Tag Archives: SDSS

Healthy Conflcit

I recently picked up a copy of A Grand and Bold Thing by Ann Finkbeiner. It’s a book about the original Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS). I actually haven’t read it yet, so I’ll probably say more about the book … Continue reading

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The never-ending battle between big and small science in astronomy

When you hear the thundering herd behind you, it’s time to move on to a new field. That’s advice I often heard from my graduate advisers. While you might call this a “small science” mindset, they went on to found … Continue reading

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The Scientist Dilemma

In preparing talks on lessons learned from Sloan Digital Sky Survey Operations, I began to formulate what I refer to as the Scientist Dilemma: projects want scientists in their support roles to have their work grounded by scientific rationale. Scientists, however, expect to spend at least some part of their time doing science and the two competing sets of needs and expectations can sometimes lead to problems. Continue reading

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