[ExI] The Thirty Meter Telescope is now officially dead

[John Clark]

On Sun, Dec 22, 2019 at 6:23 PM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

>> Synthetic aperture is not going to help you when it comes to equalling
>> the light gathering power of the thirty meter telescope,
>>
>
> *> I never said it would be the same.  I said I could get a 30 meter
> diameter synthetic aperture telescope up for far less.*
>

You said it could be developed for just 100 million dollars and I said I
very much doubted that price estimate. The James Webb Telescope was
originally suposed to be launched in 2007 and cost 825 million dollars, but
as of this date it has cost 10 billion and it's still sitting on the ground
doing nothing. Space telescopes are very expensive and take longer to make
than you'd expect even if you take Hofstadter's Law into account.
Hofstadter's Law says It always takes longer than you'd expect even when
you take into account Hofstadter's Law.


> *> Now, if you want almost the same telescope - how much do you think it
> would take to get enough robotic (possibly teleoperated) mining, refining,
> and manufacturing capability on the Moon to be able to start constructing
> lunar observatories? *
>

I don't think anybody on the planet could give a price estimate on that
that was worth a damn.

John K Clark
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