Forward to the past—what can new eyes expect to see?

Abstract

All the foregoing discussion serves, perhaps, to highlight some of the things we don’t know about galaxy formation. Some of these unknowns can be addressed only by new kinds of data, spanning a wide range of wavelength and science goals. Progress in astronomy, as in so much of science, has been driven jointly by instruments and ideas. On the hardware side, new instrumentation projects are now years-long efforts by large teams. We therefore know what facilities are to be expected for the coming decade, and can foresee some of the kinds of results that should be coming in the effort to watch galaxies form. And on the idea side, who knows what to expect?