I've always had a fascination with the stars in the nighttime sky, but now that I know how to program, I'm tossed-up between becoming an astronomer or a programmer.

Do any of you have an opinion on it?

Well, being a programmer can take you further in life than being an astronomer, unless you can somehow make it into a space program, either via the public sector, or government/military.

I just figure that I could keep astronomy as a hobby, but I do love space alot.

There's no reason you couldn't go to college and major in both CS/E/whatever-your-college-may-have-that'll-teach-you-about-computers-or-whatever and Astronomy. Unless you went to my college, and then Astronomy is only offered as a minor with the assumption that you'll major in physics, but you could double major in CS and Physics and minor in Astronomy. Hell, maybe you decide to pursue Lit instead. That's why college is awesome.

Then program some astronomical simulators. No reason why the two can't go together for now.

I'll be honest, it was always my dream to go into space some day. But I've been forced to abandon that dream due to bad health. If you have the physical strength and mental temperament to go that far, you should definitely make an attempt.

Personally, I'd go for government spaceflight first, but if you don't quite make the cut I'm sure Richard Branson will let you ride one of his toy spaceships into the upper atmosphere for 3 minutes. It'll be kinda like space. Sort of.

We have a full astronomy major, and I actually took quite a few astronomy classes. Including one which focused on learning to use our planetarium to give presentations. It was awesome.

That does sound awesome, but I'd probably get thrown out for using the planetarium after hours for... other things...

I HAVE NO COMMENT ON THE MATTER.

I actually wanted to go into something like astronomy as well; the thought of discovering things like how black holes work, and things far cooler beyond that, mystified me. Unfortunately, I now like programming better, but when I go to college, I might take that suggestion.

And, Dshiznit, need help getting to the moon?

That's a hilarious video Ashbad.

Sarah, Astronomy is a great field. I live just over 5 miles north west of Lick Observatory. Sadly, it's more of a 20 mile drive (about one hour on those roads), so I don't go up there as often as I should. I've never actually took a tour or visited the telescope, just for the miraculous views of the night!

Do you ever make attempts to view the Persiads? I believe the Quadratids were earlier this month? Some friends and I went out to watch them but failed to look up the forecast. So we tried our best to see them under an almost full moon.

Like others have suggested, you can take Astro-Physics and create simulation programs to mimic the behavior of galaxies, solar systems and even the universe.

Astronomy is great.
I have luck that our school has a planetarium, a world time clock, a pendulum and a big telescope
Well, It also always fascinated me, the stars etc, but I think I don't want to learn it as I fear it is to much just putting some variables into some formulas..

Are you familiar with The Drake Equation, Sorunome?

Drake Equation is crap.

Sarah, I highly recommend that you subscribe to the "Hubblecast" in itunes. It's a FREE podcast with some EXCELLENT coverage or NASA's & ESA's most recent discoveries, etc. There are a couple other free podcasts similar to it as well (I like "The Hidden Universe", which shows news and images from the Spitzer space telescope, which uses infrared light to see through dust etc.)

Which-ever you pursue, programming and astronomy both make EXCELLENT hobbies; so I don't think you'd be losing very much

Another tip for programming though: avoid "tech" schools and go for a liberal arts education. Tech schools tend to just hand you skills and can be kinda gimmicky; but liberal arts focuses on quality of learning and tends to go more in depth in the theory (people thought I was odd for picking a liberal arts school for Computer Science) ... Of course, this is a generalization, and I'm sure there are exceptions on both sides of the fence. USD and SDSMT are very good choices if you are near South Dakota (though I'd not live here if it weren't for the schools)