[mmaimcal] forwarded message from Robert Brown

[Bryan Butler]

hi folks,

well, it's nice to see that ESO has approved the resolution.

however, does the following paragraph (taken directly from the
press release web site) annoy anybody else?

"Several joint working groups formed under the ESO-NRAO agreement were 
set up to explore the possibility of a collaborative project. It was 
concluded that a homogeneous array of 64 x 12-m antennas, providing 
submillimetre performance with a total collecting area of 7,000 m2, 
could be built at the high (5000 m) Chajnantor site, an hour from the 
array control center at the town of San Pedro de Atacama.  It is this 
collaborative facility that is presently referred to as the Large 
Southern Array/Millimetre Array (LSA/MMA)."

this is an incredibly slippery statement, as the _implication_ is that 
64 x 12-m was decided on by the joint ESO-NRAO groups, yet it is not
exactly _stated_ in that way.  it's worded as: "it was concluded that a 
homogeneous array of 64 x 12-m antennas, ..., *could* be built at the 
high...".  well, yes indeed, we concluded that a 64 x 12-m array *could*
be built, but by no means did we (at least the science working group)
agree that 64 x 12-m was the desired array.  

if we continue to allow statements like this to propagate, we will
undoubtedly end up with 12-m antennas.  maybe i'm alone in this, but
i think that this is too large.  10-m is even too large.  if i'm not
alone in this thought, how are we going to fight this fight?


	-bryan