TMT Work to Resume Says Ige!

[TomK]

Maybe this should be on a separate thread, but the best way I can describe my reaction to your post, Punatic007, is cautious skepticism. I find it hard to believe any professional astronomers would say that the TMT will be obsolete if and when it's built. It's certainly not my opinion and have never heard another professional astronomer I know make such a claim. Perhaps you're just using the wrong word? There is certainly some competitiveness when it comes to building the first very large optical telescope, but it doesn't mean the second one to be built will be obsolete. In the end, the science they generate is of most interest to astronomers.

Couple more points - I agree the Europeans have their act together when it comes to this stuff although I don't know if ultimately it'll work out best. Europe has the centralized ESO whereas the US has a much looser astronomical organization. Asian astronomical communities are more interested in trying to emulate ESO rather than the US model, but whether that's the way to go, I can't say.

As for Sofia, a bunch of my friends and colleagues certainly moved away to work there. It can do some things ground-based observatories have trouble doing, but it is rather specialized and is not capable of carrying out most of the observations the MK observatories do. Having said that, I strongly considered working there as they do the science I'm interested in, but living in Palmdale gave me second thoughts!