Based on a socio-historical survey on the construction of astronomical observatories on the island of Hawai’i, Pascal Marichalar shows that scientific policies can no longer be detached from their ecological and social impacts.
Famous for its heavenly beaches and surf spots, the Hawai’i archipelago is also known to astronomers due to the many observatories that are built there, some of which are among the largest in the world. At the top of Mauna Kea, the culmination of the archipelago at 4,200 meters above sea level, no less than thirteen professional observation instruments have been installed since the late 1960s. At this altitude, the air is rarer and the sky lighter. The distance from urban lights and the favorable climate make it an ideal site for astronomical activities. However, when the historian and sociologist of the sciences Pascal Marichalar went to Hawai’i in July 2019 to visit his uncle, it is the mobilization of the population against the construction of a new telescope which occupies the major titles of local newspapers. Would the natives be “ anti-science », As some astronomers work on site seem to think ? This is the starting point of the book, which offers to go to the much deeper roots of this challenge.
In order to write this story that reads like a suspense novel, and highlight its multiple issues, Pascal Marichalar conducted a long -term investigation for five years. He relied on a number of documents – some relatively “ sensitive With regard to what was previously told in scientific circles – from the archives of observatories and universities involved. This archival support is especially skillfully put at the service of an ethnographic approach, based on meetings and interviews conducted on site or at a distance by the author. He exchanged with a multitude of actors with sometimes very distant social positions and roles, from the teacher of astrophysics to the buildings construction worker, including environmental activists and Hawaiianity.
A piece of history of contemporary astronomy
The book presents us in the first place a piece of the history of recent astronomy (since the second half of XXe century). We thus learn that from the 1960s, the famous astronomer Gerard Kuiper was married from the quality of the sky at the top of the Mauna Kea, alongside the “ mirror Alika Herring, key figure in identifying the best sites and installing the first observation instruments.
Through the figure of Herring, it is also a piece in the history of “ testing site And his techniques which is sketched by Pascal Marichalar. This practice is to look for the best place to install an observatory, taking into account in particular the specific climatic and atmospheric parameters at each place. If methods to measure them have been formalized and standardized during the 1980s, Herring has developed other criteria of “ testing site »Resting mainly on its qualities of observation, its practice and its fine knowledge of the instruments.
The author also recalls that some major discoveries in the field of astrophysics and cosmology were made at the Hawai’i Observatory, like the famous “ black energy Which would represent, depending on the model, nearly 70 % of the total mass and energy of the universe. The existence of this energy makes it possible in particular to explain the observed acceleration of the expansion of the universe, which contradicts the theory of general relativity of Einstein in its initial conception.
However, the history of astronomy is not just that of astronomers, their techniques and their discoveries. As the author recalls, and there is all the true interest of the approach developed in this book: “” The telescopes may observe the sky, they are always built on land and, among them, fragile lands, sacred lands, and stolen lands … »» (p. 27).
First constructions and first resistances
Quickly after the discovery by some astronomers of the quality of the sky of Mauna Kea, the first projects to build observatories were launched. The federal state of Hawai’i being legally owner of the mountain, an arrangement was found in the late 1960s with the astronomical institute of the local university: in return for a symbolic rent of one dollar per year, it is offered a 65-year lease allowing it to exploit the Summit of Mauna Kea for the installation of observation instruments. The Institute will then quickly sublet (still for a symbolic dollar) certain parts of the summit to other institutions (mainly other American universities or other Western countries) wishing to install their own observatories, in exchange for the guarantee of a minimum observation time for the local astronomical institute. This provision by the State is reflected in fact by a stranglehold of the Institute (and its president John Jefferies) without any control or almost on the arrangements carried out, the very first works being even carried out without a license. We must wait for the first large -scale project in the 1970s – that of “ France Canada Hawai’i telescope ” – For an impact study and a public inquiry to be carried out, all in a context of renewal of environmental struggles and evolution of environmental legislation. Several associations seize the subject, with the leading figure in the activistseS Mae and Bill Mull. While the impact study produced by the Astronomical Institute concluded that a total non-interest in the top of an archaeological and biodiversity, these activists,eOn the contrary, produce, on the contrary, producing the presence of rare birds and insects, as well as sanctuaries and funeral sites built by the Kānaka Maoli, the Aboriginal people of Hawai’i.
The Mauna Kea development master plan adopted in 1977, however, does not take into account these alerts or minimum requests from the activistses, which aimed to limit, for example, the number of domes built on the summit.
While local business circles rub their hands, seeing in the arrival on the island of this academic world an important economic windfall (especially through real estate speculation), activistseS Ecologists are gradually joined in their fight by defenders of Hawaiianity. This movement for the recognition of the Kānaka Maoli and Aboriginal culture is indeed experiencing an important renewal from the 1970s. First skillfully associated with the promotion of astronomy (“” The mountain is sacred and the telescope on site too ), The Kānaka Maoli will gradually distance themselves while the construction of new instruments at the top of Mauna Kea exploded during the 1980s and 90s. The places are indeed very far from being respected by the actors of the various scientific programs: various pollution in ransacking of sanctuaries, the incidents multiply, causing the anger of the defenders of Hawaiianity.
Breaking point
In the early 2000s began to emerge the first giant telescopes projects, with diameters ranging from 25 to 40 meters, against 8 meters for the largest existing telescopes.
Despite the previous disputes (which had certainly never succeeded in preventing the construction of new telescopes), and an official report which alerted on political and social risks to build an instrument of this size at the top of the Mauna Kea, the summit was still chosen in 2009 by two Californian universities to build the “ Thirty Meters Telescope “, Or Tmt. While this 30 -meter diameter telescope project installed in a dome 18 meters high was initially to see the light of day by 2020, it is today still in a standstill. The last part of the book returns to the events of the last fifteen years, which have had the consequence of blocking the start of the work of Tmt. Of the first events of 2014-2015 to the installation of a permanent opponent campeS In 2019, Pascal Marichalar puts this unprecedented mobilization in perspective in the long colonial history of the Hawaiian archipelago. Of the expedition of James Cook, at the end of the XVIIIe century, to its constitution in federated state of the United States in 1959, passing by its unilateral annexation in 1898, the history of the territory had its share of violence, of discrimination against the Kānaka Maoli and of course of grabbing their land.
In the eyes of a number of opponentses, the appropriation of the Mauna Kea summit by astronomers and the non-compliance with a mountain considered to be sacred only constitute the last stage of the negation of the Aboriginal people and their rights. More generally, the hundreds of millions of dollars spent on the construction of telescopes in recent decades have ultimately had economic benefits that are extremely limited for the local population, despite promises of prosperity. The repression suffered by the movement, in particular with the arrest of opponentewho were trying to block the access road to construction machinery, then appears as a major breakdown that has largely contributed to Tmt A central issue in Hawaiian politics.
If there is indeed in this story “” Something of a tragedy »» (p. 28) As the author underlines, staging scientists sincerely convinced of only working for the good of humanity while ignoring (or worse by denying) the sufferings of the Kānaka Maoli people, one can nevertheless hope that the publication of this investigation contributes to moving certain lines. As certaineDied, the book is indeed widely demonstrated that the human and social sciences constitute a precious tool of analysis and understanding of the complexity of the world, including with regard to a priori scientific activities “ harmless ». In terms of this book, but especially of the mobilization which is originally against the construction of Tmtit now seems obvious that any campaign of “ testing site »For the construction of future telescopes will not only have to take into account the different atmospheric parameters but also the multiple political and social problems well terrestrial relating to each place of observation.
Beyond the case studied, the work also constitutes an important contribution to different fields of research: in history and sociology of science since it is a question of astronomy, but also in the field of social movements, the study of post-colonial societies or even ecology. The strength of the approach developed by Pascal Marichalar lies precisely in the many crossings carried out between these fields, on a subject which can only be addressed in this way to be fully seized. The question of the lands on which observatories are built-or other scientific infrastructure-thus invites us to think more generally of what the inscription of scientific activity implies on a territory, and to try to highlight the unthought (here colonial) which often underlying it.