From:   SMTP%"cmu@stsci.edu"  2-MAY-1995 10:46:09.93
To:     DEBATE
CC:
Subj:   feedback on the debate (feel free to post)

Date: Tue, 2 May 95 10:45:45 EDT
From: Meg Urry <cmu@stsci.edu>
Message-Id: <9505021445.AA00715@SOL.STSCI.EDU>
To: debate@grossc.gsfc.nasa.gov
Subject: feedback on the debate (feel free to post)
Cc: cmu@stsci.edu

Dear Debate Organizers,

I attended the 75th Anniversary Astronomical Debate on the Great Gamma
Ray Burst Question and enjoyed it immensely. It was a significant
cultural moment, a day people seemed drawn to a scientific issue for
its sheer intellectual interest more than from a personal attachment
to the topic, a day that made one proud to be an astronomer.

Each speaker made a superb case for his preferred view --- as one should
in a good debate, I felt persuaded first one way then the other, and back
again. I came to the Debate with a slight prejudice in the Galactic direction,
perhaps because the Cosmological side seemed to form its bandwagon long
before the data required it, and I left the Debate persuaded that either
view, Galactic or Cosmological, could be correct. Now I'll simply wait to
see whether the isotropy becomes too overwhelming or bursts are found in M31
or some other result becomes definitive --- for me, the purpose of the Debate
was not to decide the issue finally but to focus our thinking about it, which
it did beautifully.

You are to be congratulated for the excellent organization of the event
and format of the Debate, which was interesting, fun, stimulating, and
altogether a joy. Thank you!

Cheers,
Meg



  +--------------------------------------------+----------------------+
  | C. Megan Urry                              |        cmu@stsci.edu |
  | Space Telescope Science Institute          | Phone (410) 338-4593 |
  | 3700 San Martin Drive, Baltimore MD 21218  |   FAX (410) 338-4767 |
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