Expert: Jayendra Upadhye - 10/3/2005

Question
Is it possible to go into the astronomical field for a career without a math or science degree?

Answer
Hi,
Unfortunately, the days of considering space as the new wild frontier are gone!

where any one with any ability could "come up with something useful".

The classic case of such "useful" work as was done by Edwin Hubble and Milton Humason that paved the way for HUBBLE'S LAW can no more be repeated.

You see, Humason was very good in photography, and hubble needed someone to assist him with the mundane photographic work that was part of the search for the cepheid variable stars that formed the back bone of his theory of the expansion of the universe, and also proof that milky way had its limits, outside which other galaxies resided.

Now astronomy has rapidly grown and diversified into many fields that have become "specialised".

Without maths, you couldnt be an astrophysicist.
without science, you could not get associated with the science of life on other planets (exo-biology?)..

and the photography involved has long moved from simple photographic plates to charge coupled devices ('ccd's).

OFCOURSE as an AMATEUR you could still leave your name in the field, say by spotting a supernova before anyone else, or a comet before anyone else.

But that chance is also getting slimmer by the day, thanks to "listening" devices that look and see farther than humans can, (the asteroid monitoring project will easily spot a comet, and the particle physicsists in underground mines will see the telltale neutrino flash of an emerging supernova, even before observers see the visible flash!

You see, the space cow-boy has gone, and flash gordon has arrived!
Jayen