Telescope Reviews: Most people in this hobby

I'm 30, so I guess that puts me in the middle of the pack since we are speaking to points about correlating age to interest here, among other things. Being in the middle, I'd like to share some of my own thinking on my situation over time which has led me to where I am in amateur astronomy today.

I had a huge interest in Astronomy as a young kid. The outer solar system missions did it for me. This is at a time where media was more readily available to me (school libraries, etc) to see beautiful images and stories to stir my imagination. There were still strong talks about manned missions to mars and other stimulating things.

My family was enlisted military as I was growing up. We traveled the world quite literally. We didn't have a lot of money, and we never had clear skies - ALWAYS lived near the world's largest cities - London, Athens, etc. The best instrument I ever had as a kid was a set of 50mm binoculars and always under light polluted skies. Not once did I see anything in the sky that blew my mind. Yet, I knew it was out there, and always persisted. I always made sure to catch lunar eclipses, and close comets - anything I could see with the naked eye or those binocs. Faint fuzzies never did it for me, frankly, they kind of still don't do it for me, but I'll make another point with that in a second.

At 17 or 18 I got my very first scope. It was a 60 or 70mm dept store piece of junk by most standards, but it was my piece of junk, and it gave me views to things I never had access to before. I saw Saturn and it's rings for the first time through my own eyes even though it was barely a speck, still never saw anything deep sky that drew my attention. At this time I had moved to New Mexico for the first time, and got to experience truly dark skies. There were now things I could see with my own eyes that I could never see with binocs in polluted skies. I wanted more out of it, but still didn't have any money. Shortly after, I was out of school, working a new career and had moved to Washington D.C. and started a family. Once again, back to polluted skies, and financial limitations as I started a family in a very expensive part of the country. I even left my little scope in NM with family, knowing it wouldn't get any use in northern Virginia. Life was just too busy and too expensive for me to get anything further out of astronomy other than what my imagination and magazines and books could provide.

I moved back to NM about 5 years ago. I live far out of the city lights now. And of course over all of these years the cost of astronomy gear that can provide respectable views of the heavens has become more and more affordable. I live in ideal conditions, and have some disposable income which allowed me to rekindle active astronomy in my life again. I bought in to AP gear, granted, entry level, but none the less, it has taken me to an aspect of astronomy I would have never imagined possible when I was younger. I can now produce my own renditions of the beautiful objects I always saw in books and magazines. I can see things on my screen that I could never hope to glimpse through an eyepiece. Point of all of this is not to turn it to an AP vs visual arguement, this is not my point at all.

Getting more to the point, I grew up on Atari, Nintendo, and in conditions that aren't truly conducive to bringing about interest in astronomy as a hobby. This generation has cell phones, laptops, wireless communication systems, and so many items in our lives that make everything accessible at the push of a button without having to really use imagination or to lift more than a finger to get results. Most things tend to be instantaneous. We're continuing to head further down that path, and light pollution is growing along with it. I certainly enjoy the conveniences myself, I'd be lying if I said I didn't. Maybe that's why AP has drawn me in to astronomy as a serious hobby in the last few years. It's push of a button access to a digital rendition of astronomy, when I choose, where I choose. But I wouldn't have gone this far if I didn't live in dark skies, have some spending money, time to sit and enjoy the hobby, and of course the influences and exposure I had to space related material as a younger child. As an older child I didn't get ANY exposure to astronomy in high school. I took "Astronomy 101" to discover I had a teacher who read from notes in a book published in the 60s and was so inaccurate that I could ignore him in every single class and still ace his tests. There's just not as much influence out there to spark the younger kids' interest in Astronomy. MOST live in light polluted skies, and simply don't have any real media to inspire them. Why would they want to spend any money (assuming they have some) to get in to a telescope, or bother traveling 20, 40, 60 miles or even more to find a dark sky? I kept at it because I had lots of exposure at times when interesting things were going on, and because I like to contemplate what is out there. There just aren't as many kids out there under the right conditions to really want to grasp on to astronomy as a serious interest. You aren't going to enjoy a hobby that is difficult to sustain - refrerring to light pollution, lack of education, lack of friends/family in the same interest to share with, lack of at least some financial flexibility.

It's like living in Iowa and expecting young kids there to become serious mountain climbers. There's no stimulation or exposure in their flat fields to really encourage it.

I'm sure you get the idea of what I'm trying to say. Of course none of it I mean to be projected in absolutes, just more of generalization. I consider myself more of the exception rather than the norm.

And, btw, a hobby I did sustain over the years was collecting game systems - I have managed to procure just about every system ever produced over the years. I don't get a lot of time to play them, but I grew up on them. So, yes, it's not just the "digital age" that deters kids from Astronomy in my opinion, it's a conglomerate of many factors playing out against them. I don't believe it's a lack of intellectual ability. I don't believe it's due to the need for instantaneous gratification via technology as we now have astrophotography readily available for cheap. I think conditions are as such that maybe people simply don't realize what is there. Ever hear the stories about the big blackouts in L.A. in the summertime and how people call the police reporting huge clouds over the city and thinking the city was burning down? Or reports of the strange lights and how we were under attack? It was the Milky Way and people didn't know it! Why? How far do you have to drive from L.A. to see the Milky Way like that? 100 miles? Maybe more?

Elitism didn't drive me away either. Sure, starting in, I spent maybe a total of $1500 into my first AP rig - dirt cheap in comparison to those who are far more serious about it. At gatherings and star parties, there's people with $10K, 20K, 30K setups as their "portable" gear. All of them much older than me. Yet, were the most enthusiastic and involved people I've ever met. More than willing to share, most eager to have you look through their EP or screens. I think too many people assume that if you drive a nice car, you must be a snob. I think the same misperception applies to the astronomy community to some degree. That's just a lack of people using their feelers and making assumptions rather than finding out the truth for themselves. I've been doing outreach for the last couple years. Since sharing with neighbors and people around me at work who have never touched a telescope in their lives, I've managed to stimulate at least 5 people into buying their own telescopes. Why? It didn't take any pushing on my part, just simply exposing them to the right conditions and showing them an avenue they've never known was within their reach. Gear is affordable now, and here in NM, skies are accessible. They simply were never introduced to it.

Anyway, I've rambled on so long my kids and wife are wondering whem I'm going to cook breakfast....

Thanks for the great thread guys. It really did have me stop and think personally what it was that drove me to stay in Astronomy, and what kind of factors were against me from the start, and what factors my children may face as time goes by. Lot's of thought on this whole topic.

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-Josh

http://cleardarksky.com/c/AlbuqNMkey.html

My AP Gallery

Edited by DaemonGPF (11/08/09 09:41 AM)