Filtering isn't even really for advanced amateurs, since the cost of a filter pales in comparison to the cost of the scope. 20-30$ will get you something that will get rid of most of the low-pressure sodium (orange) emissions. Novices, like me, have a small set of filters they use to improve various views of different objects, and a lot of these filters will be completely defeated by white lights. I'm pretty busy, and prefer to do my observing from my backyard, rather than wasting a couple of hours in a car, so actions like this (replacing easily filtered lights with broad-spectrum ones) is a little irritating.

For astronomers that can actually be worse. For one, if they're not reducing the current through the light to take advantage that more of it is going to its intended target, then the increased reflected light from the street still causes light pollution. More importantly, those white lights emit all over the spectrum, and are incredibly hard to filter out. The ugly orange lights only emit at a couple of frequencies, and is very easy to filter out.

The site they're moving to -- the Gower -- has much darker skies than the glare of Swansea. So, yeah -- they've decided, probably for good reason, that it's not worth paying that much extra for light polluted skies, when they could maintain their costs and increase the quality of their experience.

They survived just fine (obviously), but humans have forced the evolution of cows and other animals so hard & fast that there are many species that quite literally could not survive outside of a farm. Chickens, turkeys, cows (I think) -- look it up.

I had a reply all ready to go about how that statement is wrong since I can quickly prove that pi or sqrt(2) are not rational numbers, but your two word reply is so much more elegant. Absolutely perfect. Bravo! :)

I have two kids, and no TV, and it really isn't so frighteningly difficult to get stuff done that I want to have a TV babysit them. I agree with the GP -- the thought of an 11 month old sitting in front of a TV or a tablet for extended periods really makes me sad.

You must be new here....

Zero mass particles don't have a rest frame. Boosting into different frames -- any frame you like -- will only alter their frequency, not their velocity. They move at c in *all* inertial frames.

If you can be bothered reading it, there might be something in this -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_Jesus -- and the citations listed there. I think there were other people to mention a historical Jesus, but each and every one (I think) comes with a lot of YMMV warnings. Personally I don't think it's unreasonable to believe there really was a historical Jesus, but I'm not out to convince anyone, and I don't think there is anything particularly irrational about your belief that he didn't exist. I just wanted to answer your request for a non-Christian source. I think it's more important to see the difference between the "he existed / he didn't exist" argument, and the "he was the son of God / no he wasn't" argument. The former is a pretty minor leap of faith, while the latter requires abandoning a lot of what we know about the world.

Josephus is one -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josephus_on_Jesus -- but I think there is some disagreement about that.