An article at astronomy.com suggests you study statistics rather than the constellations.

“The majority of astronomers don’t have a clue where the constellations are located in the sky.”

GrapesOfWrath:

That is correct. Professional astronomers find the coordinates for celestial objects that they wish to study and then direct technicians to find those celestial objects. The technicians must, of course, be extremely accomplished at finding *stuff* and are absolutely necessary for astronomical research. Professional astronomers are studying the properties of the objects found and must know a lot of physics, etc. They study what is necessary for their jobs.

Both kinds of scientists are important to astronomy.

Amateur astronomy is a lot of fun, however, and finding stuff for Messier Marathons and the like is very rewarding. However, the amateur astronomer has little need for Copernican ways of thinking about the Cosmos, because for them, the sky is continuously revolving overhead with the time and with the seasons. Amateur astronomers, in turn, must depend upon the professionals, such as Wil Tirion, to help them find things in the sky, so there is a great similarity involved here, too.

It would be silly to expect professional astronomers to find the celestial objects and waste valuable time in their study. Professional technicians will do that job of finding stuff for them, leaving the professional astronomers free to study stellar, galactic, and cosmological evolution. There are professional jobs out there for excellent finders of celestial objects. The number of such jobs are limited, but the technicians must be very accomplished.

I think that it is a great working arrangement between and among professionals in the field. It is something called *The Division of Labor.*

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The technitians right now happen to be automated. Still, there's a lot of practical astronomy done in front of a computer. Positions in the sky can be described in any number of ways and it is often important to translate back and forth.

Constellations are stupid and utterly arbitrary from any perspective other than a historic one. I'm studying a sightline to 3C273, and while this is an incredibly famous object and I can recite the coordinates to you in ra-dec and galactic, I haven't the foggiest what constellation it lies in. Who cares? Constellations are for naked eye observing and aiming telescopes without the use of computers. Other than that, they really serve no purpose.

The point about stats is very true. If you read any papers nowadays they are littered with statistical analysis.

Whenever i was asked about constellations and stuff like is what you`re on about in [insert random constellation here] i`d have to answer dunno,but its at ra whatever dec something else so i know its in the sky!!!

I think these dualities exist in all prefessions: what the public think you should know about, what you actually know about to do you job/research.

Example 1: I'm a computer scientist. I study algorithms, computational theory and logic. But I can't tell you why why some application (say MS Word) always freezes and how you can get that corrupt document back. Sometimes I think my mom wonders what she was spending her money on with my CS degree.

Example 2: My wife is a 4th year medical student. She is specializing in pediactrics. Her relatives think she should be able to diagnose all kinds of cardiac and geriatric conditions.

Sure experts in some fields do tend to know a lot about stuff in other fields. But not always. I think the general public needs some general education in job descriptions.

Almost all the sciences will rely heavily on statistics. The only way you time you can get away from statistics is when testing a theory with solid mathematical underpinnings, automatically excluding economics and psychology, and when in controlled laboratory setting, automatically excluding astronomy. Realistically only select, well-developed branches of physics, chemistry, and biology don't make heavy use of statistics. In other words statistics is the norm, not the exception.

When I was getting my electrical engineering degree, everybody was asking to me fix their TV or VCR. Arrgh!

I think you hit on the reason why stats are so prevalent in astronomy. Since we dont have time to wait around for stars to evolve before publishing a paper a sample of a number stars has to be taken and conclusions dervied from the sample.

About the degree thing, after i got my astrophysics degree i got two reactions when people heard.
1. astro ...ast.. hmm sounds complicated..
2.astrophysics eh? well im a gemini so does that mean im going to have a good day today?

When I answer "astrophysics" to those that question what I'm studying I often get the theatrical, "WHOAAA! You must be a GENIUS!" No, not really, it's just the subject I'm interested in.

So instead I've taken to saying, "astronomy" (even though it's technically the astrophysical science department) and people are usually not as annoying in their drama. However, the fact that its orthography is so close to "astrology", it opens it up for more people who are convinced in the validity of said subject. I usually either make a snide comment about the hokum that is astrology or explain that they are two VERY different subjects, one time related.

Astronomy is a hodge-podge of various naming conventions that were developed by different people in different times. Many of them are still in use today, and many of them involve the constellation (not as a picture drawn from stars in the sky, but as a defined area of the celestial sphere).

So, constellations do have their uses, if only because old habits die hard.

I disagree. Just because someone calls the object "Delta Pavonis" or the "Andromeda Galaxy" doesn't mean the constellations they are named for are important. Perhaps for those studying the history behind naming conventions it might be of some interest, but practically who cares what the shapes of these associated areas on the sky are named?

IMHO, the asterisms that are not constellations (Big Dipper, Great Square, the teapot, the Summer Triangle) are just as useful if not MORE useful than the constellations themselves.

It would be interesting to consider what are the most important objects for an astronomically literate person to be able to identify, even in heavily light polluted areas...

Northern hemisphere for now, a short and incomplete list for me would be:

Big Dipper
Little Dipper
polaris
Orion
Cassiopeia
The Summer Triangle (Vega, Deneb, and Altair)
The Greate Square
The Pleiades
Arcturus
Castor and Pollux
Hercules
Bootes
Sirius
Andromeda Galaxy
the Milky Way

Of course many of these objects would be hard to pick out in light polluted skies. Any other nominations for useful asterisms, objects, or constellations to be able to "point" to?

Constellations are for naked eye observing and aiming telescopes without the use of computers. Other than that, they really serve no purpose.

I thought constellations were part of the naming convention for stars. Y'know, Alpha Orionis, Beta Persei, Omega Oregano.

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JS,
I disagree. Constellations are to the sky as countries, states, counties and cities are to the Earth. I could say that the house I grew up in is located at:

Lat. 36 deg. 14 min. 34 sec N
Lon. 92 deg. 52 min. 52 sec W

Or:

The house at the top of the hill a mile north of Yellville, Arkansas, USA.

They are equally valid.

PS I grew up under some really dark skies.

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