Hi Mark,

The fundamental problem with amateur astronomers detecting asteroids and extrasolar planets is fairly obvious - namely that as bodies which produce no light of their own they are invisible to almost all telescopes.

Or put another way...
Five hundred thousand field glasses or five still wont see the rings of Saturn.

The odds of being able to discern a body moving in front of a star and identifying it is extremely remote.

Here in Arizona - and in other regions where observing is made easy the amateur can do a lot of good - but asteroid and planet hunting are still best left to orbiting and professional telescopes.

It is hard to say what might motivate more space fubnding for such observation. One would think the extrasolar planets discovered would be enough - but they are not.

Deduction and scientific observation means little to the image-hungry public. Until they can actually see something - asteroids and extrasolar planets just don't exist in their consciousness. They suffer the same fate as other theoretical sciences.

My five cents,

SDAI-Tech1