Turning 49 today. I've got a funk I can't shake.

[TXPaganBanker]

Politics got us here, but it's the science and space programs that are hitting home.

In 2020, the Arecibo Radio Telescope / Observatory in Puerto Rico suffered catastrophic damage when one of its 8 cm cables broke away from its mounting. The cable sliced into the dish, and soon after, a second cable gave way, causing a portion of the dish to fall away (You may recognize it from movies like Contact and GoldenEye).

Since 1963, the dish had been scanning the skies for potential NEOs (Near Earth Objects); comets, asteroids, etc. that could threaten the planet. Over its lifetime, it discovered hundreds of objects, and 70-ish objects that could potentially collide with the Earth or at least enter within lunar orbit. These are extinction level event objects. Fortunately, the closest one would take about 100 years to get here.

A decision was made last month not to repair the telescope. Not because it had been replaced, but between several different space and environmental agencies, a discussion had been had. By the time the nearest object threatens the Earth, it won't matter. Let me repeat: It. Won't. Matter. The projected environmental damage from man-made climate change would make it a moot point. Civilization as we currently know it is not projected to exist.

To make that point pellucidly clear: Multiple scientific organizations looked at the current data trends, and decided, "Fuck it. Fixing it isn't worth it because we'll have already destroyed ourselves."

Scientific organizations are making policy decisions based on civilization ending within the next century. They're in wrap up mode, folks.

[Otto_Harper]

1. I've got a couple of decades on you, and there is a teaching I learned along the way

If you are ever out in your front yard planting a tree, and someone runs by and tells you that the end of the world has arrived, finish planting the tree, then go and look..

Or, another one

You can think you're going to win, or you can think you're going to lose. Either way, you'll probably be right.

[TXPaganBanker]

6. The other half is I'm not going to be around anyway.

I'm a terminal cancer patient (inoperable, and I've refused further chemo and radiation). I've got maybe another 6-9 months. So, it's not just my birthday, but it's most likely my last one. Not gonna hit that half century I was hoping to.

[UniqueUserName]

10. I'm sorry that you are dealing with so much

I'm glad you made the right decision to retire at 40. I'm glad you took 9 years too Relish in the good things about existence.

[True Dough]

11. F*ck cancer!

Do what you can to enjoy those 6-9 months. Hopefully your health holds up well enough that you can engage in things that bring you pleasure.

The reality is that none of us is guaranteed one more day, diagnosis or not. It's a shame that we cannot indulge in the activities that we'd prefer daily in this relatively short time we have on Earth. Instead, many of us are a slave to the grind, paying bills and banking money toward a retirement that we may never live to see.

So many unknowns. Your future is seemingly written on the wall, but many of us have know people with a prognosis of several months to live for years. Because my wife is Canadian, I heard this story in the news last week:

TORONTO - Alan John Park, a longtime member of the Royal Canadian Air Farce comedy troupe, has died.
Park died Thursday at the age of 60, eight years after he was diagnosed with terminal cancer.

https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/royal-canadian-air-farce-alumnus-alan-john-park-dead-at-60-1.6150628

Whatever your fate, try to savor each day. Easier said than done sometimes, I know. But I wish you the best, TXPaganBanker. Take care.

For the record, I'm also 49. I turn 50 at the end of January, if I'm fortunate enough to wake up that day, and all the days in between.

And I hope there's a plan for your dad to bunk down somewhere else should the time come that that's a necessity.

[Celerity]

16. So sorry to hear this TPB. 😞😓😩

HUGE hugz.

[Meowmee]

20. Very sorry to hear that

I hope you have researched all options.

[Raine]

27. Aw gee 😟

I'm so sorry... 💕

[electric_blue68]

30. Terrible news, so sorry to hear. Enjoy whom and what u love now. AND you still migh beat the odds.

I've not seen your username before.
Love it - it's intriguing.

[Duppers]

33. What Meowmee said.

So sorry.

Raise hell anyway you feel like doing.

to you.

[UniqueUserName]

2. But we are not dead yet.

Happy birthday! Or maybe a day late?

I'm on the back half of my 50s and I suffer this existential malaise as well.

My long-term partner of 22 years died at 49. That was 4 years ago.

Yet, just this night I watched a video about quintuplets. It's such a weird set of notes in music. Somebody on YouTube took the time to explain that to the universe.

It's all pretty meaningless. But it can be fun.

[Mister Ed]

3. Wow, you sure are in a funk.

But, are you sure that the reason the Arecibo scope was not repaired is that we're all doomed anyway? The search for near-earth objects was never its primary purpose.

If scientific organizations were really making policy decisions based on civilization ending within the next century, wouldn't they abandon their efforts altogether?

This is not to downplay the existential threat that climate change presents to civilization. That threat is here, now, on our doorstep, and must be dealt with. In contrast, world-changing collisions with extraterrestrial objects occur only occasionally, across a span of millions of years.

[TXPaganBanker]

5. It's from a pair of sources

News article from Oct 2022: https://www.inverse.com/science/arecibo-wont-be-rebuilt

and my father (whom lives with me due to health reasons) watches space shows to get to sleep. There was an interview with a NASA scientist discussing the reasoning behind changing course and not building the "bigger and better" one originally planned last year.

[Mister Ed]

8. My wish here is to reassure you rather than quarrel with you.

I've read the linked article now, and could find no hint that the reason Arecibo will not be replaced is that humanity is doomed anyway.

I can't guess what shows you may watch with your father, but I can say that humanity's fate should not be considered to be sealed just because of something one NASA scientist said on one show.

We face challenges and threats, as all species always have and always will. The final chapters of that saga remain unwritten.

[BlackSkimmer]

24. Yet as I watched the NASA channel last night, I heard them talk about future moon flights and

even flights to Mars.

[marybourg]

4. The 60 year old radio dish has been superseded

in its mission by more modern technology It was not abandoned because the end is nigh. This OP is bs.

[TXPaganBanker]

9. I'm basing it on statements from the National Science Foundation and NASA...

[vlyons]

7. Extinction of our species (and many many others) might very well happen

We certainly wouldn't be the first species to bite the dust. Just too bad that we are doing it to ourselves. All things are impermanent. Eventually the sun will exhaust its fuel and expand to a giant red star that will vaporize our planet.

All things are impermanent.

[NJCher]

13. What do you think

Of the quotes in post 1?

I have some thoughts; would like to know yours.

[vlyons]

15. I'm not confident that human beings can overcome the greed of the fossil fuel industries

Do you remember the movie, Dr Strangelove? The oligarchs plan to move into tunnels deep in the earch fo 100 years to survive a nuclear war. I think today's super wealthy think they can just move somewhere that is safe from climate change. They don't care about the rest of us.

[Hekate]

36. I know they think that. I read a recent article by a guy who was asked to talk to a group of billionaire ...

… survivalists. All male. It was an exceedingly weird experience for him. And really, I had to laugh.

(Found it — sorry, no link when I saved it to PDF.
The Observer
The super-rich ‘preppers’ planning to save themselves from the apocalypse
Tech billionaires are buying up luxurious bunkers and hiring military security to survive a societal collapse they helped create, but like everything they do, it has unintended consequences
Time to bunker down... if you’ve got the cash.
Douglas Rushkoff
Sun 4 Sep 2022 05.00 EDT
As a humanist who writes about the impact of digital technology on our lives, I am often mistaken for a futurist. The people most interested in hiring me for my opinions about technology are usually less concerned with building tools that help people live
better lives in the present than they are in identifying the Next Big Thing through which to dominate them in the future. I don’t usually respond to their inquiries. Why help these guys ruin what’s left of the internet, much less civilisation?
Much more)

For me — I really had to laugh at how blind they were to human nature and society, because that is where their plans are going to fall to pieces. They had plans for locked storage vaults for their food in their nifty gigantic concrete bunkers, and were worried about how to control the guards they were going to bring along. Meanwhile, I wondered if they had a nursery anywhere. ‘Cause, you know, the future.

Aside from that, for many years I have had the feeling that the super wealthy are a bunch of fools who really do believe that they and their children will be just fine when the air becomes unbreathable.

Also, as to building new scientific equipment, before the pandemic shutdown there were spirited fights at DU over the desire of scientists to build an even more gigantic telescope in Hawai’i on top their most sacred mountain. Some DUers thought the protests by native Hawai’ians were stupid. I asked if that was what they said about Native Americans who objected to the misuse of their land. Lively. But anyway, it shows that planning to build scientific equipment continues apace.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

12. Everyone has exactly the same amount of time -- this moment.

[NJCher]

14. +1

Eom

[malaise]

17. Happy Birthday youngster

😀😀😀😀😀

[twodogsbarking]

18. Keep on keepin' on. Happy B day.

[Meowmee]

19. This article says nsf

Decided it was too dangerous to repair, nothing about what you said.

https://www.space.com/20984-arecibo-observatory.html

[Goddessartist]

21. Good morning and Happy Birthday

Mine was yesterday. I turned 60. Sending you peace and love. One of my 5 sisters passed at 61 in July, and our Mom as well. Chemo and radiation didn't work for her either. My first husband passed at 48 from C. The radiation killed him.

I understand your funk. I have it too, though I am trying to manifest different dreams. Had a heart attack in June (Broken Heart Syndrome), an Aneurysm, and diagnosed with Vascular Ehlers Danlos in the past 24 months, so my time here won't be too long and I'm okay with that.

I would love to have you eat RSO daily, as I do sometimes.

Again, sending you love and hope, for that's really all there is.

Rebecca

[LeftInTX]

22. Happy Birthday! It's mine too. I'm 66!

[BumRushDaShow]

26. Happy Birthday!

[Sympthsical]

23. I mean, that isn't at all what happened

They couldn't repair the telescope. The thing literally collapsed.

The foundation that runs the site decided they weren't going to build another telescope there - and they would have to build a whole new one. The old one was completely destroyed. Instead, they're going to use the site for other STEM-related things.

However, we have tons of telescopes that do similar work. Yes, Arecibo was amazing and led to a lot of discoveries over the years, and it's pretty tragic it came to the end it did. However, if you look at the number of planned projects, scientists are looking to the future just fine.

Does this look like scientists giving up?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_proposed_space_observatories

Also, I missed the "We're all going to die anyway!" discussion scientists have apparently had. Did NASA live stream that one?

[BumRushDaShow]

25. I crunched many many many WUs of SETI@Home's data from Arecebo

but it was really getting old and harder to maintain. Hurricane Maria did a number on it (and so many other things in Puerto Rico that are still being rebuilt). A bunch of us were monitoring when this happened -

China now has the largest of its kind -



https://www.space.com/33357-china-largest-radio-telescope-alien-life.html

To make that point pellucidly clear: Multiple scientific organizations looked at the current data trends, and decided, "Fuck it. Fixing it isn't worth it because we'll have already destroyed ourselves."

Scientific organizations are making policy decisions based on civilization ending within the next century. They're in wrap up mode, folks.

As a scientist by career and hobbyist of astronomy (among many others), that's not what happened. The old gives way to the new.

This morning a humongous rocket was launched to the moon and it certainly wasn't a "fixed" old model Saturn V that was part of the Apollo program. It was the replacement.

Link to tweet

NASA Artemis
@NASAArtemis
·
Follow
When we go, we go together.

The #Artemis team wants to thank everyone who helped us along the way toward the first launch of the @NASA_SLS rocket and @NASA_Orion.
2:48 AM · Nov 16, 2022

Link to tweet

NASA History Office
@NASAhistory
·
Follow
Nearly 50 years elapsed between these two photos. #WeAreGoing!!!

⬇️ #Apollo17 at 12:33 a.m. ET on Dec. 7, 1972
↘️ #Artemis I 1:47 a.m. ET today
Apollo 17, the last of the Apollo Program, launches to the Moon on the Saturn V rocket just after midnight on December 7, 1972.
The Artemis I rocket launches from Kennedy Space Center at 1:47 a.m. November 16, 2022.
2:16 AM · Nov 16, 2022

Want to send you birthday wishes and healing wishes as well. Today was the start of a new beginning.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

28. It was a tool for near-earths, but not the best tool and far from the only tool

First and foremost, it is good that you are sharing your fears and your funk and I hope this post helps you.

The reason it is not being rebuilt is because there are better tools now, especially for near-earth objects. Back in its heyday, the Arecibo observatory was one of very few tools and it was used to find NEOs. But now, since you follow the news, there are NEOs found every few months that hit the news. They are being found by better more modern tools and more of them are being found than ever back in the heyday.

That's the first false premise, that it was needed.

The second false premise is the idea that devastating NEO impacts are so frequent that it is going to happen in a generation or two. There is a teeny weeny tiny vanishingly small chance one could happen in my lifetime and yours. Multiply that by a dozen generations and the chance is still tiny and vanishingly small. Worth searching for, but teeny tiny.

And the speculation in your second last paragraph is just wrong, unwarranted, unreasonable, not true.

I'm sorry you are feeling this way but you have worked yourself into a state on two false premise. Personally, the science deniers worry me much more, but there I have a strategy that I apply to science deniers and asteroids and earthquakes and pandemics.

It goes like this:

I worry about the things that I might actually be able to do something about and I accept the things that I can't do anything about. If it were me, I would study NEOs, as you have a little bit, learn more. That is something to do. But let go of worrying about it hitting. Maybe keep a bug-out get-out-town kit handy, which is a good idea for earthquakes, forest fires, hurricanes, etc. That is something you can do. But you can't stop an earthquake and you can't personally stop an NEO impact, however unlikely as they are. So let go of worrying about an actual hit.

[BannonsLiver]

29. On the upside

You are a kid on DU at 49.

[JHB]

31. I think the environmental factors are hurricanes and earthquakes...

...the same factors that weakened it and led to the collapse in the first place. Increased storm activity might have been part of the decision, but it wasn't "scientists packing it up because we're done".

Radio astronomy has changed a lot since Arecibo was first built. There's a reason why more like it weren't built: as techniques and technology improved to coordinate multiple dishes, the need for "one BIG one" diminished.

[FakeNoose]

32. Don't get discouraged my friend

Our best telescopes are out in orbit now, and we didn't have those back in the 60's when Arecibo was built. The scientific community still has eyes and ears toward space, and investments are still being made in the future.

Nobody is giving up on the future. But they're getting more realistic about where the money is coming from, and what compromises will need to be made. It's an ongoing process and it's a little bit messy, like evolution is.

[Duppers]

34. In my 70s now & am worried for my 35yo

And what his future will be.

The public doesn't want to hear the truth about much of anything.

I've literally been crying in my dishwater for days because of my personal funk, wishing I could change what cannot be changed.

Just hang in there, kiddo. for ya.

[DemocraticPatriot]

35. I'm sorry.... some DUers might think that you are 'too old'

for your opinion to matter--- about anything!


Otherwise, I admire your post, it is way over my head---
but it was not without much information---unlike some other OP posters....