The SOC

Formerly known as the AOC... In any event, the building where I'm
working! Can I even begin to convey the excitement of working in a building that actually says 'National Science Foundation' on the outside?! I know the NSF has its bureaucratic issues, and sometimes it's hard to access them. But where would we be as a nation without the NSF? I mean, think about it. What a brilliant thing for a nation to do. To decide that knowing about the Universe is SO important that we'll pool our dollars, start a foundation, and then spend decades paying scientists to ask questions, seek answers, look at stuff and figure stuff out. Eventually, they come up with bio-markers that make it possible to fight disease. They discover an understanding of quarks and the fundamental structure of matter. They invent new ways of thinking, and new ways of knowing, and new ways of asking questions.

In this building, some people are trying to understand about outflows from black holes, and some are trying to understand about galaxy formation, and some are trying to understand about how stars are born. Some are 'just' trying to figure out how to make a better interferometer. And, yes, some of us even work really hard to try to understand the shaping mechanisms of dying stars. It's the little pieces that make up the big pieces that make up the sum total of human knowledge. This knowledge is a gift from our forebears, but it comes with an obligation---to add to this total, and to pass it on to the next generation, better than when we received it. That means BOTH doing the research, and telling about it. This is the whole point of having research institutions, teaching institutions, schools AND museums. To make sure that the knowledge gets passed, intact, down the line. It's redundant, with many ways of accomplishing the same goal. But it's not wasted effort. It just means that no one failure will destroy the whole system.

I don't think I ever saw that really, really big picture before. Or got the visceral sense of holding this gift in my hands, with an obligation to care for it, add to it, and pay it forward.

Take that, John McCain. Here, in this building, the American people have spent hundreds of millions of dollars on what you would probably call a 'radio' that makes pictures of the sky, for planetariums to show with an 'overhead projector'. There is no utility here---astronomy is a fundamentally un-useful thing to do. Paradoxically, it's also one of the most important things we do, as human beings. It fulfills a fundamental obligation that makes us, us.