[Physicist]

The article doesn't mention that SIRTF is the last of the four telescopes of the "Great Observatories" program. The other three were the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory, the Hubble Space Telescope, and the Chandra X-ray Telescope.

I've already entered the contest. The name I suggested is "Shapley", after the famed astronomer Harlow Shapley. Here's the essay I submitted:

Harlow Shapley was one of the very greatest astronomers of the 20th century. He's the one who first elucidated the true extent of the Milky Way galaxy, and our sun's location within it.

Interestingly, he is well known for a blunder. He identified the "spiral nebulae" not as distant galaxies, but as galactic gas clouds that were in the process of condensing into stars. This was his position in the famous "Shapley-Curtis Debate". Curtis took the position that the Milky Way galaxy was small, and that the spiral nebulae were in fact distant--but not too distant--galaxies.

Time has proved both men right and wrong. The "nebulae" are indeed galaxies, but Harlow Shapley was right about the extent of our galaxy. Nobody realized the univere was so big.

Shapley was right to expect to find stars forming within our galaxy. He believed that the "nebulae" were protosuns and not galaxies, because he could not believe that anything could be so distant. Moreover, the "nebulae" had the shape one would expect from a condensing star.

This telescope will find the protosuns that Shapley expected to see. Since he never found them, it is fitting that his namesake should.

I apologize for its being so sketchy and incoherent, but the essays are limited to 200 words, not the 250 claimed on the website. I had to do some last-minute editing. I also wanted to mention that Shapley and Hubble were great rivals in life; it is fitting that the rivalry should continue, to the advancement of astronomy.

(When I say that they were rivals, I mean that they really couldn't abide each other. One time a paper of Shapley's was sent to Hubble for peer review. Hubble scrawled the words "Of No Consequence" on the first page and sent it back without further comment. To Shapley's horror and Hubble's delight, the words somehow made it into print, appended after Shapley's name.)

Any other good names out there? Submit them and let us all know!

[Physicist]

You guys must have some ideas.

[Physicist]

Ping.

Who else should we apprise of this prize?

[537 Votes]

Wasn't it Slipher who discovered the red shift in the first place? His name might do.

[Physicist]

Name that telescope!

[anymouse]

While we're pushing for every other government facility, bridge, freeway, museum, airport, etc. to be named after him, how about "The Ronald Regan Space Telescope?"

[Physicist]

Name that telescope!

[gcruse]

 new planets at the farthest
reaches of the universe.

I would call it PipeDream, because

1.  It looks like someone's dream of a pipe.
2.  If they think we can see planets at the
   farthest reaches of the universe, as opposed
   to, at best, this galaxy, then it is, indeed, a
   pipe dream.

[Dick Bachert]

How about "The Clinton?":

It's always up, hard, in the dark, turns to the left and in the sucking vacuum of space.

[Hatteras]

Maybe they should have had a contest before the named this one: CLICK HERE

[Psycho_Bunny]

"The Bunny Thump"

"Magic Bunny Ears"

"Carrot Colossus"

”The Big Peeper”

”Whoa”

”The I-See-What-Yer-Doin’”

[general_re]

How about "Deep Wallet Nine"? Or maybe "Deep Wallet Mine" ;)

On the other hand, my brother (the "artist") is (again) looking for work, and he can do some pretty fabulous things with an airbrush. I don't suppose NASA is looking for a subcontractor to do a nice flame-job on the front end or maybe some pinstriping, hmmm?

Seriously, though, how about "Kepler"?

[Teacher317]

Space Infrared Telescope Facility, or SIRTF.

Why not Facility for the InfraRed Space Telescope, or FIRST?

[Phantom Lord]

How about Hubble without the glasses

[Phantom Lord]

How about The Frink, or Glavin

[Phantom Lord]

CompuGlobalHyperMegaScope

[onedoug]

Thanks for the flag, and for encouraging your own competition. I'm waxing exploratory....

[Physicist]

Two more names relevant to the formation of stellar systems: Bart Bok and James Jeans.

[Old Professer]

FIRST THINGS SIRFT

[dead]

In the interest of smaller government, how about "Budweiser"?

[dead]

Did anybody bother to name Katie Couric's colon scope?