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Originally Posted by Spacewriter
If all you see is starving astronomers begging for a chance to get work, then I can't help you. The science that will be lost is tremendous...
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How do you know it will be lost? It will just be postponed. Maybe a supernova will occur that Hubble might otherwise have imaged. That would be a great loss. But that is not predictable. Andromeda Galaxy will still be there when we get the new Telescope up and running. If it's not then we have bigger things to worry about.
Spacewriter, you just joined this board. Do you consider that time spent wondering aimlessly around the net lost? Or did you find something productive to do in the meantime? I'm glad you're here now and I hope you are too. Decommisioning the HST is a temporary setback to be sure. I'd love to be able to have my cake and eat it too. Let them [astronomers] eat cake, I say.
Sometimes we have to take a step backwards in order to take a step forwards. What if a low cost launcher could send two or more smaller disposable non-servicable telescopes into Libration orbits for VLBI imaging by 2008. Would that make up for the retirement of Hubble? Let's think of new ideas. Think of the new plan as a challenge, not an obstacle. Necessity is the mother of invention. Let's see some inventiveness, and not invectives.