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Planet X Larger Than Pluto?
nova_planitia writes "The Minor Planet mailing list is buzzing with the discovery by an amateur astronomer of a 17th magnitude object 51 astronomical units from the Sun, tentatively designated 2003 EL61. For those not versed in astronomical lingo, this is an object several times brighter than Pluto even though it is 25% farther out from the Sun (the orbit vizualised by JPL). This means that barring a strangely reflective surface, this object is larger than Pluto, possibly Mars-sized! The debate whether Pluto is a planet is likely to get rekindled by this discovery."
The link to the BBC story in the summary is broken.
A functioning link can be found here.
So....the race is on to give this mysterious new planet a proper name! (Planet X is soooo Gen X...)
Please post your ideas below.
____
~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
This rock I have in my backyard is a mountain.
I never spellcheck and I freely admit it. Save your karma for more worthwhile "lol erorrs" replies
Try here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4726733.stm
It could be worse, it could be Monday.
Pluto doesn't really exist, and we haven't landed on the moon.
From my inexplicably rejected story submitted hours ago:
The New Scientist reports:
On Thursday a new planet-sized object was found orbiting the Sun at a distance of between 35-51 AU (at different points in its orbit) and an inclination of 28 degrees to the plane of the inner planets. By comparison Pluto orbits at an average distance of 39 AU and an inclination if 17 degrees. (1 Astronomical Unit = the distance between the earth and the sun) If the object has a reflectivity similar to that of other Kuiper-belt bodies, it is approximately twice the size of Pluto. Jose-Luis Ortiz and his colleagues at Spain's Sierra Nevada Observatory discovered the object while reviewing data from 2003. The International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center (MPC) in Cambridge, Massachusetts verified the obsevations and designated the object 2003 EL61.
"Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery?" - Patrick Henry
You fail it.
Lord John Whorfin: Where are we going?
assembled Red Lectroids: PLANET TEN!
LJW: When?
aRL: REAL SOON!
My understanding, and correct me if I am wrong please, is that Pluto was not formed at the same time as the rest of our solar system, that it was pulled in. Would it be the same for this additional planet? If so, there could be others out there with orbits that we didn't expect.
Maybe I will move my telescope from being pointed at the neighbors shower and point it towards the sky.
What I love about space, is that the more we discover, the more we have to learn.
And All I Ask is a Tall Ship And a Star to Steer Her By
In order to avoid confusion as to whether Pluto is a planet, call the new planet Pluto and rename old Pluto something else, like Herbert The Cow. Or Mr Gazpacho. Or Hellish Creamcheese.
It's Friday afternoon, and 5pm looks a LOOOONG way away. Can you tell?
A potential base for mining the Oort Cloud? I wonder if Wan is already there?
"Can there be a Klein bottle that is an efficient and effective beer pitcher?"
Nemesis, also known as the 'Black Moon', home to those who were exiled from Crystal Tokyo. They are led by the prophet Wiseman, who is one and the same with the dark planet.
The next Slashdot story will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and slashdot the links early!
I, for one, welcome our new 2003-EL61ian overlords.
Sorry...I've never gotten to do one of those before.
Maybe that's where all the WMD are hidden?
She's got to be at 9-9-9!
Yes, because we defined it as such. Right or wrong, we've defined it as a planet, therefore it is a planet. Stop debating and arguing over the status of the hunk of rock. It's not like if we define it as something else it will change or cease to physically exist. We are simply categorizing it. We could call it a comet, it fits into that category too.
---
Programming is like sex... Make one mistake and support it the rest of your life.
OK, since most of the planets were named after Roman gods, here's a name for it:
Bacchus - the party planet! Party all night - and it's ALWAYS night!
www.eFax.com are spammers
Pluto... What a dog.
it is.
Best Slashdot Co
This will get Planet X believers hopping as 'proof' that Planet X is on its way to destroy us.
A reflective surface you say?
That's no moon, It's a discoball!
*cue imperial march*
Costello: "We could call it planet Y."
Abbot: "Y?"
Costello: "Because"
Abbot: "Because why?"
Costello: "I don't know"
Abbot: "Third Base!"
No wonder they keep getting it wrong! Not only do they have to keep track of Sedna, but Planet X too. And who knows how many more?
Anyone get the feeling this solar system is getting a mite crowded?
On the other hand, the repeat business can't be so shabby - just think how many of their best customers will need their charts recalculating...
Patent Examiners Flee USPTO
To me was "Planet Examiners Flee PLUTO"
weird.
IT is Dead. The industry is Shot Join Others Who Feel Your Pain http://www.internalstrife.com/
Seriously, this is going to get all those nut cases all revved up.
Heavens Gate 2.0, here we come. All abord for the suicide express
Life is not for the lazy.
Actually, TFA mentions that astronomers discovered Sedna in 2004, and since this is 2005, this is a separate discovery.
from TFA: "The same team that found Sedna have designated it [the new discovery] K40506A after it was picked up by the Gemini telescope and one of the twin Keck telescopes in Hawaii."
I believe this planet should get a name to detract from Uranus as a planet, seriously, its time to take it out on some other rock.
Goofy of course. And if we decide to de-planetize Pluto, it'd be OK. I was never clear on why Disney needed 2 stupid dogs in their character library anyway.
The TFA mentions two teams of scientists who found the object independently of each other. It doesn't say anything about discovery by an amateur astronomer.
How about Vista? That has such a nice ring to it :-)
Can't the plates be digitized and loaded onto a big harddisk. Appropriate metadata (time, location, angle, etc.) could be put in a database. Someone could write a program to align the images and then do an image diff. With Quaoar, Sedna, and Planet X there should be more local planets.
That is incorrect. Sedna was discovered last year. This a new discovery which has not yet been named.
"Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery?" - Patrick Henry
Reading comprehension for the win!
Sedna was discovered back in 2004. It's just an object of similar size in a similar area. This object is not Sedna.
I'm somewhat ignorant when it comes to astronomy like this, so if the following questions are ridiculous, just ignore me :)
If the object is as big as the story says (With orbit that JPL predicted for it) why haven't we noticed it before? Given its (apparent) proximity to Pluto's orbit, wouldn't we have detected some sort of gravitational interaction?
Excellent! A new source of Illudium Phosdex, no doubt. It will probably be over three hundred years before we can get there, though, by which time our supplies will be alarmingly low.
proof, n. A demonstration that a conclusion is implied by certain premises and axioms.
How about you RTFA, this is not Sedna. This object was discovered by the same group that discovered Sedna in 2004. According to my calendar, it's 2005.
Slashdot.. Land of nerds, trolls, and FlameBait..
Pluto: Old and busted.
Planet X: The new hotness!
Seconded! Don't forget your red gems.
... my mom's name is Sedna. :-(
a complete irrelevance. Pluto doesn't care, I don't care, only the categorisers actually care.
There's so much variance in objects in the solar system it's difficult to even come up with a definition of what a planet is although a popular definition is "large enough for it to form a sphere". This means that many satellites also become planets.
The best way to describe these objects is size, density, distance(s) from sun, orbital period, rotation period/direction etc... "planet" is a single word that expresses very little. Most common single words turn out to be quite abstract in their definitions!
Having said that - this is a very, very interesting little planet. Isn't it about time that we built a sizeable, nuclear powered, ion drive probe filled with instruments and hires telescopes and sent it hurtling off through the solar system with enough juice for say 50 years complete with a big transmitter to get the data back?
Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.
Not working for me :-(
Ok, I'll say it, you can say it with me. Ready, Pluto is not a planet. It is a Kuiper belt object. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuiper_belt Yes it's got a moon, yes it's pretty big for a KBO but it's not a proper planet. If Pluto is a planet then so is Ceres http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1_Ceres and Juno http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/(3)_Juno They're even round too.
The days of the digital watch are numbered.
Considering Pluto's magnitude is around 14, this object is about 16 times fainter (2.512^dm, where dm is the magnitude difference).
Even so, it should have been detected long ago.
It came in about seven o'clock last night...
Hello MPML,
Jose Luis Ortiz of Sierra Nevada Observatory asked me to forward his message. Actually he sent it to MPML today but it looks as if he is moderated and so his message is delayed. As this is pretty urgent, to give anyone interested the chance to do science on it, I hope my message gets relayed faster!
----------
Hi there,
We found a very slowly moving object while carrying out a checking of some of our oldest images from the modest TNO survey that we started in 2002.
http://www.iaa.es/~ortiz/OSNTWeb/index.htm
The object was very bright in our images (m_V~17.6!!) so we were able to precover it, and also recover it.
According to our best orbit fit and using regular assumptions on phase angle correction, the H value es around 0.3. Unfortunately we do not know the geometric albedo but if below 0.25 (which is the case of all TNOs for which an albedo has been measured except Pluto), the object would be larger than Pluto. However, it may well happen that this object is abnormally bright (with a very high albedo), like Pluto. So, depending on the albedo, this object might be sort of a Pluto's brother or Pluto's father...
This object is beyond Pluto and almost reachable by most amateurs, which is the reason why we write here!. It is observable right after sunset for a while at a reasonable elevation. Maybe some decent science can still come out of your observations.
Enjoy it!.
Our findings have been sent to the MPC, but the object has not received a provisional designation yet. Some ephemeris are given here:
Ephems (geocentric) [Date, RA, Dec, r, delta, elongation, mag]:
20050728.00000 13 21 50.208 +20 7 53.62 51.605 51.239 68.32 17.47
20050729.00000 13 21 51.856 +20 7 14.56 51.619 51.239 67.49 17.47
20050730.00000 13 21 53.576 +20 6 35.29 51.632 51.239 66.66 17.47
20050731.00000 13 21 55.369 +20 5 55.81 51.646 51.238 65.84 17.47
20050801.00000 13 21 57.233 +20 5 16.13 51.659 51.238 65.01 17.47
20050802.00000 13 21 59.169 +20 4 36.26 51.672 51.238 64.19 17.47
20050803.00000 13 22 1.176 +20 3 56.23 51.685 51.238 63.37 17.47
20050804.00000 13 22 3.253 +20 3 16.02 51.698 51.238 62.55 17.47
20050805.00000 13 22 5.401 +20 2 35.67 51.711 51.238 61.73 17.47
20050806.00000 13 22 7.619 +20 1 55.17 51.723 51.238 60.92 17.47
20050807.00000 13 22 9.906 +20 1 14.54 51.736 51.238 60.11 17.47
20050808.00000 13 22 12.261 +20 0 33.79 51.748 51.238 59.29 17.47
20050809.00000 13 22 14.685 +19 59 52.93 51.760 51.238 58.49 17.47
20050810.00000 13 22 17.176 +19 59 11.97 51.772 51.237 57.68 17.47
20050811.00000 13 22 19.734 +19 58 30.93 51.784 51.237 56.88 17.47
The orbital elements are:
OSNT11 Epoch 2005 July 29.0 TT = JDT 2453580.5
M 197.97485 (2000.0) P Q
n 0.00345428 Peri. 239.53682 +0.91285785 -0.07597426
a 43.3408541 Node 121.89008 +0.13526717 +0.98332108
e 0.1887862 Incl. 28.19395 -0.38521856 +0.16524998
P 285.33 H 0.2 G 0.15 U 2
--
Jose-Luis Ortiz
Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía, CSIC
P.O.Box 3004. 18080 Granada. Spain.
----------
Regards,
Jaime Nomen
620 OAM
Cue the Uranus jokes:
"Speaking of size, what about Uranus?"
"How can be possible comment on this new planet when we still have yet to send a probe to Uranus?"
Some wise astronomers have tried to change the speech from "your anus" to "urine us" or "you're in us". Unfortunately the planet seems to just be plain doomed as far as American English pronounciation goes.
Is this within or outside the oort cloud? I don't know much about the outer solar system, but I do know that ice could be refined into hydrogen and oxygen fuel...
Of course the thing is just damned far out there in the first place. Unless we can fuel a star drive on hydrogen and oxygen there's probably not much point in having that as a refuelling post.
It's sort of like the periodic chart wars for us chemists....
This sig seemed like a good idea at the time....
The published magnitude of Pluto is around 13-14. This thing is 25% further from the Sun (and Earth too) away but several times 'brighter' due to being more reflective and larger. That means it ought to appear brighter in the sky than Pluto. But it's reported as magnitude 17, which is quite a bit dimmer.
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
When's the first astrologer going to sue because the discovery of this planet has deformed her horoscope?
Former US House candidate, TN-5
...or the Plutos.
Since this was found so easily, one has to wonder just how many of them there are out there. This might be only the first of many.
This, by the way, is an excellent reason to call these things TNOs (Trans-Neptunian Objects). Who wants to memorize the 85 planets of our solar system?
This sig seemed like a good idea at the time....
Its "brigther then Pluto".
"Strangly reflective" eh? This could mean a large body of water or that the planet is mostly water (like Earth). Water = life
Who cares? It is a mass of matter that orbits the sun, and kinda has an atmosphere. Close enough. Now let's move on to more important things. There are a lot more interesting things out there.
Freedom would be not to choose between black and white but to abjure such prescribed choices. -Theodor Adorno
Cale: I'll call it planet Bob.
Akima: You can't call a planet "Bob."
Cale: So now you're the boss. You're the King of Bob?
Akima: Can't we just call it "Earth"?
Cale: No one said you have to live on Bob.
Akima: I'm never calling it that.
Titan AE
When I tell an object to delete this, am I killing it or telling it to kill me?
Discovered by an amateur, not seen before with all hightech equipment, strangely reflectant surface almost rendering it invisible?? Round (asuming it is a ballshaped object): It is a super borg sphere!! Run to the closet and get your bathlets! They can not fight against that!
Ok, the other possibility: Independence day...
And the last option: It is a cloacked deathstar!
My wife's sketchblog Blob[p]: Gastrono-me
In Soviet Russia, planet sues you!
Rhapsody in Numbers
But when I was in high school, Pluto didn't have a moon, and it's mass was about the same as Mercury. This planet might have been the one they were teaching me about. :)
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
:)
On that note, 2003 EL61 has its own article already.
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
Zebra, so we can build Ice Station Zebra?
this is an object several times brighter than Pluto even though it is 25% farther out from the Sun
Pluto is currently around 13.7th magnitude. The new object is around 17th magnitude. This means the new object is actually ~20 times dimmer. Astronomical magnitudes increase and brightness decreases.
The fact that it is 20 times dimmer than Pluto might be a hint as to why it was so hard to spot.
-aiabx
Just this guy, you know?
Before Einstein explained the precession of Mercury's perihelion, many scientists believed there was a planet Vulcan inside Mercury's orbit. Some even "spotted" it. (For the "Some" link, search on "Vulcan".)
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
gravitational effects are difficult to discern. Think about how small and far away Pluto is: it's volume is almost three orders of magnitude less than that of earth, and on average 40 times further away than the sun. It's low reflectivity makes it difficult to see even with large telescopes.
Think about how long its orbital period is: 248 years. Discovered in 1930, it's only been directly observed for 1/3 of a "year"
However, anomalies/eccentricities in the orbits of the planets is one of the reasons that astronomers were/are still looking for objects like sedna and X.
Interested in a Flash-based MAME front end? Visit mame.danzbb.com
And we've been wasting all our money on sending a probe to Pluto, when it's really just a piddling chunk of rock compared to this thing. :)
Secession is the right of all sentient beings.
What? I was frozen for a thousand years and Cat crashed the Dwarf on this planet that is how far from earth? You smeghead!
I read Slashdot for the headlines, because the headlines, unlike the articles, are usually original and never duplicated
As technology improves, the definition of what is a planet, moon, and asteroid needs to be revised. There are essentially an infinite number of particles/rocks/objects orbiting the sun and all of the planets of differing sizes. In the good old days we could only identify the really big ones, so there were 9 planets, Jupiter had 4 moons (in the REALLY old days), etc. Now that we can see smaller and smaller objects, where do we draw the line as to what consitututes a planet or moon?
Note that this is not Sedna, and this is not Nibiru.
It kinda confused me when I saw a article regarding "Planet X".. i was thinking it was the planet Zacharia Sitchen wrote about and how it's inhabitants screwed homo-erectus and created homo-sapiens.. Planet X refers to the 10th (and or) 12th Planet.. Annunaki!!
*plays the Apogee theme song music*
I'm no astronomer, but it does certainly appear that Pluto got there late in the game. Just look at the orbits of the other eight planets. (Here having Celestia helps.) All nearly circular, none overlapping and all on the same plane. It's as if a bunch of space debris orbitting our sun condensed to form them.
Now look at Pluto's orbit. More elliptical. Obviously not on the same plane and criss-crossing with Neptune's orbit. Hell, Pluto's smaller than our own moon for Christ's sake.
I don't know why Pluto was ever considered a planet in the first place. It looks like some object that happened to get trapped by sun's gravity.
That's just my amateur opinion, anyways. Maybe some astronomer out there knows better?
Happy people make bad consumers.
Someone suggested moving Uranus' name to this planet. I think there should be a contest! Possible new names:
Vaginus
Clitorum
Vulvus
I mean, why not. It's frigid and inaccessible to those who want to "study" it most!
At least, according to the article, Planet X is guessed to be 1500km, Sedna is 1700km, and Pluto is like 2200km, so it seems rather likely that Planet X is NOT bigger than Pluto, which means we have on more Slashdot headline that has about as much journalistic integrity as Fox News, and yet another post by an uptight user bitching about it.
"I have never won a debate with an ignorant person." -Ali ibn Abi Talib
In the book "History of your galaxy" by an anonymous alien, chapter 7 indicates that Pluto was actually stolen through a dimension trick (kind of like the hat trick you use in UT, only using antimatter and quarks).
You dont need your telescope! No, dont stop reading the book, and you really do need that tinfoil hat...
"And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the World"
1 John 4:14
I think I should launch camera's into space. And see when we get visited by aliens. But also see what planets we missed when we started counting.
Then again, that might be a neat idea. Mounting a few camera's on each planet to get THEIR perspective of the universe. Well, planets that could actually support a camera. A giant ball of gas is hard to mount something onto.
http://www.6765656b.com it's the ~ for us geek's.
...and could it be responsible for the Pioneer Anomaly?
Would be nice to have an answer, but somewhat disappointing that it isn't something more exciting like dark matter/energy...
It's just Big Boned!
from TFA:
. It is the only planetary orbit which crosses that of another planet (Neptune)
Doesn't that make them TWO?
gtkaml.org
Could this large object out there possibly be responsible for the Pioneer Anomaly?
I pity the foo that isn't metasyntactic
Before Einstein explained the precession of Mercury's perihelion, many scientists believed there was a planet Vulcan inside Mercury's orbit. Some even "spotted" it.
(For the "spotted" link, search on "Vulcan".)
You can also read about it here.
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
It's a space station!!!!
It has come to punish Hayden Christensen.
I, for one, welcome our new Sith overlords.
Fry: Did you build the Smelloscope?
Professor Hubert Farnsworth: No, I remembered that I'd built one last year. Go ahead, try it. You'll find that every heavenly body has its own particular scent. Here, I'll point it at Jupiter.
Fry: Smells like strawberries.
Professor Hubert Farnsworth: Exactly. And now, now Saturn.
Fry: Pine needles. Oh, man, this is great... hey, as long as you don't make me smell Uranus.
Leela: I don't get it.
Professor Hubert Farnsworth: I'm sorry, Fry, but astronomers renamed Uranus in 2620 to end that stupid joke once and for all.
Fry: Oh. What's it called now?
Professor Hubert Farnsworth: Urrectum. Here, let me locate it for you.
Fry: No, no, I, I think I'll just smell around a bit over here.
According to some of the sites covering this, planets in Pluto-like orbits must be named after Underworld figures.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Pluto was once thought to be much more massive than it is currently known to be. When I was in high school, prevailing theories had it as being slightly larger than Mercury. Furthermore, it was first discovered due to its supposed perturbation on the planet Uranus (those perturbations were, in fact, due to incorrect calculations, IIRC). Additionally, we had very little information on other objects of similar ilk. So, why wouldn't it have been considered a planet?
The flip side of the question is, "should we change its status now?" I don't really care much, but I don't see why its so important whether its a planet or a KBO, from a labeling point of view.
Some might argue that it makes teaching about the Solar System easier, but I think the exceptions can help to make the system more interesting, and, hence, easier to learn about.
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
no astronomy discussion would be complete without reference to the death star and the eerie resemblance of saturn's moon, Mimas?
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
Essentially, European astronomers have found something they call 2003 EL61 and what American astronomers call K40506A.
There are questions on how reflective the object is, which means we don't have that much information on how big it is or how far away it is. The guesses by astronomers, at this point, are pretty speculative, according to the BBC, which is tracking this breaking story.
NASA has published a wild guess as to the orbit, in Java.
The other known super-large (1000Km or bigger) Kuiper Belt objects are:
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
I, for one, welcome the return of our Annunaki overlords...
Then again, it could be Mondas, the Earth's long lost twin planet and homeworld of the Cybermen...someone better get ahold of that eccentric Time Lord who travels through time and space in a phone booth...
"Right now, somewhere in this world, Scott Baio is plowing a woman he doesn't love," - Peter Griffin, *Family Guy*
I like the name Minerva myself. We need another chick-planet anyways.
See the Pictures of the Flood of '08
It just shows, Pluto is a mickey mouse planet.
doh!
3. Profit!
2. ???
1. On Soviet Slashdot, a Beowulf cluster of alien Natalie Portman overlords welcomes YOU!
Thanks for the info. What's a KBO?
Happy people make bad consumers.
great site you have there. what the hell is wrong with you?
An apt name for this planet is "Fortuna", as we were just plain lucky to find it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fortuna_(luck)
Fortuna (Greek equivalent Tyche) was the personification of luck, hopefully of good luck, but she could be represented veiled and blind, as modern depictions of Justice are seen, and came to represent the capriciousness of life.
Imagining "Planet X" making its orbit in the dark (51 AU away from the sun), also makes the characterization of being blind all the more appropriate.
Amongst professional astronomers (which includes me), Pluto is generally not considered a planet. It is the largest member of the Kuiper Belt. It is historical accident that Pluto was discovered almost 50 years before the second Kuiper Belt object, Charon, in 1978. The third KBO was found in 1993. Since then, over 700 other KBOs have been found, several of which rival Pluto in size.
What we have here is one that could be larger than Pluto. This is not unexpected, but has been predicted ever since we started discovering KBOs in serious numbers. There is always a distribution of sizes, and Pluto lies near the upper end, but it is unlikely that it is the largest, and even less likely that it would be distinctly larger than the rest of the population.
To call Pluto a planet is to create a category of "ice planets" which contains only one object. That is scientifically silly. To call it a Kuiper Belt Object fits it in with a family of other objects whose characteristics in composition, orbit size, orbit shape, orbit inclination, companions, etc are shared amongst the group. That is a scientific classification.
The solar system does not contain "the Sun and
9 planets" as so many of us incorrectly learned. Rather, it contains 6 families: a star, the rocky planets, the asteroid belt, the gas giant planets, the Kuiper belt, and the Oort cloud. Each of these families shares common characteristics that are the basis for this classification. Pluto, and this new discovery,
fit squarely in the Kuiper belt.
Now for the truth about planets. The IAU, which
governs these things, has no official definition of what constitutes a planet. There is a reasonable upper limit in mass (i.e., not so larger as to create fusion at it core), but there is no lower limit. Most astronomers would say that a reasonable idea would be large enough for gravity to make it spherical (or close to, like Earth). However, then other KBOs and asteroids qualify as planets. You simply can't come up with a rigorous definition that includes Pluto and excludes the others unless you work customize your definition in a manner that is not scientific.
This will not be the last big KBO. There will be several more. These are exciting times as we discover more and more about our own backyard.
Just as interesting (but nowhere near as well supported) is the possibility that the solar system is actually a binary star system, with the second star a dim brown dwarf at around one light year distance. The idea is that its long period orbit would periodically take it through regions with large numbers of objects, whose orbits would be perturbed by the passing star, and would lead to periodic bombardment of the inner solar system.
Where is itin relation to galactic center, and which direction is it going?
If it's a Piersons Puppeteer ship, I wanna hitch a ride.
Maybe Loius has an extra wire I can borrow.
Space.com has a clarifying article at http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/050729_large _object.html. 1. It apparently isn't larger than Pluto, regardless of how reflective its surface might be. It's mass is only about a third of Pluto. 2. It has a very small moon. 3. It was *just* too dim to have been found by Clyde Tombaugh, the discoverer of Pluto.
Rb
You don't considering a new planet in the solar system newsworthy!? How many have you discovered this week?
because it's hiding deep in the darkness
I'll license use of the name Planet X (R) for a paltry $50,000.
... I've been wondering where I could ride my bike. Planet-X Bikes
I made a heck of a typo when I submitted this story, 2005 EL61 is a about roughly eight times fainter than Pluto, not brighter. The latest information is that this object is more likely to be in the ballpark of Pluto's size and not bigger. This object also does not appear to be the same 17th magnitude outer solar system object observed by the Gemini telescope earlier this year that was going to be "announced" in September at the DPS meeting. So it looks like a few of these guys may be out there.
A man said to the universe "Sir, I exist!"
They loooove our television there, and our mail-order furniture.
Planet X is his moped.
Rupert is the ONLY name that should be considered.
I bet that right now the invasion fleet is reading slashdot and waiting for the right time to make their move.
siener's youtube channel
If it is then it's time to start evacuating before the Grebulons destroy the Earth because is rising into capricorn.
ahh screw it... Let's just go to Stavro Mueller Beta and watch the show...
Planet X is often the name given to a planet influencing Neptune's orbit. It was first thought to be Pluto upon its discovery, but its mass was later found to be too small to cause this.
Is this just about a random "planet possibly further out than Pluto" planet given a confusing name, or is it a planet indeed taking the role of Planet X?
Beware: In C++, your friends can see your privates!
The debate whether Pluto is a planet is likely to get rekindled by this discovery."
Yawn. The term "planet" is just an arbitrary label attached to rocks of a certain size that orbit the sun. You humans are so caught up with lumping everything into buckets, you forget what really matters. Get over yourselves, the rest of the universe has already moved on.
Medeep, medeep.
They've unwittingly discovered Melmac, a planet that fans of NBC's ALF have known about for years.
"In a 32-bit world, you're a 2-bit user. You've got your own newsgroup, alt.total.loser." -Weird Al
We've visited with their kind before.0 0542CN/103-0613423-4589463?v=glance
Here's the documentary.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00
I'd call the new object KBO 2
Perhaps Kwigibo 2 in honor of The Simpsons.
Saskboy's blog is good. 9 out of 10 dentists agree.
http://www.fascinationst.com/productImages/sku2374 .jpg
Joe Siegler
Webmaster - 3D Realms & Black Sabbath Online
Call it "oid"
That way, the name will be informative, and will help alleviate future pointless debate over whether it is a planet (It is, and it's called Oid) or a planetoid (that's what I said... planet-oid). -nAP
John Whorfin: "Where are we going?"
Red Lectroids: "Planet 10!"
John Whorfin: "When?"
Red Lectroids: "Real soon!"
Planet Reagan
*shiver*
They should have chosen another name for this planetary object. The name 'planet X' is reserved for Nibiru, the 12th planet. Just when things related to Zetatalk and stuff was cooling down, there goes more fuel to the fire...
What an oppurtunity for the physics students of the world. Lets get together with Ron Popiel and invent a gravitational device that will Knock this planet into orbit around Venus.
Here's my plan how...............
1. Discover Useless Iceball in outer System
2. Knock world into differant orbit
3. ?????????
4. Terriform
5. PROFIT!!!!!!!
--"Sorry for the inconvience." Gods Last Words to his Creation
DNA, So Long and Thanks for all the Fish
unless we want to 'incentivize' Walt to be more productive (now that he's dead) by paying steep licensing fees.
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
Pluto is such a loser - Always trying to act like he's part of the planet crowd....sheesh
"I'm not impatient. I just hate waiting." - My Dad
how about priapus?
after all, it does take a large telescope to see it.
putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
oh nevermind
http://xs4.xs.to/pics/04481/p556222.gif
Planet Reagan
*shiver*
Nah, they'd stick to naming planets after gods...
Planet Jesus.
The libertarian solution to the failures of capitalism is to apply more capitalism til the failures are fixed.
It already has a name. The artbell-flavor mystics have been predicting the discovery for years, and they will tell you the name is:
Nibiru.
There does seem to be a point where Pluto's and EL61's orbits get rather close. I wonder if this could point to a potential common origin? Maybe Something Else (tm) passed by and flung 2003 El61 out of the little triad. (I would doubt Pluto and Charon would be the ones tossed because the odds of them staying together would be low) The distance between the orbits might be explained by precession.
Unfortunately the Java app only covers from Jan 1, 1600-2200 so I couldn't test this theory. Can someone else play with the app and look into the distant past for a near miss?
Planet X will return bringing the Niburu with it as it was prophesied by Zecharaiah Sitchin. I keep telling you people, Plent X is coming and no one ever believes me. You all keep relegating it to the laughable realm of pseudoscience, but it's not and now this is obviously proof. The Niburu will return to enslave us as they did 4000 years ago (read the Bible and the stories about the giant and monstrous offspring of humans mating with "angels" in Sodom and Gomorrah. The supposed angels were the Niburu!!). Zecharaiah Sitchin is the only man on Earth who can read the ancient Sumerian texts properly. They knew about the orbit of Planet X and that it would take nearly 4000 years for it to return. The other people who are currently aware but are trying to convince you that this is all untrue are: NASA, the Bush Administration, many of the world's largest comporations. And why? Because they have been in communication with the Niburu and have been offered a deal in which their lives and the lives of their children will be spared from slavery whilst the rest of us will have to suffer. If you didn't see the X-Files movie already, watch it tonight!!! It is Chris Carter's attempt to blow the lid off of this cover up. Why did an astronomer who first noticed planet X back in the 90s have to mysteriously die alone in a desert? Because he knew too much!!! NASA wanted to cover up the revalation he had inadvertantly made. He was dangerous to the architects of the New World Order, so they saw to it that he was neutralized. Don't believe the mainstream media because they are owned and operated by the masterminds of this fiendish plot. They are Niburu operatives. Don't believe the lying christians. They continue to blame UFOs on demonic powers. There is no such thing as a demon. That's just ridiculous and unscientific superstition. Planet X and the Niburu are sound science that is being oppressed by the Niburu controlled military/political/industiral complex! I've been noticing strange goings on near my house at night lately. I believe the Niburu are going to try and silence me, but I wil fight them tooth and nail. I've had strange and inexplicable power fluctations. Sometimes I will look out of a dark window and I will see a face looking back at me then it disappears. Sometimes, there are loud banging noises on the roof or the side of the house. Other times, there is the inexplicable loud "scurrying" sound up the side of the house onto the roof. Whatever it is moves fast. From the ground to the third story in two to three seconds. It's also heavy because it sounds identical to someone walking around upstairs as heard from the celing below, except that it's the side wall of the house. Go see the Mothman Prophecies for more truth about what's really going on out there. We are being attacked by aliens from outer space and our governments and corporations know this. Do not be lied to any longer!!! Demand that you be told the truth! All of the latest terrorist attacks are examples of alien mind control. The Niburur are using it to create unrest among the populace so that they will eventually feel good about being under martial law. It will happen! Mark my words!!! Every civilized nation on the planet will be in a state of marital law within the next five years. The only people with any freedom will be the families of the highest government officals and the wealthiest people on the planet. Eveyrone else will be herded into quonset huts and be fed high doses of experimental drugs to prepare them to be docile servants for the Niburu. In exchange, the rich will recieve positions of power within the Niburu empire and access to advanced technologies. Why do you think AMD and Intel have made such strides in the past decade? Not because of better engineers or progress, but because of direct information given to them by the Niburu. Our first x86 chips were based off of the chip designs stolen from the Roswell crash site. Our scientists were only able to make so much progress which is why it took us all the
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
site ?
... what the hell is wrong with YOU ?
Nice spelling you have there
IT is Dead. The industry is Shot Join Others Who Feel Your Pain http://www.internalstrife.com/
It's a... Oh, wait, it is a moon. My bad. Just a moon everybody, no need to panic.
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
You can go to either a dictionary or just listen to Motley Crue's "Welcome to Planet Boom" to get the definition. Either way, it's stated the same....
"A non-luminous celestial body, illuminated by the light from a star, such as the Sun, around which it revolves."
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
some idiot mod'd the the first post a troll, but then the response is modded "funny"
problem is, the response doesn't make any sense without the first post, please remedy this
May you be touched by His Noodly Appendage. RAmen.
Are you too stupid to understand the timecube can't hold up to a slashdotting? Dumbass. Now how am I supposed to find out that there are actually four days in a day?
Now that we've found Kobol, we can finally find Earth.
Err, wait..
That's no moon!
// This is not a sig.
...please correct the injustice of this moderation. I was trying to post something relevant and factual, and instead it gets moderated as a troll. This serves to further prove how people are just afraid to face the truth.
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
You nailed it with the 'night all the time' bit. But it's also: :)
(a) In a more eccentric orbit than any other planet.
(b) In a longer orbit than any other planet.
(c) In a more inclined orbit than any other planet.
So it's more eccentric, lazier, and tipsier than any other planet. Bacchus is therefore a perfect name for it.
Oh, and since it's so cold there should be plenty of ice for the alcholic beverages.
Serving your airship needs since 1995.
then what is goofie?
we must flee!
if you dont know why read the hitchhikers guide trilogy (five books) NOW. if not, leave slashdot because you are not a geek.
-schwal "Hanging is too good for punners, they should be drawn and quoted"
- It was broken off.
- It is loaded with holes and cracks, with new ones appearing all the time.
- But so far out, that it is hard to see all the holes and cracks except by very focused ametuers or professionals
????I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
We've seen this whole thing before when NASA & JPL announced Quaoar. (See previous /. posting) OH! And lets not forget Sedna! Are they just trying to keep recycling "new planet" headlines to give themselves more attention?
During the first day or two the new planet seemed to be almost invisible dark object seemingly surrounded by some kind of fog. Then about the third day it took on the tale-tale signs of brightness caused by water reflections although it was difficult to tell exactly what was happening. There were dumfounded as the planet took on more of a greenish cast the fourth day. Spectrometry showed that the light was very similar to that from light from some kinds of plant life on earth, and have great hopes of finding some type of life forms.
At first the astronomers were not sure that the new object was a stable mass or whether it was just a mass of swirling gasses, but on the fifth and sixth days it seemed to have reached a stable brightness. They were still very puzzled by the changes that initially took place during the first four days. They had been glued to the scopes round the clock for four days as the new planet went through major changes, and welcomed the fact that things seemed to have stabilized during the fifth and sixth days. Pleased that the changes had stopped, and being extremely tired, on the seventh day they rested.
Actually, a 17th magnitude object is significantly less bright than Pluto. The editors / poster should remember that larger astronomical magnitudes mean DIMMER objects. Pluto is (right now) about 14th magnitude, more than ten times brighter than this 17th magnitude object.
I guess this means that the bunkum spreaders will now write off all their charts as there's a new planet that's going to affect how people's lives are going to pan out.
The planet's name is Nibiru. At least thats what the Ancient Sumerians called it.
They Sumerians knew about all planets we currently know about, including Pluto which we didn't discover for ourselves until 1930. However, they also knew about a 10th planet past Pluto that they called Nibiru. According to the Sumerians, this 10th planet had a highly eliptical orbit and orbited the sun in the opposite direction to the rest of the planets.
The Sumerian's even believed an alien race, known as the Annunaki, inhabited this planet and possessed space travel technology that allows them to visit earth while their planet is inside the asteroid belt because of its highly eliptical orbit.
... and in the DRM, bind them.
Check out this picture from Mike Brown's website. He's the one who discovered Sedna and has a bit of useful information on that site.
I feel that Pluto should officially be considered a planetoid at least officially. But I don't especially care what they teach in Elementary School. By the time we start looking for smaller planets around other stars we'll come up with some definition of a planet and a planetoid and maybe Pluto will be grandfathered in, but it would probably just be easier to start saying now that it's a planet and not a planetoid.
Scientists: Ok fellow scientists. We have to decide on a name for this new planet. All in favor of planet X?
Everyone: Aye
Scientists: And now all in favor of Effram the Retarded Planet
Peter Griffin: Ah screw you guys!
...then it HAS to be Mondas. But it's late! It should have reached perihelion in 1986.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
...for the fault in the naming of the planet. Those responsible have just been sacked.
--------
This isn't the sig you're looking for. Move along.
The next planet is supposed to be out at 77 AU. I vote this is a non-planet.
Planet X will return bringing the Niburu with it as it was prophesied by Zecharaiah Sitchin. I keep telling you people, Plent X is coming and no one ever believes me. You all keep relegating it to the laughable realm of pseudoscience, but it's not and now this is obviously proof. The Niburu will return to enslave us as they did 4000 years ago
SNIP
People will, naturally, think you are a FUCKING LOONY and label your stuff as TROLL. Why? Because that's all a load of fantastic bullshit, and everyone with more than three working neurons knows it.
So kindly go find a bridge to haunt and quitcher bitchin'.
RS
Shoes for Industry. Shoes for the Dead.
Well, since we are into tech names in this thread:
How about naming the planet(-ino)
"foo" and its moon "bar" ?
because cleary it is Far Out and Beyond All Recovery
I'm still trying to figure out what people mean by 'social skills' here.
Can you give me a concrete example? I'm trying to imagine an X that holds for planets Mercury through Uranus, but does not hold for Pluto, other than "mass is greater than Y kg". OK, I guess I can think of a few others: "orbit is less eccentric than Z", "orbital plane is less titled than W". I guess I don't see how these cause confusion, however. Can you give me an example where it is necessary to specify "except Pluto"?
(I earned an MS in Physics/Astronomy, but have done no work in the field. For anyone interested in alternate space-time metrics, my thesis is here.)
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
Then call it Bellus.
-- Gary Goldberg KA3ZYW 301/249-6501 AIM:OgGreeb Digital Marketing Inc., Bowie, MD
Re:Broken Link, Naming Contest. (Score:1, Flamebait)
...as well as those mods who not only don't have a sense of humor but also think that anyone who dares to criticize mods who don't have a sense of humor is worthy of flamebait. So, I ask again ... What's your point? >:)
I feel the humorless mods ruin Slashdot
The Overrated mod is for reversing inappropriate, positive mods, not for voicing disagreement with a post.
would be a breeze. I can see it now...
My very eager mother just served us nine pizzas JR179 JQ179 JP179 JO179 JH177...
What could be so hard about that???
So, how would that work, to differentiate it from other types of object?
Asteroids are generally very irregular in shape and are likely to have relatively little variation in their composition. Iron, nickel, magnetite, but probably not a whole lot more.
Comets are relatively regular, seem to be stratified but the composition also seems to be pretty uniform. The Deep Impact probe didn't get a clear picture, but between it and all of the other cometary probes launched, it's pretty clear that comets have a rocky core - probably similar in composition to asteroids - with a mix of ice and organic compounds sitting on top. The core, though, seems to be a collection of rocks that are frozen together. Dead comets are piles of rock fragments, not single rocks.
So, my "working definition" does meaningfully distinguish between planetary objects and other objects, although it's hard to test in many cases. How to distinguish between planets and planetoids? That would be tougher. If Pluto is a planet, then so is Sedna. If Sedna is a planetoid, then so is Pluto.
How to get a good definition, though...
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
no text
If you look at my posting history, you'll see that I only post decent stuff 98% of the time. The other 2% of the time I'm hoping to get "Funny" mods because after all... it's only karma. I'm guessing your sense of humor sucks.
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
Well, it's official. You don't get to name anything. Ever.
Planet X was thought to be a very large planet, responsible for causing apparent perturbations we were seeing in the orbit of Uranus and Neptune. When Voyager II flew by these planets and got refined measurements of their masses, the discrepancies went away. We now know that the revised data shows no perturbations, putting severe limits on very large objects to very great distances. That is, there is no Planet X, and there never was.
There are likely all sorts of Pluto-sized objects out there, though. So finding another one is not surprising. There's nothing special about the mass of Pluto, and so some Kuiperoids will be around the same mass, and some will be more (though probably not too many). Thus, this discovery is nothing very surprising. You'd expect to find Kuiperoids more massive than Pluto out there.
As for reigniting the "controversy" about Pluto's planetary status, probably not. There's really not much controversy here. The IAU does not have and never has had an objective definition of the word planet that Pluto succeeds or fails in meeting the criteria for. A planet is literally what we point to and say, "That's a planet." The terms are made up by us, after all; do you think Pluto cares what it's called? Do you think that somehow further enhances the study of it, knowing that it's in this classification bin but not this one?
There have been a few serious astronomers suggesting conferring dual classification -- as both a planet and an asteroid/Kuiperoid -- to Pluto. The official proposal was never about demotion. Talk at length about removing planetary status from Pluto has largely been taking place in the popular press and by amateurs. Most actual astronomers don't care, because it doesn't matter what name you give something.
WASH: Yes. Yes, this is a fertile land,and we will thrive. We will rule over all this land, and we will call it... This Land.
...and bring a paddle!
try 'grammar' doh!
1. People in power become aware of an unpleasant truth which, if everybody knew about it, would upset the balance of things, (i.e., the muggles will stop working and shopping.)
2. The people in power say, "We cannot keep this a secret. It's impossible to jam the lid down tightly enough on any secret. But we simply cannot afford to have the public become aware of this latest item."
3. A social scientist in the back row sticks his hand up and says, "No problem. It's true that you cannot keep a secret, but you CAN prevent the people from looking or believing in the facts when they leak out."
4. And so. . .
5. The counter intelligence powers flood the media with dozens of conflicting bits of semi-honest confabulations. The craziest examples of which, (Nibiru) are believe wholesale by the wild-eyed crazies that nobody is going to take seriously. The rest you distribute through other outlets, resulting in things like Michael Moore and Oliver Stone films, and items like the infamous, "NASA Moon Landing was Faked Documentary", all of which has the net result of making everybody so confused and fed up that nearly every misses the real story going down.
6. You associate 'conspiracy theory' with 'uncool', and make sure everybody has gone through an educational system which makes people so petrified of being 'uncool' that they would be happier going along with an obviously flawed official story rather than risk flexing any of their own brain muscles for fear of being laughed at.
7. Voila! People see nothing and do nothing.
Honestly. This Nibiru stuff is crap. --The last time I looked at that theory, the 12th planet was hollow and contained a master race which was going to attempt to invade Earth. This theory is incredibly simplistic and stupid, and with all the genuinely intriguing things going on out there, anybody who buys into this one is a serious chump.
This is not to say that something very big isn't going on; there is. But Nibiru isn't it.
It might have something more to do with this theory. But it may not. It might just be that a big rock was found out in space beyond Pluto.
It will be interesting to watch how this story develops.
-FL
Just when you thought that this couldn't be bigger news, Ron Baalke at JPL has pointed out that another object, 2003 UB313, resides at 96 AU and has a diameter from 4400 km to 9900 km, assuming its albedo is between 0.05 and 0.25. Though the inclination is a bit weird (44 degrees), this may be considered planet-sized.
http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/mpec/K05/K05O41.html
http://neo.jpl.nasa.gov/orbits/2003ub313.html
I guess this may be the actual object the world was looking for originally. Clyde Tombaugh originally discovered it looking for planet x. Planet X was supposed to be the object that accounted for the odd gravitational effects that disrupted Neptune's orbit. He found pluto kind of by accident (and Pluto never accounted for the gravity problem). I wonder if further investigation will show that this object has the gravitational influence that affect Neptune's orbit? If so, this discovery is not only big because of the distance and size of the object, but the great mystery it may solve. Good job to the guys who found this!!!
I say we call it Yuggoth. No reason. Just, uh, because. Yeah.
-- The reason it's called the right wing? Irony.
Sorry. But dictionary.com says site is correctly spelled, as it is a shortened form of website.
When I go to the URL in your signature (presumably the site that is referred to just before asking what's wrong with you), it just goes to some search page. Is this intentional? If so, why?
Have a pleasant day.
Thanks to the internet, we can now all die alone together! -SomeWoman
I recall feeling skepticism when I heard the explanation that the putative perturbation of Uranus was due to erroneous observations and/or incorrect calculations. Perhaps it was a romantic attachment to the notion of Planet X. I also recall hearing that the perturbation was caused by some transcient event, something massive and unobserved just passin' thru. (A much more romantic notion.)
NOW I'd like to know whether this new planet's orbit is such that its gravity would contribute anything to the supposed purturbation of Uranus.
However, there's an even more interesting thing that Mike Brown has on his page, called 2003 UB313 (a.k.a. "Lila").
Show me on the doll where his noodly appendage touched you.
so how long until we have (trans)warp drive or jump engines or FTL jump drive or hyperdrive or slip stream drive or infinite improbability drive etc or something that will allow the sending of a probe(cheaply) out there quickly and into orbit of the big rocks in question and sending back some cool pictures and detailed scans? Right now all people can do is look at it through a really big telescope, it might be a little easier if there's something in orbit relaying lots of data, or even better if there was a real live human in a scout ship. Anyone know what happened with Deep Space 1 and it ion drive? (I'm too lazy to look it up myself)
F7 doesn't work, ignore spelling and grammar
I agree that "Troll" isn't the best fit. Anybody up for signing a petition to add a "-1: Just Plain Nuts" option?
/. If the government wants us to respect the law, it should set a better example.
WWJO: What Would Jesus Orbit?
omnia tua castra sunt nobis
This needs more attention, as it seems to be potentially even more interesting. :) C'mon - mod parent up!
He's got my vote!
Why is it that Goofy can talk, but Pluto can't...?
They're both dogs, after all...
The article references two teams in academia... How is that amature?
from here: http://www.nytimes.com/2005/07/29/science/29cnd-pl anet.html
:(
I vote for 'p4wn3d' because....
Dr. Brown had still hoped to hold back announcements of 2003 UB313 and another large Kuiper Belt object, 2005 FY9, until October, but his hand was tipped by Brian Marsden, director of the Minor Planet Center, who said that he was worried about hanky panky.
Dr. Marsden said that it was possible by looking on the Internet at the logs of one of the telescopes Dr. Brown's team had been using to find out where they had been pointed. He had evidence, he said, that someone had done that and computed crude orbits of the two unannounced planetoids, "presumably" in preparation for their own observations.
Also, in the article it says the astronomers themselves have been calling it Xena.... don't think I like that name
There are 10 types of people in this world, those who can count in binary and those who can't.
If they can miss an entire planet in our solar system for decades+, what does this say about everything else they have been telling us about the far reaches of the galaxy let alone the rest of the universe?
When I was in grade school they called it Planet X and/or Planet Humphrey. What ever happened to that?
And now, The International Star^H^H^H^HPlanet Registry will let you name your own planet in our very own solar system!
Just send $19,999.95 to Impy the Impiuos Imp c/o PayPal, and you can name a planet after your loved one!
The name will be resigtered in book form in the U.S. Copyright Office, so you'll know it's true!
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
...or maybe it will be new proof for her cause. She's the nutty woman running around telling everyone "It's comin' right for us!!!" and showing pictures of light phenomenon as her proof that Planet X is bound for earth. It will bring a pole shift and other certain destruction. By the way, it was supposed to have happened in May of 2003 but she is still trying to convince us it's STILL out there and visible to the naked eye, STILL... For a good laugh, check out http://zetatalk.com/
Happyrocker68 happyrocker68@gmail.com http://happyrocker68.wordpress.com/
This web page gives away their name:e x.html
http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~mbrown/planetlila/ind
Lila is the name of Dr. Brown's newborn daughter by the way...
There are 10 types of people in this world, those who can count in binary and those who can't.
We FOUND this planet. So we obviously can't call it Clitorum.
If Mr. Edison had thought smarter he wouldn't sweat as much. --Nikola Tesla
Percival Lowell, who is most well known as a proponent for canals on Mars, called this hypothetical planet "Planet X" (X for "unknown", not the Roman numeral "ten", as only eight planets were known at the time). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planet_X
You know, if they were smart, they'd eBay the name off and make a killing...
They changed the name to Urectum in 2620 to get rid of that stupid joke.
I suggest you check out this page at the bottom about "Why is it called Sedna?"
The article pointed to by the link has been updated to reduce the confusion between these two new objects.
Now my Astrologer is going to have to recalculate everything!
Gods don't kill people, people with gods kill people.
...alrite stop your naming game..i have bought the planet..i am calling it 10th planet :P
Planet X - Planet Xena
X is the Roman Numeral for 10.
Some more about X, now, as I have learned from late Saturday night radio mojo, "A View from Space". X is the mark of Cain. Has a prophesy come true regarding the coming of the one world government and their one world religion? Also noteworthy, the Spaceman believes that Christ was killed on a stick and the cross is the X used to mark Cain. The cross is how the X symbol is hidden. Are we in end times? Will Planet X be tossed into the inner solar system?
If the end is coming, what would you do to take control of the situation or make life meaningful?
Know your pads. One time pad: good for cryptography. Two timing pad: where to take your mistress.
I think Maia should be the name of this new planet. Maia is the Roman Goddess of Growth which is logical for the first planet in a long time to be added to the solar system. Another good reason is that Maia is the mother of Mercury. The last planet in the solar system named after the mother of the first planet. Uranus already got its name for a similar reason. Uranus is the father of Saturn and thus this name was given to the planet found further out and next to Saturn. Sure I know Maia is not that well known to most people, but this would help people learn the name.
Look for The Annunaki. They have our gold.
-PMP-
Sorry, but the Cal team can't name it Xena after all...
Life is hard, and the world is cruel