Praise Science Call to Action: Save Arecibo!!!!

The Arecibo Observatory (aka Earth's largest radio telescope) is being threatened by Alec Trevelyan and the Goldeneye Satellite by massive budget cuts that will shut down most of its operations, including collecting interstellar radio transmissions analyzed by the SETI@home project, which we mentioned here oh so long ago.

The Arecibo Observatory is an amazing feat of Science and stands today as an incredibly inspiring and functional monument of human daring and ingenuity. It signifies our collective voice shouting into the heavens and our collective ear turned to the stars. Cutting funding, shutting down operations, and dismantling it would be not only a shameful admittance of defeat, but also a step backwards as a species.

I find this news slightly heartbreaking, and since you're reading this blog, I assume that you do too. If you are heartbroken enough to want to do something about it, you can go here and print out a letter to send to your congressmen expressing your concern. You can also email if you are too lazy/cheap to send a letter (although legislators are more likely listen if you do send snail mail). So, as a community of Science loving people, perhaps we do a little something to help make a slight difference in the struggle to save Arecibo.