Revolutionizing Astronomy worldwide

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Hi,

I am a 21 years old Male Aspie from Singapore. Currently, I am working out plans to commercialize Astronomy in my country and turn it into a sustainable social enterprise for all those interested into Astronomy; as we don't even have an institution where we can take Astronomy courses here! Unlike the US or European nations.... :/

Among those I am leading, are talented youth (younger than <24) individuals with interests in Astronomy & Physics, and all are Neurotypical.

The ventures I am pursuing now are:

- Selling Telescopes; being a Vendor to the general public & schools
- Telescope Rentals
- Astronomy training & management assistance for new school astronomy clubs
- Astronomy enrichment courses for young kids (6-12 yrs old, for example)
- Astronomy cafés

So I was wondering if there's any Aspie here on WP that would be interested to join me in this venture, even if you are from other countries? I was hoping we can brainstorm to see what we all can accomplish together to engage in a paradigm shift with how Astronomy is being taught, and how we can have a sustainable enterprise with it? I already have a couple of NT friends who are Cambridge Astrophysics & Physics students, and we are already working out how else they can help from the UK.

As we enter the era of instant gratification, Astronomy which are led by mostly old-timers are failing to adapt to the new social culture, is becoming less and less of an interest to youngsters and is seeing a decline. Even Singapore's mainstream education system has removed the Solar System from our primary school (7-12 years old) science syllabus! What the heck!

As any Aspie here who knows and loves Astronomy, all this bodes badly for humanity. I want us to change that, and strongly believe I can make a difference, yet I can't do this alone. So apperciate any thoughts about this!

Wunderbar!
I love astronomy too, and I would like to contribute in some small ways.
I am really busy all the time (neuroscience grad student at caltech), but hopefully I can do something for your projects.

Hello, DarkNeptune welcome to our club you might wanna google the san pedro observatory [formerly the skywatcher inn] in benson, AZ. I think an observatory you can stay at like a resort would be a splendid idea!

Haha many thank yous! I am still working out details, I would sincerely love international support whenever possible. We are about to approach the era where the race to Mars get real (big Elon Musk fan here), and I feel we all should find ways to gather a large pool of talented individuals worldwide (Both Aspies & NT) to work on ways to innovate on existing technology to produce new ones to prepare us for colonization on Mars! What do you think?

Yeah, cool! But realistically speaking, I am not some rich dude that can spend on building an observatory, especially since land in my country is scarce and is priced at very high rates by all those greedy landlords! We do have 2 public observatories, but they are managed by incompetent fools and their politics, that they are places not conducive to advance the field of astronomy!

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Asides from wrong planet, does anyone else here know of other places where I can reach out to more Aspies? I realise I can't find any specific Aspie-Astronomy support group on the internet; was hoping to create one actually!

Hi, DarkNeptune, and welcome!!

I can't do anything to help you, but I just wanted to ask you a question..... Isn't that Neil deGrasse Tyson, in your avatar? I ADORE him----can't get ENOUGH of him!! One day I hope to own a couple of his lectures / shows / whatever, on DVD.....

The BEST of everything, for your project----I think it's a FABULOUS idea!!

Of course!
We should try some proof-of-concepts for potential technologies that would allow us to ackshuly survive long-term once we get to Mars.
I graduated in chemistry before studying brrrainzzz, so I am much into what the hell do we do when we are on Martian ground?!

What are your credentials for 1. business
2. Astronomy
and 3. leadership?

Haha yes! He came to Singapore during a promotional tour visit for his COSMOS series! And I was lucky enough to have caught him! XD

Hello!

#1
Asides from a few part time jobs, I have also worked as a telescope salesman as Astro Scientific Centre Pte. Ltd on&off from 2012-2015, and have sold more than 100 telescopes & binoculars to my customers with satisfaction.

I am currently helping out part time at INgenius, the space company that will be responsible for launching the first Singaporean to space later this August, such as giving astronomy talks and tours around their space exhibits (which includes their own space capsule!)

#2
I have no academic credentials for Astronomy as my country Singapore doesn't offer any courses on this subject, save some university modules on Astronomy. But I am the longest serving volunteer at the Singapore Science Centre Observatory from 2007 to now (since I was 13). I am an ex-member of TASOS (The Astronomical Society of Singapore) as well as Astronomy.SG before departing those organizations as I felt I can't help outreach and advance my country's local astronomy scene while I was in those organizations.

I have also been an active sidewalk astronomer since 2014 at Bishan Park & Toa Payoh National Library, alongside my friend Gary Chee who has been doing such sessions there actively since 2010 as well as giving free Astronomy talks to the general public. I have also recently become the advisor of both Ngee Ann Polytechnic & Institute of Technical Education (College East) astronomy clubs.


#3
Credentials for leadership can be quite subjective, as back when I was in school I wasn't bothered to lead my classmates since my way of thinking was radically different from them, as I was in mainstream schools filled almost entirely by Neurotypicals.

Regardless for me I have been among the less-than-handful few in my country's astronomy scene alone trying to "unify" the different political factions with fruitless results. Thus I revamped my own envisioned paradigm of Singapore's astronomy scene, and decided that if anything, I would focus on leading the young generation of astronomers here and not be too concerned with the older generation. Since the latter are less committed to astronomy, more egostic and less open-minded to new ideas & structures.

Wow that's awesome!

I am currently contemplating create perhaps, for a start, a Facebook group/page for Aspies worldwide to discuss everything Astronomy & science related, so do you think this is a viable idea as well?

(To other posters)

I would also love to have your input!

I would rather discuss astronomy here or on dedicated forum than on Facebook.
Facebook has all kinds of privacy issues.

I love your enthusiasm for this awesome subject.

Never underestimate the passion that the establishment Astronomers have for the Science. You see them as slow-moving and out of touch...and they very well may be...BUT they do deeply love Astronomy...don't forget that

They do, don't get me wrong. But they are hardly interested in connecting with the younger generation; most of the older generation ones enjoy ego-stroking one another with their knowledge & equipment. Everyone can have a similar passion, but when it boils to getting serious work done, the whole "we have a common goal" is just motherhood talk. You need people who are both passionate & willing to get the job done. The former alone won't simply cut it; I have been through enough people politics with all these NTs to learn this the hard way. So I am not ignorantly discriminating the older generation astronomers.

That's primarily why I am focusing on my generation & the future ones as they are more open & likely to getting the job done instead of showing off their knowledge and experience, which can be frustrating.

Neil deGrasse Tyson, Brian Cox and Brian Greene are hardly slackers! And I am a fan of the videos Dr Meghan Gray has created with Brady Haran on Youtube...



https://www.youtube.com/results?search_ ... eghan+gray

But if you have a better way to connect with people about astronomy and can make it work, that would be fantastic.

I think it's important to get young people who may not be astronomers (or astronomers yet) to spark interest in others in astronomy, space, planetary science, and to other sciences too. Astronomy is one of the most accessible science, one of the first that children are interested in, because there are large concrete objects for them to understand. They may not go into astronomy, but it's a gateway for being interested in and going into other stem fields. Also a lifelong passion for many people who don't do it professionally, but there is nothing more fun than going out to the desert for a star party.