overthrew the native government [wikipedia.org], and got the U.S. to annex it.
Yes they did. And a thousand years before that, settlers from Tahiti conquered the descendants of the previous settlers from the Southern Marquesas.
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The point of a Constitution is that it's a set of rules that restrict the government from taking action against the citizenry. It makes me uneasy when someone advocates for loosening those re
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ahupuaa? (Score:2)
Section 7. The State reaffirms and shall protect all rights, customarily and traditionally exercised for subsistence, cultural and religious purposes and possessed by ahupua’a tenants who are descendants of native Hawaiians who inhabited the Hawaiian Islands prior to 1778, subject to the right of the State to regulate such rights. [Add Const Con 1978 and election Nov 7, 1978]”
It may be law, but it makes me uneasy when a religion becomes enshrined in law. I guess we're lucky they're not cannibals.
As I remember from fourth grade, an ahupuaa runs from the mountain peak (mauka) down to the ocean (makai) so that each one is self sustaining. I'm having a hard time figuring out the correct ahupuaa for the location on Mauna Kea for the telescopes to determine which group of native Hawaiians have the right to protest under section 7 of the state constitution.
Bummer, looks like /. doesn't support Unicode enough to write the okina
Re:I support the telescope (Score:5, Insightful)
If Maunakea is so sacred, why has the military been able to use it as a bombing range all these years? Could it be that astronomers are just more easily picked on than soldiers?
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Well, they wouldn't be the first religious people to prefer bombs over science,
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Praise Bomb
http://www.ew.com/sites/defaul... [ew.com]
Mauna Kea [Re:I support the telescope[ (Score:3)
If Maunakea is so sacred, why...
The telescope is on Mauna Kea.
In any case, neither Mauna Kea nor Mauna Loa was used as a bombing range. You're probably thinking of Pohakuloa.
Re:Mauna Kea [Re:I support the telescope[ (Score:4, Interesting)
"You're probably thinking of Pohakuloa."
Yes, Pohakuloa on the lower slopes of Maunakea. And are they still running those Enduro 500-mile mud races?
Re:I support the telescope (Score:4, Insightful)
I think you're on the right track, but the phrasing is backward. People with guns an pick on whomever they want. People with telescopes have to ask permission.
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The same reason PETA protesters throw paint on women wearing furs but not bikers wearing leather.
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Good, there are 3 different giant telescopes in early stages of construction. Only 2, or maybe 1, giant telescope are truly needed.
I'm sure they could just turn the one giant telescope around and look through the earth if they wanted to observe stars only visible from the other hemisphere.
Fuck having more than one view of the sky, amiright?
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I'm sure they could just turn the one giant telescope around and look through the earth if they wanted to observe stars only visible from the other hemisphere.
Yeah, the designers of the Earth should really have had it spin on an axis, so that you get a varying view of the sky. Then you could just locate your telescope near the equator, and see every star.
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Or hey, we could have one or two in each hemisphere and get even better views.
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Long baseline astronomy is one reason for the Chile-Hawaii pairing of two telescopes of the same size. The other problem is that there are no good sites under the murky tropical skies of the equator.
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The science that is done on these telescopes is almost entirely independent of hemishphere. They look at objects so faint and far away that there are billions in view of any site.
At this price point, yeah, we should have one. The problem is that "private" scopes like Keck soak up a lot of NSF funds, having run them through the UC system, leaving less for "public" observatories like Gemini. It's using tremendous amounts of public funding to make a toy for very, very few people. It's much easier somehow to ge
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I understand, but believe it or not small groups of people being able to gum up the works is a design feature of our system not a bug. The reverse is generally considered undesirable, think of the term "getting railroaded" or Andrew Jackson's forced removal of Indian populations.
Where the TMT can go now (Score:3)
There are not many places on Earth where a telescope of this size can go. Hawaii was chosen because of the near-ideal weather at high altitude, and a low Northern Hemisphere latitude, which would make the Thirty Meter Telescope an ideal companion to the European E-ELT now being built in Chile. So with Hawaii now out of the picture, where could we put it now?
How about the Qinghai Plateau of Tibet (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tibetan_Plateau)? This is even higher than Maunakea, though the weather will not be as favorable and the latitude is somewhat too far north.
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Re:Where the TMT can go now (Score:5, Insightful)
Pay off the natives like they wanted, build telescope, leave religion behind.
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This is another possible approach. Another out-of-box solution for getting the TMT built in Hawaii might be for the state to legalize pot.
Re: Where the TMT can go now (Score:5, Informative)
It' not so much about altitude and weather as it is seeing conditions; Mauna Loa has among the best if not the best seeing conditions on Earth outside Antarctica. Good seeing depends in large part on how flat and uniform the terrain is for hundreds of kilometers upwind; high mountains on islands consequently tend to fare well (the Canary Islands are another good spot)
The best known seeing location on Earth is in deep Antarctica. Unfortunately the location would make the costs prohibative.
Re: Where the TMT can go now (Score:2)
** Mauna Kea
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Put it right next to the Mauna Loa Observatory. There's already a paved road leading all the way up, so it's not like a huge amount of infrastructure is required. Sure there might be an eruption in the next 100 years or so that could wipe it out, but... that's a problem for the next generation.
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It is not clear that the TMT has to go somewhere else. The ruling was about the permit process, the university is free to apply for a permit again
Re:Where the TMT can go now (Score:4, Informative)
Yes, UH can theoretically reapply for a permit. The environmental qualification required for this mountain, independent of any native claims, is so intricate that doing it over again would take another fifteen years. Meanwhile, TMT components are already being built. I would rather see China grab the project than see us go through such a long permitting process all over again.
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Only after China gives Tibet back to the Tibetans and apologizes for the atrocities they've committed there.
We should make the natives live there. (Score:2)
That will fix this crap.
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the European E-ELT now being built in Chile.
Funny, I'd have thought that astronomers would have taken at least *one* course in geography.
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That list of locations obviously preceded siting of the E-ELT, because the two are designed to work together. It's odd that Gran Canaria was not among them, but San Pedro Mártir is an interesting possibility.
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Yeah, let's be like China, that's the model to emulate!
Re:Where the TMT can go now (Score:4, Interesting)
When it comes to dealing with extortion from people putting up religion as a front, yes.
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Living up to your name (but not so much your .sig), I see.
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You think it's too late to slip some 'cynism' tag into the next HTML specification?
Re:Where the TMT can go now (Score:4, Insightful)
China, as a major partner in TMT, has a sincere interest in seeing the project get built. Best of all, the Greens who are really behind this have no input to Chinese policy. Native objections could not have been crucial in stopping the TMT, because the site was in a designated telescope reserve inside a large environmental preserve on the mountain that has been run by University of Hawaii since the Sixties. The TMT would have been just the latest of many instruments built in the reserve. The Green campaign against TMT has been identical to their long but unsuccessful attempt to kill off the astronomy "industry" here in Arizona (http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-94-010-0049-9_6#page-1).
Additionally, China would love an opportunity to get a jump on a nation that it perceives being in decline, and would probably increase its commitment to the project. The Qinghai Plateau is in a poor part of the country that, unlike Hawaii, does not get much tourism because of its remoteness. The natives are going to love those construction and maintenance jobs.
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Your objection applied a generation ago, but the path away from Maoism is now firmly entrenched in China. It's today's up-and-coming industrial nation, just as the US was from the Gilded Age through WW II, and as such it appreciates the value of science. Certainly, building the TMT would be a point of national prestige, but we of the nerd community need to think of what's best for the science of astronomy, and the research bonanza that humanity will get from having a TMT as part of a north-south pairing of
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The Tibetan plateau is a huge place, so you're not restricted to locations near the Himalayas. There is already astronomical activity on the Plateau.
Ask the right questions (Score:5, Funny)
"Cut the crap, how much money to appease the spirits of your ancestors?"
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Either's fine by me.
When religion stands in the way of progress, religion is wrong. Simple as that.
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When religion stands in the way of progress, religion is wrong. Simple as that.
Presupposing that all "progress" is good, and that religion is always bad surely is a simple position, in the sense of MW's 4th definition of the word.
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Appease? Hah? Ask them how much the spirits want and which escrow account to deposit the funds. And no naughty siphoning off the money by the natives, they aren't dead yet.
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Bargaining 101:
Never make the first offer.
Never make an open ended offer.
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Exposing 101
Make it seem like an offer when your intention is to show that the other side isn't bargaining fairly.
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Sacred ground (Score:5, Insightful)
A vocal minority of Hawaiians has vehemently protested the construction of the telescope for religious reasons.
Don't you love how people can make up nonsensical stories about how something is sacred to them to stop activities they don't like? Sometimes they even believe the nonsense they are spouting. But it's still nonsense. Personally I find scientific inquiry to be sacred ground and I can actually show how scientific inquiry benefits mankind. If they want to show how this telescope will cause some objective problem (environmental, logistical, financial, whatever) then by all means let's slow down and consider if the telescope is a good idea. But religious objections carry no weight with me.
So they have to hold a hearing so everyone can have their say. Fine. Hold the hearing. But religious objections are no grounds to stop construction of the telescope. Let them tell us how sacred this particular patch of ground is and then build the damn thing. I'm tired of people trying to trample valuable research because of their mythology.
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Take a deep breath. Cultural or historic factors need to be taken in to consideration. If we simply discount our rich history, then we are no better than the fanatics destroying ancient monuments and statues in the desert.
Something that isn't there. (Score:2, Insightful)
Scientists in this case are discounting something that isn't there, not destroying stuff that is.
Nothing being damaged here (Score:2)
Take a deep breath. Cultural or historic factors need to be taken in to consideration.
This has nothing to do with history and probably not much about culture either. It's (allegedly) about religion which is a mythology. And frankly I cannot see any rational argument that this damages the culture or historical record of anyone. It's a telescope on top of a mountain which is not being used for any other purpose. So long as there is no environmental issue or property rights issue involved then there is nothing to discuss.
If we simply discount our rich history, then we are no better than the fanatics destroying ancient monuments and statues in the desert.
Really? You're going to go there and compare scientists to a bunch of
Re:Nothing being damaged here (Score:5, Insightful)
In a falsifiability test between 'Hawaiian Magma Gods' and String theory, my money is on Hawaiian Magma Gods.
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In a falsifiability test between 'Hawaiian Magma Gods' and String theory, my money is on Hawaiian Magma Gods.
Mod this +1. Caveat: I am biased and work for TMT.
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This has nothing to do with history and probably not much about culture either. It's (allegedly) about religion which is a mythology. And frankly I cannot see any rational argument that this damages the culture or historical record of anyone. It's a telescope on top of a mountain which is not being used for any other purpose. So long as there is no environmental issue or property rights issue involved then there is nothing to discuss.
Obviously you've never been involved in an Environmental Assessment Process. Cultural considerations, as well as aesthetic considerations can be show stoppers.
Really? You're going to go there and compare scientists to a bunch of religious loonies destroying ancient artifacts? Ok, tell me what is being destroyed here. Aside from the area directly being built upon, what tangible thing is being destroyed? How does this change history or our record of history in any way? Who or what is actually being harmed here?
I don't know exactly what is going on there. I am not an archaeologist, nor an anthropologist specializing in Hawaiian culture. But to discount the beliefs (which MAY be genuine) out of hand is 100% the same as blowing up idols because you believe they are not necessary. What is being destroyed ? Well, the locals, who are better informed that you
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The Hawaiian natives are being played. The real agenda has nothing to do with native objections to a project that has less impact on the mountain than many things that have already been built on it.
Read this and weep: http://dgrnewsservice.org/2015... [dgrnewsservice.org]
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Unless there is something architectural in existence or a burial ground these things shouldn't even be allowed to go to hearing.
Consider This... (Score:3)
I don't know specifics of this project or the religious complaint against it, but consider this:
Some projects may have an environmental or "beauty" impact (what if the top of the mountain has a beautiful view, and the project is about to cut down all the trees in the area and limit access to that view?). This telescope may do something like that. People are upset at losing a natural resource: the beauty of nature in their area. It should be a national park for future generations to enjoy the same view I enj
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> But religious objections carry no weight with me.
Guess what, no one died and made you god to dictate your myopic opinion is the only one that matters.
They were there first; they get to decide the laws.
> I'm tired of people trying to trample valuable research because of their mythology.
And I'm tired of arrogant people who can't respect other people's cultures.
How do you respect yourself when you can't even respect others of differing opinion?
Re:Sacred ground (Score:5, Insightful)
And I'm tired of arrogant people who can't respect other people's cultures.
Science is a part of my culture. And I'm tired of people blocking its progress with silly religious objections.
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And I'm tired of arrogant people who can't respect other people's cultures.
Science is a part of my culture. And I'm tired of people blocking its progress with silly religious objections.
Not the same damn thing. No one is stopping scientific progress here. Its simply a choice between sites. This site is NOT the only one. It may be optimal from a purely technical point of view, but when you take in all considerations it may not be the optional solution. I'm sorry, putting your nuclear research centre downtown isn't a good idea. Find another location, and get on with your work.
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Don't you love how people can make up nonsensical stories about how something is sacred to them to stop activities they don't like?
Of course I did! And it wasn't just me, lots of other people [wikia.com] did too.
Most people in Hawaii are not white (Score:3)
Maybe they're tired of white invaders trying to trample their natural landscapes and culture.
In case you didn't notice Hawaii is the only state where white people are not the majority. Not even close. White people account for less than 20% of the population and they certainly aren't in a position to "trample" anything if the voting public cares about an issue. Hawaii has an asian plurality and if you've ever been to Hawaii (I have) you'll quickly note that almost all the white people are tourists. Nobody is getting trampled here and they work very hard in Hawaii to respect local traditions. Th
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Maybe they're tired of white invaders
Exactly: What have the Romans ever done for us? [youtube.com]
Re:Sacred ground (Score:4, Insightful)
They're US citizens. They can be elected into any political office. They have the same freedom as any white person in the most powerful country in the world. Their state has representation in the government, and they enjoy all benefits of any other state...including it's protection from other foreign invaders. Considering it's strategic location, their independence would be short lived if it wasn't part of the US.
Or do you mean rich people doing what they want with their land? If so, then say that. Please don't include me (an average white non-rich Coloradoan) in your class war rhetoric.
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In that case, start building. If the Mountain God objects, she will stop the project with a bolt of lighning, lava flow, or something.
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" In this case Native Hawaiians have their God on the mountain, while the astrologists have their gods of science, guns, bulldozers and the stars. Which side will win. Will Astrology triumph over the Mountain Gods' or will the Mountain God's pull off an upset and waylay the astrologists carefully laid plans to pry open and peer into the sky's nether regions with their big eye ball seeing thing."
You sound like a typical Virgo.
NIMBYs, nothing more, nothing less (Score:2)
NIMBYs have used "environmental concerns" for a few decades to try to scuttle things they don't like, I suppose it was only a matter of time before someone tried to use religion. There have been telescopes at that site for over 4 decades, if there religion was offended it was done and over with 2 decades ago.
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Pulled or revoked (Score:2)
Seems to me a trade would be in order (Score:3)
Maunakea isn't like the Matterhorn. The area on the Maunakea plateau that's high enough etc to suit astronomers' needs is actually quite large, and the Thirty Meter Telescope's proposed location is at least a mile away from the summit and at least 500 feet lower.
But about 8 of the existing dozen or so scopes are practically right on the summit. Much more intrusive both to native sensibilities and to tourists. Built before cultural sensitivity was a thing, I guess, and before native Hawaiians had done much to organize politically. I think those opposed to the TMT may well largely be objecting to "one more straw" rather than to this telescope considered in isolation.
If all these scopes were planned for new construction now I think a reasonable compromise would be to disallow putting any of them above about the 13400' contour on the summit. And I imagine that by now many of the scopes on the summit are no longer all that scientifically useful anyways, having been eclipsed by bigger scopes and better technology.
Why not have a trade- go ahead and build the TMT, which will be a big scientific boon, but promise to gradually phase out and demolish the scopes on the summit and try to restore the summit area to a relatively pristine condition?
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Perhaps you're just poking fun at their sensibilities, but the question deserves a serious answer.
If you look at a map, you can see the access road forks at about 13300' - the left spur stays on the plateau and goes to the Caltech observatory and on towards the proposed TMT site, while the right spur, which services the summit observatories, climbs almost all the rest of the way to the summit in the next mile.
When the last of the telescopes on the summit is decommissioned (probably a couple decades away), t
Maybe I'm Cynical (Score:3, Insightful)
> vehemently protested the construction of the telescope for religious reasons.
Maybe I'm cynical but I wonder if this is more about wanting a payoff than anything religious.
Religious reasons? (Score:2)
The First Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibits the making of any law respecting an establishment of religion.
Other reasons might be fine as a basis for revoking the permit. But it certainly does look like the Hawaiian Supreme Court blew it on this one.
200 years from now (Score:2)