Telescope Reviews: From the Editors Desk: A tale of two astronomers

I wondered as I clicked who the two would be – Tombaugh and Hubble? Galileo and Newton? Ptolemy and Tycho? Levy and Seki? Alfred and Steve were unexpected, but made a fine parable. Here are three related thoughts:

I heard a good perspective on hobbies in a radio interview: one way people find happiness is to approach their avocations like their careers, committing TIME and PRACTICE to learn, to add and hone skills, to become passionate about and expert in some small area of the hobby, then another area, etc. Alfred throwing himself into double stars while learning constellations was a good example of this approach.

(Or judging by our daytime posts here, maybe more of use should approach our careers with the same energy as we do CN!)

A second thought is that we should make sure beginners base their buyer’s remorse or happiness ON THEIR OWN EXPERIENCE and are not prejudiced, or pushed to the cycle of impatient buying rather than learning, by other’s opinions. It requires restraint by mentors and an effort to communicate more know-how and less “buy more” advice, and encouraging newcomers to read the observation threads as much as the equipment forums.

Knowledge gained with a little patience and practice won’t disappear with each trade-up by a new astronomer, and that can be accomplished using any equipment that meets a fairly basic, workable minimum standard.

Finally, the present cornucopia of hobby gear doesn’t mean everyone has to have every latest thing. To manufacturer’s credit I don’t see that philosophy in telescope ads as much as in hobby forums. Do people ask if they’ve gotten all they can from scope or eyepiece A before they chase B, C, and D? People loved fishing before depth-finders and GPS, found wonder in amateur astronomy before go-to, and learned the art of photography before stabilized auto-focus zooms, etc. All the new technology offers many useful and specialized tools, some undreamed of in the past, but if the tools become an end in themselves then we are spending our time and our resources to be more collectors than astronomers.

I don’t mean that everyone learning the hobby should wear a hair shirt for a year of observing with a 3-inch Dob and an uncoated Ramsden eyepiece, but if that's all they have they can learn the sky and see a lot more than without a scope.

Advice so often offered to beginners as ‘buy more’ might better be ‘more books and charts, a chair, etc.’ than ‘more aperture and more eyepieces, stretch your budget, etc.’...

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'these things stand like stone - kindness in another's troubles, courage in your own' Gordon