Is this really a worry? Won't all the gear eventually be moved off Earth and into space making this argument pointless?
I'm guessing amateurs with a telescope in their backyard are the ones suffering?
I'm guessing amateurs with a telescope in their backyard are the ones suffering?
https://twitter.com/SuperASASSN
https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/Space/story?id=8221167
It's going to be a long time (if ever) before space gets cheap and accessible enough to replace these folks.
(The article, incidentally, shows photos from a four meter telescope. That's... probably not amateur astronomy.)
* Many experiments and a lot of science cannot be done from space, even if delivery costs were much cheaper. E.g. LSST (0.5 billion in US funding alone, + lots of other funding sources), or wide-field astronomy important for near earth object detection and monitoring (e.g. ASASSN). These things are too complex and too large to realistically do in space.
* Ground-based astronomy is inherently cheaper (no space costs, no extra engineering effort, and importantly, the ability to fix things and upgrade equipment), and therefore has a much lower barrier to entry. You can do truly meaningful research from the ground for ~$1 mill + a team of 4 or 5 core people, whereas space requires 10-100x this + an entire fleet of people with all of the associated bureaucratic nightmares + extra time required and engineering challenges. Space offers some benefits, but often times the tradeoff is either not worth the cost, or the experiment is not feasible to do in space.
* Regardless of whether or not you care about the impact on astronomy research (hey, astronomers care about humanitarian stuff too), the way SpaceX bowled through and just started launching their Starlink constellation was irresponsible, reckless, and actually quite ignorant (e.g. they were surprised by how bright their satellites were...this is basic stuff people). On the other hand, I'm not sure how much blame you can really place on a company being reckless when the law allows for such recklessness. There should absolutely be more regulation and oversight. It's in the governments' best interest because it's going to just destroy (needlessly) a lot of R&D already paid for.
Ninja edit: mentioned Space-X in here but this article is technically about Amazon's Kuiper constellation; however statement is the same (this isn't really a single company problem, this is a new-technology-without-appropriate-regulations-problem). Starlink is the largest constellation and the biggest problem (planned to have ~10x the satellites as the Kuiper constellation, they are lower orbit than anything else, and not sure how the albedo compares to Kuiper, but the brightness is > 99% of other satellites).
So: these constellations will multiply number of orbiting satellites by 10-100x, they are extremely bright (> 99% of all satellites), and they are very low orbit. So its a perfect storm of problems for astronomy.
final ninja edit: check out https://www.astro.princeton.edu/~gbakos/satellites/ to see one astronomer's page about this stuff, some actual images that illustrate how big the problem is with the extremely limited amount of starlink satellites currently in orbit, and some other links. OK that's all
What does good behaviour look like?
The problem is really that there needs to be better oversight and more regulation. The laws as they stand do not address the problems that these constellations produce, because they were written in a time when starlink-like operations were scarcely imaginable. SpaceX and amazon, etc., should definitely be allowed to do cool and serious projects like this, but the oversight agencies basically saying "hey do whatever you want" is a recipe for serious accidents like collisions, as well as a needlessly enormous impact on astronomy research. If there were, say, albedo requirements or something, everyone would have to plan for that, but that is not in place today.
One part that irks me even in the absence of regulation is that SpaceX provided no forewarning of how bright their Starlink satellites would be, which astronomers were shocked by. Space-X claimed they were "surprised" by their brightness which is either a lie or belies serious incompetence.
Assuming that within 20 years we can have sufficiently cheap space launch systems that there are sufficient geosynchronous telescopes for amateur use would that solve this problem?
Genuine questions, not Socratic method.
I think it's a bit of both; right now SpaceX is trying to get the brightness of their starlink sats down to ~7th mag (they're at 5th mag now, they have an experimental coating that should bring this down to ~6th mag), and it sounds like if they can do this the problems will be far more manageable (for LSST specifically this amounts to a few extra months of observing time, however the impact even with these mitigations is strongly dependent on the specific science case).
However, this work should be done before approval. What happens when SpaceX realizes that getting things down to 7th mag is too difficult and costly and time-intensive? Without regulations in place, I would expect they shrug their shoulders, do some PR to frame the problem as "us vs those pesky astronomers" and launch what they want to launch. We have virtually no leverage. But from the standpoint of people that operate in space pretty regularly, what we're asking is pretty basic. Astronomy of course isn't going to be thrilled with the amount of satellites growing by a factor of 10-100x, but we live in the real world. But something that monumental needs to be done thoughtfully and carefully and with respect to the billions of dollars of R&D already paid for that will be impacted.
> Assuming that within 20 years we can have sufficiently cheap space launch systems that there are sufficient geosynchronous telescopes for amateur use would that solve this problem?
Again, space delivery costs are only one factor. Not to say this wouldn't enable new kinds of instruments or make some new things possible, but it would not solve the problem, no. There are too many things that can't realistically be done from space.
* NEO's (asteroids) are really only detectable at twilight so this would severely hamper efforts here, and I hope most people would understand how important NEO detection is from a practical, human-survival standpoint.
* Depending on your latitude/day of the year, "twilight" can constitute the majority of the observable time...
* e.g. for LSST 30% of all images will have a StarLink trail. If Space-X can somehow manage to get their satellites down to 7th mag (15% of their current brightness, 50% of the brightness of their "DarkSat" version), then LSST can mitigate a lot of impact; it will come down to extra cost + observation time for many science cases, however a lot of science cases are still SOL even with these mitigations (precision cosmology, NEO detection, etc.).
The point I'm trying to make isn't that astronomy is "doomed" (though some subfields will be) it's that we should not be in a situation where we are scrambling to fix problems like this (i.e. Space X is now helping mitigate things voluntarily, thank god, and only after a huge outcry). There should be regulations that ensure everyone is on the same page and that prevent issues like this and ensure at least a bare minimum set of requirements are met.
Those regulations are not there only because when these laws were written, nobody even dreamed of a situation like StarLink or Kuiper. I don't think Space X or amazon are "evil" or anything, they're doing great work, but they have zero incentive (except maybe PR) not to trash billions of dollars in astronomy research, and that is neither good nor necessary.
Eventually? Can you estimate how much it costs to move all existing and planed satellites in space? After that can you tell us if the billionaires would pay or the public? Also please estimate when it will be done.
If the society needs this satellites then we need something that the entire world would benefit not some billionaires(reminds me as regular pollution where billionaires get rich and poor guys pay the consequences )
Also we need to minimize the number of this objects, you will not like it when China puts 1 million of satellites - at least Trump for sure will not like it and propose some space wall.
Obvious with what the rest of the thread says and the timeline you gave it won't be 100x easier to observe space itself from Earth but instead it'll be easier to observe space from off Earth.
Thanks for the obvious point though \s