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Adamantium
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22 May 2015, 12:16 pm

There is nothing quite like that first view of saturn or M31 through a decent telescope!

The arrival of dobsonians and sidewalk astronomers has done a lot.



Rocket123
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22 May 2015, 12:44 pm

Adamantium wrote:
The arrival of dobsonians and sidewalk astronomers has done a lot.

When I was 12, I wanted my own telescope. My Mom enrolled me in a telescope making class taught by John Dobson (the inventor of the Dobsonian telescope). I was easily the youngest person in the class. Unfortunately, not enough people enrolled in the class and it was cancelled. Still, I wanted to build my own telescope (an 8” reflector). So, my Mom spoke with Mr. Dobson and he agreed to help me build it outside of a formal class. It was hard work (hand grinding the telescope's mirror). I remember going to Mr. Dobson's basement apartment (on Baker street in San Francisco) where he inspected the focal length of the mirror and advised us on how to build the "housing" for the telescope.

Sorry for the tangent.



Adamantium
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22 May 2015, 1:05 pm

Rocket123 wrote:
Adamantium wrote:
The arrival of dobsonians and sidewalk astronomers has done a lot.

When I was 12, I wanted my own telescope. My Mom enrolled me in a telescope making class taught by John Dobson (the inventor of the Dobsonian telescope). I was easily the youngest person in the class. Unfortunately, not enough people enrolled in the class and it was cancelled. Still, I wanted to build my own telescope (an 8” reflector). So, my Mom spoke with Mr. Dobson and he agreed to help me build it outside of a formal class. It was hard work (hand grinding the telescope's mirror). I remember going to Mr. Dobson's basement apartment (on Baker street in San Francisco) where he inspected the focal length of the mirror and advised us on how to build the "housing" for the telescope.

Sorry for the tangent.


Wow! What an awesome experience and memory! Thanks for sharing that. I wish I had been there!

I have 30 Year old Celestron C-5 with which I show my kids the planets and the true nature of the star field they don't usually perceive, but I am planning to get them involved in grinding a big mirror for a Dobsonian with me! I would loved to have learned from the man himself.



Rocket123
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22 May 2015, 1:50 pm

Adamantium wrote:
Wow! What an awesome experience and memory! Thanks for sharing that. I wish I had been there!

Looking back, it was an awesome experience. At the time, I remember it being a lot of work. I thought I would never finish grinding the mirror, using different sizes of “grit”. For those interested, the process is pretty much described here: http://www.stjohnsrasc.ca/mirror-grindi ... -talk.html

Adamantium wrote:
I would loved to have learned from the man himself.

Mr. Dobson was a really nice man. On one of our trips to The City, he was lying in bed, sick with a fever. And still, he took the time to help us.

In particular, I remember him being enamored with my Mom’s car (a really ugly Green Mercedes diesel). After building the telescope, I read an article about him (in a local San Francisco magazine). In that article, he referred to my Mom’s car (describing the amount of time it would take to drive a Green Mercedes to the sun and back).



slave
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25 May 2015, 9:08 pm

Rocket123 wrote:
Adamantium wrote:
The arrival of dobsonians and sidewalk astronomers has done a lot.

When I was 12, I wanted my own telescope. My Mom enrolled me in a telescope making class taught by John Dobson (the inventor of the Dobsonian telescope). I was easily the youngest person in the class. Unfortunately, not enough people enrolled in the class and it was cancelled. Still, I wanted to build my own telescope (an 8” reflector). So, my Mom spoke with Mr. Dobson and he agreed to help me build it outside of a formal class. It was hard work (hand grinding the telescope's mirror). I remember going to Mr. Dobson's basement apartment (on Baker street in San Francisco) where he inspected the focal length of the mirror and advised us on how to build the "housing" for the telescope.

Sorry for the tangent.


me so jelly :nerdy: :nerdy: :nerdy:

you are very lucky :!: :!:



DarkNeptune
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27 May 2015, 4:28 am

Hihi,

Sorry for absence but I have been bust on company admin work such as setting up my website and all.

I recently joined the Aspergers FB group, and when I made a post asking for everyone's opinion on whether I should create a specific astronomy-ASD group, all I got was a few likes and no replies. I couldn't believe it.

So then I left the group.

It's frustrating when you try to do something ambitious and people don't respond to you at all. Made me all the more disappointed in people with ASD and challenged my assumption that many with ASD want to make the world a better place. Evidently that doesn't seem to be the case.

In my opinion, Astronomy & the sciences are an excellent way to also help ASD people like me blend in well with the rest of the NT society. And over the years I wondered why don't more Aspies take such initiatives? (And yes, I have been bullied and cyber-bullied before many times like many Aspies).



Adamantium
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27 May 2015, 8:30 am

DarkNeptune wrote:
Hihi,

Sorry for absence but I have been bust on company admin work such as setting up my website and all.

I recently joined the Aspergers FB group, and when I made a post asking for everyone's opinion on whether I should create a specific astronomy-ASD group, all I got was a few likes and no replies. I couldn't believe it.


I am sorry that you had an unsatisfactory experience with Facebook. I am not totally surprised, though. I don't think it's a great platform unless you are a certain kind of sort of exhibitionist, chatty person.

I find I am inhibited in my activity on Facebook because I realized that people may over or misinterpret my likes and activity there, or it may reveal things that I don't necessarily want to broadcast. For example, I liked some things from an ASD page and someone at work unexpectedly asked if I had aspergers. This was not a hostile person and I did not particularly mind this unexpected social intimacy with her, but it made me feel a bit paranoid about revealing things on Facebook. It's not always easy to figure out how the privacy settings will be applied and when you are notifying friends of friends of friends--that is to say, complete strangers.

Quote:
It's frustrating when you try to do something ambitious and people don't respond to you at all. Made me all the more disappointed in people with ASD and challenged my assumption that many with ASD want to make the world a better place. Evidently that doesn't seem to be the case.


I think you are over-extrapolating from too small of a data set and making some unwarranted inferences--but you should feel encouraged by recognizing this.

The failure of this small group of people on Facebook can't be said to indicate anything about the desire to make the world a better place in the very large global autistic population.

My sense is that only a minority of people with ASDs are interested in astronomy and people with ASDs are extremely heterogeneous with a great diversity of interests. The fun thing for those who are into astronomy is how intensely they enjoy and pursue the subject, but you can't extrapolate from astronomy-loving aspies to other ASD people who may not have special interests or whose special interests are focused elsewhere.

Astronomy enthusiasts, both ASD and NT, are likely to respond better to your efforts than people who are not particularly interested in Astronomy.

Don't take a lack of enthusiasm for your initial outreach to heart. It may have been the wrong venue and the wrong audience. One thing that is sometimes helpful to people who are trying to set up new social or community enterprises is to look at what has been found to be effective and ineffective by others who have engaged in similar start up activity in the past. Maybe you can find approaches and ideas that will help you to launch your projects.



slave
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27 May 2015, 12:23 pm

DarkNeptune wrote:
Hihi,

Sorry for absence but I have been bust on company admin work such as setting up my website and all.

I recently joined the Aspergers FB group, and when I made a post asking for everyone's opinion on whether I should create a specific astronomy-ASD group, all I got was a few likes and no replies. I couldn't believe it.

So then I left the group.

It's frustrating when you try to do something ambitious and people don't respond to you at all. Made me all the more disappointed in people with ASD and challenged my assumption that many with ASD want to make the world a better place. Evidently that doesn't seem to be the case.

In my opinion, Astronomy & the sciences are an excellent way to also help ASD people like me blend in well with the rest of the NT society. And over the years I wondered why don't more Aspies take such initiatives? (And yes, I have been bullied and cyber-bullied before many times like many Aspies).


yeah, many ASD individuals don't use FB and/or are not that interested in Astronomy. I personally love Astronomy but most on WP don't.