But wouldn't that make the students into loan slaves and make the universities even more hated? Personally I was horrified by the tuition hike and it was one of several reasons why we never moved to the UK.

Not to mention destroying the credibility of the Liberal Democrats, something from which they have never recovered.

I does seem like the big tuition hike in the UK under the Tory / Liberal Democrat government was a huge mistake for several reasons and the university admins should never have pushed for it. It made the universities look greedy and let the government off the hook.

Thanks! Very interesting.

Not sure I understand this. Surely what the UK universities charge for tuition remains outrageously high? My daughter pays a little more than one-fifth of the typical UK tuition here in the Netherlands.

I think that this is the key point. An amazing number of people are driven by hate and are willing to accept policies that hurt them so long as other people are hurt more.

More on the company behind this very destructive proposed project: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AES_Andes

I think that these images are very relevant to galactic structure.

I've sometimes offered to show these visualizations at science events or collaborate on papers involving them. But no takers. I don't get it. Maybe I don't go to the right conferences. 🤷

Flipped with negative velocity up.

And the full HI4PI velocity data with positive velocity up.

This allows me to revisit one of the main mysteries of Milky Way astronomy: the Sagittarius arm. Where did the concept come from and how much do we *really* know about it, assuming that it is actually a spiral arm at all? How might Gaia DR4 clarify it?

I am currently leaning towards the inner galaxy for the January article. What does Gaia DR3 say about the inner galaxy and how might Gaia DR4 improve that?

My plan is put up an article every month on Gaia DR4 until the release. Trying to decide whether the January article will be on mapping the inner galaxy, exoplanets, bright stars or something else. So many exciting topics!

Anyway, thanks to Tranquility Press for publishing an interesting Star Trek book and giving me a chance to talk about an important real explorer of the Milky Way.

Ah, here's a picture showing all three together. Credit: not sure but it appears to be on the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy's website.

If you ever happen to be in Heidelberg I encourage you to make the pilgrimage to the site of Max Wolf's old observatory on the Königstuhl (King's Seat) hill. Such a lovely area and also the location of the Haus der Astronomie (pictured) and the Max Planck Institute of Astronomy.

The short answer: he was a talented astrophotographer who used his images to measure the proper motion of dim stars and list them in a catalog. It turns out that the ones with high proper motion were mostly nearby red dwarfs like Wolf 359.

Anyone interested in nearby stars will have noticed that many are named after the German astronomer Max Wolf. The reason why is explained in his Wikipedia article: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Wolf