One great reason for a manned base on the moon

[ringmastery]

http://www.sunspot.net/news/health/bal-te.space10jan10,0,5674042.story?coll=bal-health-headlines

Astronomers have long regarded the moon as an ideal platform for telescopes, said Ray Villard, a spokesman for the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore.

Scientists actively discussed the idea during the 1990s but gave up when no funding appeared.

Michael Hauser, the institute's deputy director, said a lunar telescope, like those in Earth orbit, would be free of distortions caused by the Earth's atmosphere and could capture ultraviolet, X-ray, gamma-ray and infrared wavelengths that don't reach the Earth's surface.

But the moon offers a bonus: a stable platform without the "jitters" that can develop in weightless observatories, and no need for frequent maneuvering to keep targets in sight.

And unlike the Hubble Space Telescope, which orbits through daylight and nighttime every 90 minutes, the moon offers nights that last two weeks at most locations. The poles would be even better.

"At the north or south pole, you could have perpetual darkness, because there are craters where the sun never shines," Villard said.

[ClintonTyree]

1. One small flaw in this logic......................

I'm no rocket scientist mind you, but the lack of an atmosphere on the moon is precisely why it is constantly bombarded by cosmic debris. We've all seen what the surface of the moon looks like. It's worse than Manuel Noreaga's face.
Spending all of that money, and then having it smashed to bits by space junk would be insane.
Perhaps they could come up with a way to shield it from smaller particles, but the larger ones would be problematic.

[creativelcro]

2. same for the lunar base

[0rganism]

4. The lunar base will be protected by a giant trampoline

The telescopes, unfortunately, cannot be defended so easily. Last I heard, ACME was getting a no-bid contract to build powerful electromagnets which would take advantage of the meteors' high iron conentration, to pull them off their path. Unfortunately, no one knows how to protect the magnets. ;-)

[rman]

6. and you think the scientists wouldn't know that?

they also know the frequency and size of impacts.

what you see on the surface of the moon are large impact craters; earth atmosphere would not stop most of these.

yes on the moon the risc of impact damaging such a telescope is larger then on earth, but not by far as much as you seem to think.

[RapidCreek]

3. yea that's great

I gotta admit...taking pretty pictures of Mars far outweighs my social security benefits, educating my kid or going to the doctor!

RC

[Iverson]

5. a small or large danger

There may be great scientific justification, but that could simply mask the militarization of space.

[rman]

7. which is no reason not to go to space,

but i don't think it's a good idea to go now, with the world on the brink and all.