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Mercury, Sep/Oct 1994 Table of Contents

(c) 1994 Astronomical Society of the Pacific

This is the best time in history to be an astronomer. New instruments, such as the Hubble Space Telescope and W.M. Keck Observatory, peer ever deeper into space. New technologies have shattered the traditional segregation by wavelength: Terms like radio astronomer or infrared astronomer mean little to observers who jet from radio dishes at Green Bank to infrared cameras atop Mauna Kea. Likewise, the distinction between amateur and professional is falling victim to CCDs. Cosmologists brush shoulders with particle physicists; planetary geologists compare notes with nuclear-blast experts. Today's community of astronomers spans the globe. The Internet connects far-flung observing programs and breaks down the isolation of our colleagues in the Third World. Modern astronomy is ready to tackle what will likely become its most popular goal: the systematic search for extrasolar planets and extraterrestrial life.

This is also the worst time to be an astronomer. Young professional astronomers endure low-pay, low-prestige graduate school and wind up in low-pay, low-prestige postdoctoral fellowships. Many have to hopscotch from postdoc to postdoc until forced to leave the field altogether. Their colleagues scramble for funding; most researchers spend more time writing grant proposals than doing research. As careers hinge on brutally competitive funding reviews, the politics often turn nasty. Press releases have supplanted professional conferences as the forum for announcing discoveries. Outside the ivory tower, the public misunderstands and mistrusts scientists. Global competition and domestic taxophobia are forcing the federal government to shift research dollars into fields that promise practical benefits: astronomy, the purest of pure sciences, is getting harder to justify.

If astronomy is to thrive, professional, amateur, educator, and layperson need to unite. Professionals need to work education into grant and mission proposals; teachers need to excite kids with groundbreaking research; amateurs need to fill the research niches that professionals cannot; laypeople need to remind their friends and their elected representatives of the benefits of basic science.

My feeling that we need to work together drew me away from pure research to the ASP, an organization that exists to weave astronomy lovers into a single fabric. The ASP has a distinguished history, a source of strength as it feels its way in uncertain times. But we must not be afraid to experiment, even if we sometimes stumble. For better or worse, the political and social aspects of astronomy have become as important as the research problems.