Ingenuity and scientific inquiry

Sustaining the Rubin’s advances

I acknowledge that today’s column is more peculiar than many I offer because I will not provide the photographs from the Vera Rubin Observatory in Chile: I am obsessive about respecting the intellectual property others cultivate (Since I am not in Chile nor am I in the journals publishing the photos, I won’t replicate them here out of respect).

However, I will celebrate the astonishing research this Observatory facilitates as a tribute to human ingenuity. In a week marked by air fryer temperatures, in-fighting over evidence on vaccine safety, Fordo destruction levels, and inexplicable budget arguments, I highlight our human determination to explore beyond our beautiful, fragile planet. 

The Rubin is not the first Observatory or telescope, of course. The technology is not even new to the Chilean desert north of Valparaiso, as the website Astronomicaltourism.com lists a dozen others located in the pristine air of that location due to the night skies offering the best view on the planet (strong praise). 

The Rubin is a joint research facility of the U.S. Department of Energy and National Science Foundations, primary drivers in astronomy around the world today. Dr. Vera Florence Cooper Rubin, who passed away nine years ago, was a scientist specializing in the rotation of galaxies—the co-author of studies on why and how galaxies move, Drs. Rubin and Kent Ford made significant advances in the study of the relevance of “dark matter” in understanding astronomy. As the Observatory’s website notes, Rubin’s work over a long career undergirded many fundamental reconsiderations of science forever.

This tale comes to mind because the initial photographs, linked at https://skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-news/vera-c-rubin-observatory-releases-long-awaited-first-photos/, from the new Observatory in Chile, are nothing short of breathtaking in scope, detail, and promise to advance our understanding of infinitely distant parts of the universe. While science is a global, universally human endeavor, we, the people of the United States, provided massive support for this research opportunity. I do not ever take that for granted, nor, I would boldly offer, should any of us. Reaching into new endeavors is invariably expensive, risky, and prone to repeated trial and error to achieve replicable results. That the National Science Foundation and the Department of Energy co-sponsored this initiative with their resources is something to take pride in.

In an era of seeming dramatic retrenchment on everything except defense and the debt, this is a value the government provides. Not everyone will agree with this statement, but this broader, long-term investment is one of the characteristics of our traditionally superlative science program in the United States. That commitment to expanding replicable knowledge, with its subsidiary effects, is under siege as both direct and indirect government research funding cuts wither. Subsequent generations will bear the consequences of these choices, but that is how democracy operates.

Certainly science is yet one competing priority with health care, housing, environmental science, energy independence, and seemingly unending other needs. The follow on effects of scientific research, however, are crucial to modernization of our society as we have seen over the six decades of NASA’s efforts, for example. More importantly, our scientific infrastructure has been the dominant one over the twentieth century in efforts to make this the global power it has been.

Despite rhetoric and fairy tales to the contrary, those investments were largely taxpayer driven because the scale of the projects was so vast and their outcomes serve so many of us. The Gates Foundation, the Space X projects, the Carnegie Institute, or any other private sector initiatives build on the defense industrial base in conjunction with researchers across the world but primarily in this country; even the resources of billionaires pale in comparison with the expenses for these projects. Building a scientific community, rather than nationality of the recipients, in any of the relevant disciplines is why we have won more Nobel Prizes than the rest of the world

We will no longer attract the same caliber of scientists, male or predominantly female, without the research funding. Additionally, women will find this field increasingly difficult to break into, deepening inequality in research opportunities. That matters because a field of homogeneous individuals, even if they are pursuing research, may well create a less open environment for questions. The nature of the investigation, of course, is as much about the interrogatives and methods as it is about the resulting data.

Vera Rubin understood this final point well; hence, she advocated for assuring women could follow in her footsteps. Having been denied the opportunity to study at Princeton, because of prohibitions against women. Much of her pathbreaking work at the Carnegie Institution, and she taught and mentored young women for decades. Dr. Rubin was renowned for explicitly advancing opportunities for women to study science and to provide more answers to the unending supply of questions we hold about the universe or the structure of the atom—and everything in between.

As I discussed on Monday, we can never be certain of outcomes had other choices been made. Perhaps Rubin’s work would have taken a different turn had she worked at Georgetown. The world might be mired in the ancient misunderstandings of everything revolving around the Earth without Galileo or Kepler’s works. We can, however, see in the discoveries of Vera Rubin and the telescope reminding us of her advances one additional tool to open our minds to the mysteries of billions of stars we did not know existed only a few generations ago. For that advance, I celebrate the memorial to Dr. Rubin and her understanding of how vital both genders are, as investigators, in learning about our infinite universe.

I welcome your thoughts on this as well any reactions to the stunning photographs from the Rubin’s initial products. Thank you for your time. Thank you also to those who contribute financially to this column as you make a difference each and every day.

It’s cooler today which is a gift for the end of June. I leave you with the whimsy of a bee on a mission to perpetuate the world’s ecology, one plant at a time such as this one in Eastport yesterday.

Be well and be safe. FIN

“Astronomical Observatories in Chile”, Astronomicaltourism.com, retrieved at https://www.astronomictourism.com/astronomical-observatories-chile.html

K.R. Callaway, “Vera C. Rubin Observatory Releases Long-Awaited First Photos”, SkyandTelescope.org, 23 June 2025, retrieved at https://skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-news/vera-c-rubin-observatory-releases-long-awaited-first-photos/

Shay Dawson, “Vera Rubin”, womenshistory.org, retrieved at https://www.womenshistory.org/education-resources/biographies/vera-rubin

“Rubin Observatory”, retrieved at https://rubinobservatory.org/