IAU Rules Pluto Still a Planet

scottyscout writes "NPR reports that Pluto has dodged a bullet. An international panel has unanimously recommended that Pluto retain its title as a planet, and it may be joined by other undersized objects that revolve around the sun. Some astronomers had lobbied for reclassifying Pluto as its so tiny. And at least one major museum has excluded Pluto from its planetary display. But sources tell NPR that under the proposal, to be presented at a big meeting of astronomers in Prague next week for a vote, Pluto would become part of a new class of small planets and several more objects could be granted membership."

Comments

If they have such power,,,

[krell]

If they have the power to make or unmake planets, why can't they do something really useful with Pluto, such as decree it to be a really huge scoop of chocolate cookie-dough ice cream?

Re:If they have such power,,,

[Anonymous Coward]

Or declare that there is oil on it.

Re:If they have such power,,,

[mrxak]

People will debate Pluto's class until the end of the solar system. This is not a new story, in the sense that this is not the first time Pluto's status has been discussed. I think it should just be grandfathered in, if anything. Plus we have a bunch of other objects out there that could be considered planets too. Sedna, Xena, Quaoar, Varuna, Ixion... what do we do with those?

Re:If they have such power,,,

[Cornflake917]

Sedna, Xena, Quaoar, Varuna, Ixion... what do we do with those?

Xena is a warrior princess, she's hot so she gets to be a planet. The other celestial objects sound ugly, I would never date a Sedna, unless she gave good head.

Re:If they have such power,,,

[MBGMorden]

Why not just call them planets? People keep throwing up the excuse that "if we call Pluto a planet then there's lots of things that would be planets.". So? Why should we readjust our definition just to keep numbers low? They don't care about some elite social status. If there's 9 in this system or 853, we should call them planets. If we want to nitpick on composition, then Earth and Jupiter certainly aren't the same type of thing either.

Re:If they have such power,,,

[Mykid8yours]

Well, those other planets may harbor terrorist. The only logical thing is that we invade and we destroy them. This way Iraq & Iran won't be the only place harboring terrorists; that is being destroyed and Earth won't be the only planet being destroyed by mankind. But that is the only logical thing we can do.

Re:If they have such power,,,

[Anonymous Coward]

People will debate Pluto's class until the end of the solar system.

Come on. With that erratic orbit and the fact that Pluto doesn't "fit in" with the rest of the planets... she's obviously a rogue. Just send a freakin' mission out there to find her character sheet and we can all mvoe on to more important things, like debating 2e vs. 3e rules.

Re:If they have such power,,,

[Anonymous Coward]

Just play 2.83e and be done with it.

Re:If they have such power,,,

[Anonymous Coward]

Sedna, Xena, Quaoar, Varuna, Ixion... what do we do with those?

Give them better names, for starters.

Re:If they have such power,,,

[2short]

It's not a matter of adjusting our definition. It's a matter of having one, which we don't.

Various people (not generally astronomers) want a strict, reasonable definition of "Planet", but find that these either exclude Pluto, or include a vast number of things no one would really consider a planet.

Astronomers generally don't care. They know Plutos properties, and don't use "planet" as a terribly specific term. This is purely a laymans controversy. It's significant only because something you learned in grade school was an over-simplification. Experts understand the details, and exactly which over-simplification is better is not very interesting to them.

But since I'm a layman, my 2 cents:
Juptier and Earth aren't like each other. They also aren't like anything else in their repsective orbital neighborhoods. There's a whole lot of stuff that orbits the sun at roughly the same distance as Earth, and none of it is much like Earth. Ditto for Jupter and 6 other object whose names you know. There's a whole lot of stuff that orbits at similar distance as Pluto, and quite a bit of it is a lot like Pluto.

  Somewhere in there is my own favorite over-simplification, which kicks out Pluto.

Re:If they have such power,,,

[mrxak]

We should just use Star Trek terminology. Like M-Class and stuff.

Re:If they have such power,,,

[mrxak]

She? Pluto was a guy, in the Greek mythology. And that Disney character was a guy too.

Re:If they have such power,,,

[Frightening]

Why not just call them planets?

What? Pluto has spent a long time trying to get planet status and now you want a stingy little brat like "Sedna" to join in? You're insensitive. I'm sorry, but you are. Can you even pronounce "Quaoar" ? Do you want our astronomers to invent similarly catastrophic names for 500 other little bits of galactic crap, and all for the sake of equality?

I hate reds(communists not red giants).

Re:If they have such power,,,

[jonadab]

> Why should we readjust our definition just to keep numbers low?

Because if there are more than about ten, elementary school teachers will not be able to use a silly little song to teach the list to their students. Most elementary school teachers believe that such a situation would inevitably lead to the collapse of the entire educational system, since learning the list of the planets is one of the six great pillars of elementary education. The other five are learning the nine holidays (one per month from September through May -- in the US, the most common list is something like Back to School, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year, Valentine's, St. Patrick's, Earth Day, Memorial Day, but it's not important _which_ holidays, as long as you learn one each month), learning the food groups, learning to solve story problems with unpronounceably-foreign names in them, memorizing long lists of mostly-useless conversion factors (such as the number of yards in a mile, liters in a peck, et cetera, ad infinitum, ad nauseam, ad bedlam), and learning to line yourselves up in alphabetical order by last name even though you don't know the other students' last names. If any one of these six pillars is removed, the whole system could crumble.

Or, erhm, something like that.

Re:If they have such power,,,

[MBGMorden]

While I know your post was mostly in jest, the naming thing really isn't a problem at all. I'm sure that the scientific definition of a planet need not require that it be named after a mythological figure. Regardless of what it is, it's still going to get SOME type of name. Why can't a planet be called E19203.32AF? (just made up)

Or, as another poster similarly joked, the Star Trek system. Just take their "parent" star's name and tack on a sequential number. So we're living on Sol-3 :).

Re:If they have such power,,,

[Frightening]

True, but it would be so much cooler to give them mythologically derived names. Like Colbert. /*ducks

Right art thou, I merely jest, but it is for the best, that I promise thee.

Re:If they have such power,,,

[strikethree]

A good reason to not allow too many planets is that as children, we are taught the planets names. It helps us orient ourselves and learn our location/place/relation in/to the "universe". Nine planets were pretty tough to remember way back then since there was not much else to grasp on to as to their relevance. Having a large number of planets would reduce the value of knowing the names of the planets. *shrug*

strike

I "relate to its inadequacy"

[ExE122]

According to wikipedia:

-Earth's Diameter: 12,756.274 km
-Pluto's Diameter: 2306±20 km
-Jupiter's Diameter: 142,984 km
-Proportion of Earth to Pluter: 12756.274 / 2306 = 5.531
-Proportion of Jupiter to Earth: 142984 / 12756.274 = 11.209

Hmm... Jupiter has over twice the proportional difference with Earth as Earth has with Pluto. So I guess Jupiter wouldn't really consider Earth a real planet.

Personally, I think we should leave the little guy alone. Throw UB313 in there as well. Just give it a cool name that fits in with that whole "my very educated mother..." thing.

Like the well learned and professional scientist said: "We'll call them dwarf planets or something".

--
"A man is asked if he is wise or not. He replies that he is otherwise" ~Mao Zedong

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Shadow Wrought]

An excellent point and one that I don't think a lot of folks have thought of. Relativity strikes again.

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Anonymous Coward]

-Proportion of Earth to Pluter: 12756.274 / 2306 = 5.531
-Proportion of Jupiter to Earth: 142984 / 12756.274 = 11.209

Hmm... Jupiter has over twice the proportional difference with Earth as Earth has with Pluto

I'm guessing math is one of your inadequacies ;) I get your point though

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[thePig]

If it is only the size tht was an issue, then yes, your point makes excellent sense.
But, shouldnt we also consider the fact that there is a high probability that pluto was not created from the accretion disk around the sun, from which other planets were formed ?
Especially the plane in which pluto revolves, which is very very different from other planetary planes, should also be taken into consideration, I guess.

A planet should not be just an object which revolves around a star. Rather it is something which should have formed when the star was formed. This we can very easily judge (provided we know) from the heavy metal content and the ratio, I guess.

But, I guess these should have been easily the first points in IAUs discussions. Otherwise, I am completely wrong in my assumptions :-)

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Cornflake917]

I "relate to its inadequacy"

The article also talked about how children would benefit from Pluto's planethood because it's a "misfit". Shouldn't we be classifying planets based on it's characteristics, not how it affects our culture or how people relate to it? If we classify things based on how people relate to them, we might as well call whales the "misfits of fish." It might be a totally incorrect classification, but at least obiese people have something to relate to now!

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[mrchaotica]

But, shouldnt we also consider the fact that there is a high probability that pluto was not created from the accretion disk around the sun, from which other planets were formed ?

Couldn't it be argued that the accretion disk includes the Kuiper Belt?

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[CopaceticOpus]

So, you're saying that anything that's only 5.5 times smaller than a planet should also be considered a planet?

Earth/5.5 = 2300km => Pluto is a planet

Pluto/5.5 = 420km => Vesta asteroid (450km) is a planet

Vesta/5.5 = 82km => 61 Danaë asteroid (82km) is a planet

61 Danaë/5.5 = 15km => 2685 Masursky asteroid is a planet

2685 Masursky/5.5 = 2.5km => 2002 JF56 asteroid is a planet

2002 JF56/5.5 = 455 meters => CN Tower (550m) is a planet

CN Tower/5.5 = 100m => Eyeglass orbital telescope would be a planet

Eyeglass/5.5 = 18m => The Titan Missle silo was a planet

Titan/5.5 = 10.7 feet => Your bathroom is a planet

Bathroom/5.5 = 2 feet => Your Mom is a planet! Oh, snap!

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not sure what you're getting at here- 11.209 is 2.027 times larger than 5.531. The GP's math looks right.

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Anonymous Coward]

Personally, I think we should leave the little guy alone. Throw UB313 [wikipedia.org] in there as well. Just give it a cool name that fits in with that whole "my very educated mother..." thing.

 
Personally, I think they should use the name Ymir, but that's just me....

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[HTH NE1]

Maybe whether an object is considered a planet should not only consider its size but also its average distance from its star using something like a bell curve.

Ah, but then each object in the Oort cloud could possibly be considered a planet too. Damn.

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[kalirion]

I'd say that your mom's average distance from the sun using something like a bell curve would be pretty close to that of a certain planet. GP's argument holds.

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Rob Kaper]

Bathroom/5.5 = 2 feet => Your Mom is a planet! Oh, snap!

I like the way you reason, but I'd sooner call her a midget.

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Jugalator]

Hmm... Jupiter has over twice the proportional difference with Earth as Earth has with Pluto. So I guess Jupiter wouldn't really consider Earth a real planet.

But who asked the Jovians?

We can't really use size relationships as a guideline here, or we could go as small as we wished. :-)

The Plutonias would say a body 1/5th of that planet's size should be a planet too, then.

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Ced_Ex]

Oooohhhh Buuuurrrrnnnnnnnnn!!!!!!!!!

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Evanisincontrol]

Your Mom/5.5 = 4.36 inches => Oh yeah? Well my.... nevermind.

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Fordiman]

Uh. Technically, only laymen bother classifying objects as 'planets'.

Well, laymen and astrologers. Care to know what having pluto in the third house means to you?

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[DirePickle]

We could also add that it has become spherical under its own gravity. So a lot of those things are out. But Your Mom still qualifies.

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Speare]

Wow, someone has way too much time on his hands. Go spend some of that playing Katamari Damashii, and get that ball up to the size of your mom, pronto!

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[StikyPad]

Obviously it will have to be another P name, so that "pizza pies" finally makes sense, in an acronymical way, if not colloquially.

At any rate, this may seem to be one small step to most people; but it's one giant leap for little people.

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Gorimek]

So what you're really saying is that Pluto shouldn't count because it's adopted?

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[jheath314]

The analogy is a bit off... a whale is obviously not a fish because it is different qualitatively, not just quantitatively. Meanwhile, the difference between Pluto and other planets in our solar system is more a matter of quantity, not quality.

The analogy would be more apt if you were to say: a star/moon/barbeque is to a planet as a whale is to a fish. There are very significant qualities that make a star different from a planet. Poor little Pluto is different only in that it is somewhat smallish, and its orbit is a bit lopsided.

---

Anyways, I can't see how including Pluto in the definition of planet would really change anything in the science of astronomy. The size cutoff is somewhat arbitrary, so there's no harm in giving in to a little romantic nostalgia and stretching the definition a little to include tiny little Pluto.

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[shellbeach]

Couldn't it be argued that the accretion disk includes the Kuiper Belt?

But on that basis, every little asteroid/icy blob/pebble in the asteroid belt, Oort Cloud and Kuiper Belt should be called a planet.

Do you know just how many of those little things there are??? And you do realise that Joe Public isn't going to be happy until they all have a freakin' name, don't you?

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Michael Wardle]

You're a heathen! Everybody knows the correct mnemonic is:
Mark's Very Extravagant Mother Just Sent Us Nine Parakeets :-p

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[painQuin]

oh snap.

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[jonathansizz]

-Pluto's Diameter: 2306±20 km
-Ceres's Diameter: 940km
Proportion of Pluto to Ceres: 2306/940=2.453

Hmm - Earth has over twice the proportional difference with Pluto as Pluto has with Ceres. So I guess Earth wouldn't consider Pluto a planet, either.

See how we could continue with this brand of logic until we get to classify everything down to pebble-sized debris as planets?

Note also that the Moon has a diameter of 3476km, and so is 1.5 times the size of Pluto..

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[SirBruce]

No, it's My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nine Pumpkins. Didn't anyone else read Miss Pickerell?

Bruce

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[myom]

A midget MILF?

Does she have a website? :)

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[jc42]

Technically, only laymen bother classifying objects as 'planets'.

Good, point, and worth repeating whenever this bit of silliness comes up.

There was the suggestion a while back from that IAU committee to the effect that "planet" be only used with a qualifier. The term is used informally for anything big enough to be spheroidal and small enough to have no fusion occurring in its core. This covers such a wide range of objects that it's pointless to try to have a single term for them all. We really don't need a single technical term that includes both Jupiter and Pluto, especially if it excludes Ganymede and Titan.

The old point of orbiting a star is also not terribly useful, as it puts Earth and Mars in a different class that Titan and Triton (all four of which have atmospheres sufficiently dense for weather processes to happen).

Then there's the silly attempt to coin a name for planets out in space without a nearby star.

Astronomers should probably just declare that "planet" isn't a technical term, and it shouldn't be used at all. If that's too radical, the suggestion that it always requires a qualifier is a good compromise.

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[orkysoft]

Hello grants and job security!

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Mr. Slippery]

What are you people talking about? It's "Mother Very Efficiently Made Jelly Sandwiches Under No Protest." Geez.

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[LandruBek]

I just looked down at my WWFD bracelet (What Would Frink Do?), and chortled aloud at the idea.
But to play devil's advocate, or Thomas Kuhn's advocate, science is much more a subjective, social construction that we like to admit. So maybe we, uh, could turn it into a mascot for misfits. We could call it the Planet with Mass Deficit Disorder. Or maybe, The Special Planet. Perhaps you'd prefer The Differently Orbiting Planet. Mm-hai!

Re:I "relate to its inadequacy"

[Anonymous Coward]

holy shit, there's still a few of 'em out there!

$DEITY bless you, man, that laugh absolutely made my week!

Who are these people, anyway?

[Anonymous Coward]

No less a personage than Gustav Holst refused to include Pluto among The Planets.

Why should I listen to this "IAU" instead of to him?

Re:Who are these people, anyway?

[Enzo the Baker]

Pluto wasn't discovered until 1930, but Holst wrote The Planets in 1914-1916.

Re:Who are these people, anyway?

[Anonymous Coward]

Thanks for getting the joke.

Re:Who are these people, anyway?

[Roger Wilcox]

Pluto was discovered within Holst's lifetime and he refused to ammend his composition.

Re:Who are these people, anyway?

[Anonymous Coward]

Besides, a recording of the IAU will never get you laid.

Re:Who are these people, anyway?

[emurphy42]

But that didn't stop it from happening, merely delayed it for 70 years.

The Terrorists are against Pluto...

[EccentricAnomaly]

Most of the Astronomers are having trouble making it to Prague because of the security anthill that's been kicked over by the hair-gel bomb plot. This will probably have a big effect on how the IAU vote turns out.

Re:The Terrorists are against Pluto...

[cashman73]

That would be based on the assumption that most of these astronomers actually still have hair,... ;-)

Future objects

[crmartin]

... mickey, minnie, donald.

In other news, Pixar announces corporate sponsorship of IAU.

Re:Future objects

[Tackhead]

> ... mickey, minnie, donald.
>
> In other news, Pixar announces corporate sponsorship of IAU.

In a followup to an earlier story, IAU has issued a statement rejecting the Pixar proposal as fucking Goofy.

Re:Future objects

[thephotoman]

I know it's not okay to fuck with the Mouse, but I must ask if it's okay to bugger the Mouse's dog.

Re:Future objects

[crmartin]

I know I'll be sorry ... but why must you ask?

Re:Future objects

[thephotoman]

I've got a line of fangirls out here with strap-ons that find Pluto to be a "bishie" and want to, well, show him that they like him. It disturbs me.

Re:Future objects

[pengolodh]

So, if Pluto's a planet, then what the Hell is Goofy?

Re:Future objects

[Tackhead]

> I've got a line of fangirls out here with strap-ons that find Pluto to be a "bishie" and want to, well, show him that they like him. It disturbs me.

That's what I love about Slashdot. Just when I think I can make out the murky bottom of the Marianas Trench with the thread's floodlights, someone shows up with a drill bit.

Re:Future objects

[Anonymous Coward]

Also a dog. That Goofy exterior belies a darker side, a taste for enslaving his own kind.

Re:Future objects

[crmartin]

This whole thread.

How Big Must a Planet be?

[Mikkeles]

FTA: 'Some astronomers had lobbied for reclassifying Pluto because it is so tiny.'

Does anyone know the minimal diameter that these astronomers proposed for a revolving body to be a planet?

Re:How Big Must a Planet be?

[TheOldSchooler]

I believe they said it shouldn't be any smaller than Uranus.

I am so sorry.

Re:How Big Must a Planet be?

[Intron]

Based on the original meaning of planet (wanderer), the only planets should be visible from Earth and move against the background of stars. Pluto is not visible without a fair-sized telescope.

I don't think there is any distinction between planets and asteroids that is useful in Astronomy.

Besides, Pluto does not appear in Mr. Vem J Sun.

Re:How Big Must a Planet be?

[EnsilZah]

I believe they say tomato.

Re:How Big Must a Planet be?

[Mikkeles]

Fortunately, I'm not the goates.cx guy or that would imply that Jupiter mightn't be big enough to be a planet :)

Re:How Big Must a Planet be?

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe the astronomers are discussing a definition where, to be classified as a planet, the object must have sufficient mass for its gravitational forces to make it round, with some extra leeway for the effects of rotation. Not sure whether pluto could be round enough to qualify.

I don't get it

[susano_otter]

Why all the controversy anyway?

Why not fix the "official" number of planets at nine, including the largest, nearest, and most well-known of the Kuyper Belt Objects, and leave it at that?

Pluto's nature won't change either way, and our understanding of it won't change either way. This kind of legalistic controversy just for the sake of legalistic controversy is getting pretty annoying.

Traditionally, Pluto has been a planet. Now, I'm not saying tradition trumps everything, but I see no reason why it shouldn't trump meaningless debate.

Let me know if I've got it all wrong, and there is actually meaningful debate on this topic.

Re:I don't get it

[the_crowing]

The meaning of the debate, I'm thinking, is to justify very large paychecks...

Re:I don't get it

[Rakshasa Taisab]

Traditionally, Pluto has been a planet not because we think it falls under the definition of planet, but rather that we don't have a proper definition of what a planet is.

Assuming the latter is a meaningful debate, yes, there is a meaningful debate on this topic.

Re:I don't get it

[Billosaur]

Why not fix the "official" number of planets at nine, including the largest, nearest, and most well-known of the Kuyper Belt Objects, and leave it at that?

Because there's nothing the scientific community loves more than controversy, and this is beginning to rival the great Newton vs. Einstein debate, where some purists were not convinced that Einstein's theories were realistic. Clyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto back in 1930 after a systematic search for planets beyond Neptune. He had to pore through photographic plates, trying to find the tiniest relative shift of an object in the starfield that would lead him to a body that was orbiting the Sun. That he found Pluto was remarkable for the time, and I think all this debate over Pluto's status is a disservice to him. Let sleeping dogs lie, let Pluto remain one of the original nine planets, and let's move on.

Re:I don't get it

[schwanerhill]

Very large paychecks for whom? Astronomers? Hah! I'm an astronomer, so please let me know where those can be found.

(If you're in astronomy for the money, you're crazy.)

Re:I don't get it

[StupendousMan]

Why not fix the "official" number of planets at nine, including the largest, nearest, and most well-known of the Kuyper Belt Objects, and leave it at that?

Because there's nothing the scientific community loves more than controversy

No, actually, I (and most of the astronomers in my peer group) do NOT enjoy the ongoing saga. We would like the whole matter to go away.

The real answer is

Because there's nothing the media loves more than controversy

Editors know that "telling people that stuff they learned in elementary school is wrong" can pull emotional strings and get a rise out of some people ... and that leads to profit.

Sigh.

Re:I don't get it

[Anonymous Coward]

"Traditionally, Pluto has been a planet"?
Um. no not really. Well, you american ignorant bastards without history may think so.

Re:I don't get it

[Billosaur]

No, actually, I (and most of the astronomers in my peer group) do NOT enjoy the ongoing saga. We would like the whole matter to go away.

But it won't until the member body of the IAU stands up and says "Enough!" This whole controversy required exactly one meeting, where everyone could debate the issue, and then a consensus could be formed and a standard applied. But this has dragged on and on and on. Heck, this was a problem even before the influx of larger KBO's into the public consciousness. Astronomers were debating Pluto's status back in the early 90's.

No, the scientific community is in a constant state of polarization, between the old guard, wary of new things and ideas, and the new breed, mainly young researchers thinking outside the box. This debate is just symptomatic of a larger problem that's plagued scientific debate for a long time.

Re:I don't get it

[DanQuixote]

"Why all the controversy anyway?"

You insensitive clod! Don't you know how many of us suffer with severe obsessive compulsive disorder? How shall we put it in the proper box if we don't know which it is!!?!?! Sheesh.

I'll bet if astronomy were your career, or even more importantly astrology, you would think differently!

Re:I don't get it

[omnicron13]

The real debate is over the definition of "planet." Pluto is just the kernel of the debate. Is this a meaningful question? Well, its no worse than many other scientific questions. Science, after all, is historically about dividing and classifying (the root comes from the indo-european root "skei", which means to cut). We have divisions of stars and other heavenly bodies; it'd be nice to settle this in a useful fashion.

Re:I don't get it

[StupendousMan]

Astronomers were debating Pluto's status back in the early 90's.

No, the overwhelming majority of astronomers were not. We don't care. Really. The issue "what is a planet?" has for most of us the same urgency and relevance that "what is a continent?" has for geologists.

No, the scientific community is in a constant state of polarization, between the old guard, wary of new things and ideas, and the new breed, mainly young researchers thinking outside the box.

There certainly _are_ topics on which there is vigorous debate in the astronomical community -- for example, the nature of gamma-ray bursts, or the accuracy and precision of the cosmological distance scale, or the physics of supernova explosions. But this isn't one of them. The issue exists solely because a very few people who (for some reason) are seeking publicity go to the media periodically with a "new twist" on this question.

Adding the question "is Pluto a planet" to the list of serious astronomical questions of the day does a disservice to those other questions.

Re:I don't get it

[susano_otter]

Ah, but I have already settled it in a useful fashion:

Pluto was named during The Time of Naming Planets. Therefore, for reasons of history and tradition, we count it among the planets, even though it's also a KBO.

All other KBOs were, or will be, named during The Time of Naming KBOs. Therefore, again for reasons of history and tradition, we count them among the KBOs, even the really big one really far out, that we haven't found yet.

People whose professions require precise technical terminology are still welcome--encouraged, in fact--to refer to Pluto and other KBOs by whatever technical terms best suit their technical purpose, in a technical discussion about Pluto and other KBOs.

How much more useful could it be? Those of us with a technical need to define "planet" can do so unhindered. Those of us who don't, can continue on through life without having to worry about pointless revisionism where tradition and history already serve us well enough.

Re:I don't get it

[Bender0x7D1]

Well, it doesn't matter at the moment, but it may matter when we get our butts off this planet and start colonizing the rest of the solar system. Why? Well, we will need a lot of treaties and laws and rules that govern how we handle ourselves out there. For example, we may decide that no one can claim ownership of a planet - kind of like Antarctica. Or that there are certain envrionmental guidelines that apply to planets - no dumping of toxic/radioactive waste.

However, it may be beneficial to allow political or corporate entities to lay claim to asteroids for purposes of development or mining. In fact, we may state that it is OK to change their orbits for economic gain. Let's decide that we aren't allowed to smash planets (or moons for that matter) into pieces to make mining easier. There are a lot of plans for deflecting an asteroid away from Earth, so can we deflect it to hit Mars instead? It would certainly make it easier to obtain the metals we want if it is already smashed into pieces. Is it OK to deflect it into another asteroid, but not a planet?

While these may seem like useless things to consider, we have learned the hard way that humans tend to exploit environments once they get their hands on them. It is only after destroying large areas that we decide we should protect what's left. Hopefully, we can create a good system to prevent that from happening with other planets and major solar system objects, while still getting the economic benefits of mining in space.

Re:I don't get it

[susano_otter]

I have no problem with scientists wrangling out a technical scientific definition of planet, in order to productively pursue advancements in science.

And I have no problem with politicians and their constituents wrangling out a technical political and legal definition of planets, in order to better pursue political and economic gain.

My problem is with everybody thinking that any of this is at all relevant to the historical, social tradition of counting Pluto among the planets, or that we must now change our customary everyday definition of Pluto.

Re:I don't get it

[Jugalator]

Because there's nothing the scientific community loves more than controversy

I thought the set of planetary "rules" should be generic and work for our solar system to avoid controversies.

Scientists generally hate controversies as far as I know. That's why they try to search for unifying theories and theories that work, instead of keeping to invent random unprofessional theories to challenge other established ones with.

Re:I don't get it

[wanerious]

There are 4 inner planets, with similar properties and formation histories. There are 4 outer planets with similar properties and formation histories. Pluto belongs with neither, but has the most in common with what are now known as Kuiper belt objects. More and more of these are being found, some with supposed sizes greater than Pluto. One suggestion that, in my opinion, is the most reasonable is to recognize the 4 inner planets, 4 outer planets, and recategorize Pluto into the Kuiper Belt clan. Over and over in science, our first shot at categorizing things turn out to be unoptimal until we learn more about them. Recategorizing happens all the time as we learn more than merely superficial details about objects.

Re:I don't get it

[Pentavirate]

The issue "what is a planet?" has for most of us the same urgency and relevance that "what is a continent?" has for geologists.

I may not be able to define it but I know it when I see it.

Re:I don't get it

[foreverdisillusioned]

You and me can call Pluto whatever the hell we want, but in science "tradition" doesn't trump ANYTHING (with a few very specific, trivial exceptions e.g. what we call positive eletromagnetism should properly be called negative, and vice versa.) For the sake of clarity and consistency, it matters.

Now, I don't have a problem with them leaving Pluto a planet, but to refuse to add any more names to the list of planets simply because "we've traditionally had 9 planets" is just about the most retarded thing I've ever heard (and mind you, I do work with the mentally handicapped.)

Re:I don't get it

[susano_otter]

Who says "planet" is a scientific term?

I think that history has just as much claim on the word as science does.

Anyway, it's been pointed out elsewhere in this thread that most scientists don't actually care, and this is really just a trumped-up piece of media hype. In the end, it seems like the controversy is pointless, and that tradition still serves us well in the case of Pluto the Planet.

Re:I don't get it

[foreverdisillusioned]

so why does "history" end now? When Pluto was discovered, no one said "well, we've traditionally had 8 planets, so let's not add any more." It's just stupid. Either we should keep adding planets based on the (loose) criteria that we used to add Pluto to the list, or remove Pluto and redefine the term. Simply saying "no more planets!" is neither historical nor scientific; it's just lazy.

Re:I don't get it

[mdwh2]

Pluto was named during The Time of Naming Planets. Therefore, for reasons of history and tradition, we count it among the planets, even though it's also a KBO.

Ah, but this isn't the first time this controversy has happened.

Ceres for was considered a planet - and it stayed this way for about 50 years. In fact, even Pallas, Juno and Vesta were considered planets ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1_Ceres ); yes, at one time our solar system had 12 planets. However, with the further discovery of even more asteroids, they quickly lost their status (though we still have the term "minor planet").

It's more than 50 years since the discovery of Pluto, but it's clear that history and tradition are not reasons for keeping something a planet. It seems bizarre to most people today because all our lives Pluto has been a planet - but this doesn't mean future generations will see it that way.

Keeping Pluto a planet for now, possibly adding objects such as 2003 UB313 as planets, could be seen to mirror when Pallas, Juno and Vesta were added as planets. But who knows whether it will stay that way.

Re:I don't get it

[susano_otter]

I consider history not having stopped at all, but rather moved on past the point where we consider KBOs to be proper planets. Personally, I have no problem grandfathering Pluto in as a planet, on account of when it was discovered, and the now-traditional place it occupies in our cosmology; while leaving all the other KBOs as "mere" KBOs. If the technicians need to reclassify it for their own narrow technical purposes, I have no problem with that either. It's not so much laziness that motivates me here, as an unspeakable horror of the prospect of never again being able to attend a cocktail party without hearing some tiresome smarty man say "well, Pluto isn't really a planet, you know..."

Sure, things may change, and with the passage of time future generations may very well strike Pluto from the list of planets (likely some years after the technicians have already done so in their own technical contexts). I just don't see any good reason to strike it from the lists today. (And please note that I'm drawing a distinction between the technical definition of "planet" and the historical, traditional, social definition of "planet".)

Re:I don't get it

[susano_otter]

So Pluto made the cut, while other objects didn't. So what?

If future generations see it differently, let them change it.

I think it's a mistake to try to apply a strict, formally logical rule in this context. Human activity--such as the naming and recognition of planets--rarely follows purely logical rules. Scienctists try to follow such rules as much as possible, because science demands it. But Pluto is not exclusively in the realm of science.

Re:I don't get it

[Jedi Alec]

Traditionally, Pluto has been a planet not because we think it falls under the definition of planet, but rather that we don't have a proper definition of what a planet is.

Assuming the latter is a meaningful debate, yes, there is a meaningful debate on this topic.

It will be, as soon as the first draft of the Sol tax laws is written. Plutonians will claim to be on an asteroid in an attempt to avoid having to pay taxes and when the smoke clears there'll be nothing left to debate about.

Re:I don't get it

[mdwh2]

So Pluto made the cut, while other objects didn't. So what?

So what, indeed - I haven't said there's anything wrong with Pluto being a planet when other things weren't, and indeed, I'm pointing out that there also wouldn't be anything wrong if Pluto stopped being considered a planet. I merely point out that there isn't some magical "The Time of Naming Planets", because things have gone from planets to not-planets before, and that "history and tradition" is a rather temporary thing.

Re:I don't get it

[susano_otter]

Of course history and tradition are temporary things. That doesn't mean they should be arbitrarily abandoned.

All the planets, up to and including Pluto, were counted as planets before the KB and KBOs were understood, or even observed (excepting Pluto itself, of course; but it was not observed as a KBO qua KBO). During that same period, other objects were considered for planethood, and ultimately rejected.

More recently, we have learned much more about the KB, and have observed and studied KBOs besides Pluto. As a result, we know a lot more about Pluto's nature and origin than we did when it was first observed and counted as a planet.

For me, the fact that Pluto is part of the same family of objects as the other KBOs, in no way detracts from its status as a planet on historical and traditional grounds.

And really, who does it gratify, to change the status of Pluto? Not the scientists; by all accounts they don't really care. Besides, they'll still carry out their experiments, test their theories, use clear technical terms where necessary, and do good science regardless of whether or not society considers Pluto a planet.

It seems to me that such a change would gratify mainly people who enjoy categorizing things into nice, neat, legalistic boxes. As this is pretty much a subjective criteria, based more on personal taste than anything else, I see no reason why it should carry any more weight than my own source of gratification: Not forcing rich and complex human culture into nice, neat, legalistic boxes any more than necessary. And I don't really see the necessity in this case.

Anything they pick is arbitrary

[geoffrobinson]

So why does it matter? If it makes people feel good, let Pluto be classified as a planet.

Worry about Iran being on U.N. Human Rights council or what's going to happen on the third season of Lost. Something important.

Bandwagon?

[sosuke]

Why does it seem to me that this push to get Pluto out of the running as a planet or other rocks in space named as planets a ploy to gain fame as finding 'new' planets and naming them? Pluto is the only planet that was found and named last century, they should just leave it be.

enough semantics

[weopenlatest]

This entire debate is a waste of time. We know what pluto is, why is it of such great importance whether we define a planet as bigger or smaller?

Museum displays...

[totallygeek]

And at least one major museum has excluded Pluto from its planetary display.

Hell, I can show you museums that show kind, gentle dinosaurs living in harmony with man. So what?

Re:Museum displays...

[teg]

Hell, I can show you museums that show kind, gentle dinosaurs living in harmony with man. So what?

This museum is a parody site, right?

Re:Museum displays...

[jheath314]

I know exactly how you feel, man. If only it were...

Re:Museum displays...

[jc42]

I can show you museums that show kind, gentle dinosaurs living in harmony with man.

So can I. Consider that it's been a couple of decades now that birds were officially reclassified as a suborder of the dinosauria. We have four small parrots living in our house. One is actually perched on my wrist as I type this.

I suppose there might be some quibbling with that "in harmony" phrase. Parrot societies have about as much friction as human societies. Our two cockatiels tease the conure mercilessly. The conure tries to punish them, but she's nowhere near fast enough for them. And the parakeet can buzz all the rest without fear, which he does.

But they get along about as well as a set of four human siblings would.

I'd also guess that humans+birds is not what the creationists are talking about. I wonder if any of them recognize birds as dinosaurs? Probably not. After all, if God created each species separately, no two species are really related in the biological sense. Humans aren't related to chimps; domestic cats aren't related to lions or tigers; dogs aren't related to wolves or foxes. And there are no lessons to be learned by studying nature, because everything was a special creation, so medical researchers should stop using animals as models.

(And now there's a small, feathered dinosaur perched on my shoulder. ;-)

Re:Museum displays...

[Alsee]

Sadly, no.

But with a 5 digit Slasdot ID, I'm a bit surprised that you aren't already well familiar with the comical answersingenesis.org stuff that crops up during virtually every internet discussion that touches on evolution.

-

Re:Museum displays...

[Alsee]

I wonder if any of them recognize birds as dinosaurs? Probably not.

Acording to literal Bible-is-a-science-textbook-and-I'll-get-72-virgin s-in-heaven-if-I-blow-up-a-plane, Geneis is quite explicit that birds were separately created one day before land animals (aka dinosaurs).

-

Re:Museum displays...

[jc42]

Geneis is quite explicit that birds were separately created one day before land animals (aka dinosaurs).

Well, that's another disagreement with scientists, I guess. They have dinosaurs appearing first (180-200 million years ago), and birds branching off later (140-150 million years ago). The scientific dates do have a much bigger error bar than the biblical dates, of course, 20 million years vs. 1 day. But somehow I trust the scientific dates more. The scientists do have several independent dating methods that roughly agree; the bible has only the one date with no verifiable dating method.

That does it!

[Quiet_Desperation]

I declare holy^H^H^H^H science war against the IAU!

Re:That does it!

[neonprimetime]

declare holy^H^H^H^H science war against the IAU!

May I suggest starting by dropping the Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch on them?

Pluto must be happy to hear this...

[sTalking_Goat]

Has Pluto put out a press release yet. Are it and it supports going to have a celebration party? Is Jupiter going to be there? I've got a 'thing' for gas giants...

Re:Pluto must be happy to hear this...

[Anonymous Coward]

Bah, jupiter's just full of hot air...

All the better.

[krell]

"Most of the Astronomers are having trouble making it to Prague because of the security anthill that's been kicked over by the hair-gel bomb plot. This will probably have a big effect on how the IAU vote turns out."

All the better to have them converge on Prague without the benefit of the latest in hair care products, and to all end up coiff'ed like Einstein.

slashdot spelling

[Anonymous Coward]

mod this down as offtopic, but it wouldn't be a /. story without spelling "it's" as "its", despite the fact that TFA is written "it is"

Don't we have this covered already

[iShaman]

Really now...this has already been settled! Pluto is a Class C Geoinactive planet I mean sheesh.....

Re:Don't we have this covered already

[truedfx]

I assume the / at the end of the URL was accidental. How did it happen? I'm curious because you're not the only one I've seen do it.

Re:Don't we have this covered already

[iShaman]

Pure/ user/ error/. Rarely do I succumb to the desire to be quick to the funny on Slashdot, but...this was one of those times. :)

Re:Don't we have this covered already

[iShaman]

Actually, by habit I place slashes at the end of URL when using them as a link reference. Wikipedia doesn't take those well, apparently.

Re:Don't we have this covered already

[truedfx]

Thanks. Looking at my own history, I see that I actually do something similar on occasion as well: I would visit http://groups.google.com/group/alt.news.group/ even though Google doesn't link to it with trailing slashes. Strange :)

Am I missing something?

[Aleman]

Are the people on Pluto trying to avoid paying the exorbitant non-planet property tax? What's the big deal here?

You know...

[TheOldSchooler]

The real problem with Pluto is that it makes Uranus look huge.

Re:You know...

[dr_dank]

The real problem with Pluto is that it makes Uranus look huge.

You have the Klingons near Uranus to thank for that.

Re:You know...

[Kesch]

I montion that we rename Uranus once and for all to stop all these bad jokes.

My suggested name is 'Urectum'

So answer me this..

[will_die]

So after this discussion is done what will be the answer to the question: How many planets are in the Solar System?

Preserve it for Posterity

[Petskull]

I agree implicitly.. They should do something big with it- like name a cartoon dog after it or something.

Re:Preserve it for Posterity

[mrak and swepe]

I agree implicitly.. They should do something big with it- like name a cartoon dog after it or something.

I notice that you have also agreed explicitly.

pluto is a representative planet

[192939495969798999]

Pluto should stand for "and a bunch of other little ones like this". It's our Solar System's placeholder that, among other things, helps to illustrate how long it takes to go around the Sun at that distance.

Pluto has dodged a bullet?

[Anonymous Coward]

Evidently it managed to do this because it's so darn small...

Re: Pluto has dodged a bullet?

[Short Circuit]

Even so, it keeps getting hit by asteroids.

Excellent picture

[LotsOfPhil]

So Pluto has 3 moons? I had never seen this picture before and think it is very cool.
Pluto via Hubble

Inaccurate

[Zenaku]

The headline and summary are extremely misleading. The agency hasn't ruled at all. The vote is yet to come. All that has happened is that a panel of 7 people has made a recommendation, which may or may not be excepted. And the recommendation has plenty of problems that might prevent it from passing a vote. From TFA:

The panel's recommendation is being reviewed by the International Astronomical Union's executive committee. In an interview last week, executive committee member Bob Williams said the definition proposed by the panel had some potential problems, and he was not at all sure if the astronomers voting in Prague this month would approve it.

"At this point, I don't feel confident enough to bet in favor of it," he said.

Re:Inaccurate

[adavidw]

...has made a recommendation, which may or may not be excepted.

It's possible it could even be accepted.

Re:Inaccurate

[Zenaku]

Yes, yes, I saw that mistake right after I posted. My bad.

Space

[G_Sus2019]

Space is still the place, motherfuckers!

At least your 5th grade science grade is safe.

[GigG]

I'm glad they made this ruling. Think if they hadn't how many of our elementry school science grades would have to be changed because our project grades would have been changed from B- to F.

In your face, science!

[Anonymous Coward]

OK, now when will they bring back the brontosaurus?

More than just tiny

[mshurpik]

It's more than Pluto being tiny. Pluto has a highly elliptical, out-of-plane orbit that crosses over Neptune's orbit, AND its orbit is 3/2 in phase with Neptune, suggesting that it was captured by Neptune's gravity.

Is a "planet" something that was created with the solar system, or is a "planet" simply something that has a moon? Right now, we're using the latter definition.

If you want to see another example of scientific retrenchment, check out Phylocode. For years biologists have been classifying species on a Linnaean 2D grid, inheritance and time, as if God somehow keeps all his evolutions in perfect lockstep. Phylocode, tree-based, uses the inheritance dimension only.

Re:More than just tiny

[Anonymous Coward]

Pluto has a highly elliptical, out-of-plane orbit that crosses over Neptune's orbit, AND its orbit is 3/2 in phase with Neptune, suggesting that it was captured by Neptune's gravity.

Not quite, Pluto actually formed in the original Kuiper Belt, making it part of the original Solar System, not an object captured by Neptune. Its current orbit is the result of Neptune's gravity, yes, but Pluto was formed in orbit of the sun.

Is a "planet" something that was created with the solar system, or is a "planet" simply something that has a moon? Right now, we're using the latter definition.

Actually, neither Mercury nor Venus have moons, yet they're accepted as planets. The problem is not that an "incorrect" definition of planet is being used, it's that there is no clear definition of what constitutes a planet. This recommendation (the title is misleading, as no actual ruling was handed down) is merely part of a much larger debate on the definition of a planet.

Re:More than just tiny

[Anonymous Coward]

...or is a "planet" simply something that has a moon? Right now, we're using the latter definition.

Venus and Mercury would suggest otherwise.

Re:More than just tiny

[Dirtside]

The problem is not that an "incorrect" definition of planet is being used, it's that there is no clear definition of what constitutes a planet.

Nor is there any need whatsoever for a clear definition of what "planet" means. It has only colloquial meaning, even to scientists; when it's crucially important to know precisely which body or bodies someone's referring to, you ask for a list.

This is a tremendous nonissue.

Re:More than just tiny

[Anonymous Coward]

"Is a "planet" something that was created with the solar system, or is a "planet" simply something that has a moon? Right now, we're using the latter definition."

A number of asteroids have moons. And as has been pointed out previously, Mars and Venus don't have moons. You are incorrect about this.

Screw Pluto!

[Quaoar]

That guy gets all the attention. ;-(

Disney Had No Power Over Me

[shoma-san]

Pluto is a dog not a planet and to infer anything otherwise is to bow down to the Disney propaganda machine that thinks we still care about their theme parks.

Re:Disney Had No Power Over Me

[Anonymous Coward]

If you read more, you would know that Pluto is in fact the god of the underworld and predates Disney by a few thousand years.

In other news...

[Comboman]

Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead.

This is why

[ch-chuck]

the Andromedians deem our planet as yet unfit for alien contact. "They have developed nuclear capabilities, yet become emotionally agitated over the verbal classification of an outer orbiting body! The must evolve for a few more generations and then, if they still exist, we shall allow contact with the Federation of Star Systems."

Absolute rubbish!

[jrothwell97]

Pluto isn't even anything special in the Kuiper Belt. There are plenty of objects, many of them probably larger than Pluto, that are classed as KBOs, so why isn't Pluto classed as such? If they found an Earth-sized rock orbiting a thousand AUs from the Sun, THAT should be classed as a planet.

Re:Absolute rubbish!

[DanQuixote]

"If you switch on your computer and it works instantly, call a doctor - you are hallucinating."

If I switch on my computer and it works instantly, I call Theo - and thank him!

It's a familiar, if rather annoying figure

[ScentCone]

Does anyone know the minimal diameter that these astronomers proposed for a revolving body to be a planet?

It has to be at least 8.2kAG

That's kilo-AlGores.

Though, like so many other cosmological units these days, it's not even a constant. Seems to be expanding (and making movies) under the pressure of hot gasses.

Re:It's a familiar, if rather annoying figure

[Anonymous Coward]

He's saying things that are backed by some good science. You prefer your anti-science Bush administration?
NASA Climatologist silenced as UK government issues chilling report:
http://arstechnica.com/journals/science.ars/2006/1 /30/2703
and others are easy to find.

Or do you just admire Bush for his ability to disregard the Constitution, the law, common sense, etc.?

How do you define yourself, anyway? Religious zealot, generalized red state idiot, or what, exactly?

Re:It's a familiar, if rather annoying figure

[ScentCone]

How do you define yourself, anyway? Religious zealot, generalized red state idiot, or what, exactly?

At least I don't define myself as "coward," but that's your own problem.

Religious zealot? Nope - I find religion to be a dangerous, and childish anachronism. Red state? Nope, I live in a state that wouldn't vote "red" even if John Kerry were back on the "blue" ballot. What, exactly? Umm... someone, in the context of my earlier, sardonic comment, finds Al Gore to be an annoying, condescending, scolding blowhard who cannot shed his many absurd tantrums and rhetorical excesses long enough or well enough to permit anyone to evaluate his newest money-making venture (scary movies) objectively.

Pluto Dodged A Bullet?!

[LordPhantom]

[b]Submitter[/b], I seriously doubt that "Pluto" gives a damn what we think of it.
Humans who have some ego/emotion/investment in the idea that Pluto be a planet, well that's another thing.

Re:Pluto Dodged A Bullet?!

[The Angry Mick]

Besides, consider how long Pluto had to dodge the bullet . . . with a bullet having an average speed of 1500 feet per second travelling a distance of 2.66 billion miles taking 1.40448 × 10000000000000 seconds to get there, it's not like it needed lightning reflexes or anything.

Re:Pluto Dodged A Bullet?!

[Toba82]

This isn't fark.

/offtopic
//slashy

Here come the grammar nazis...

[shotgunsaint]

"Some astronomers had lobbied for reclassifying Pluto as its so tiny."
I'm only gonna sing this once.
If it's supposed to be a possessive then it's just I-T-S! But if it's supposed to be a contraction, then it's I-T-apostrophe-S... scalawag!

Rewrite the kid's science textbooks

[davidwr]

Not to mention the children's song about the Solar System.

Bingo!

[ScentCone]

Worry about Iran being on U.N. Human Rights council or what's going to happen on the third season of Lost. Something important.

It's funny you should mention that. ABC's season synopsis says that the upcoming episodes of Lost actually include plot elements that revolve around Iran's suppression of human rights on Pluto through the use of giant, underground, volcano-powered uber-magnets. Although it turns out that everyone's arthritis feels better, so it's sort of a wash.

End of Science and the Modern Age

[transami]

Yep, I called it. Many moons ago I said if they rule it's a planet it means science is dead. Real science doesn't label something based on feel good social acceptance, but strives for as much exactness as possible.

As of now, the modern age is officially over and dystopic post-modern has begun.

Re:End of Science and the Modern Age

[bogidu]

You mean like calling the year 2000 the first year of the new millennium?

Re:End of Science and the Modern Age

[Jeff DeMaagd]

Or you can spin it such that the scientific community doesn't have the balls to admit that they made a mistake. Such is human.

Frankly, I think this whole argument is a bit of a distraction. It strikes me to be a lot of wasted time and energy. What type of object it is called doesn't change what the object is, unless somehow quantum mechanics applis to an object several thousands of km in diameter.

Re:End of Science and the Modern Age

[evilviper]

Real science doesn't label something based on feel good social acceptance, but strives for as much exactness as possible.

Social acceptance is a good metric for whether a classification actually makes sense. Pluto looks, and acts very much unlike asteroids, and much more like recognized planets.

Science, however, really doesn't care about any of this. They will continue calling everything a 'body', as the boundry between planet and asteroid is really of no relevance to any of their work.

Of course, I'd like to hear how "science" defines "motor" and "engine", and how those definitions are not based on arbitrary "feel good" public opinion.

Or perhaps how the rating system for stars is (somehow) possibly not arbitrary.

Re:End of Science and the Modern Age

[Chris Burke]

Yep, I called it. Many moons ago I said if they rule it's a planet it means science is dead. Real science doesn't label something based on feel good social acceptance, but strives for as much exactness as possible.

Pfft. Science dies when people start thinking that everything can, should, and must be defined solely through rigorous scientific exactness. Not everything can, should, or must be given an exact classification and therefore the attempt to force such classifications introduces innaccuracy, inexactness, and feel-good social acceptance but labels it science, ruining the very thing that was striven for.

You have to learn that a name is just a name, and "planet" isn't scientifically well-defined. If anyone was doing real calculations regarding Pluto, then they'd use its measured properties with as much exactness as possible, not the properties implied by the term "planet".

Re:End of Science and the Modern Age

[khallow]

As of now, the modern age is officially over and dystopic post-modern has begun.

Before you waste any more of our time, please define "dysytopic post-modern age". And please be "exact". Currently, I get the impression that it's the same as the "modern age" only with a different label.

Re:End of Science and the Modern Age

[Alsee]

Pluto looks, and acts very much unlike asteroids, and much more like recognized planets.

I agree that Pluto does not look or act much like an asteroid, but I disagree that it looks or acts much like the recognized planets. The recognized plaents are the rocky planets plus the gas giants, and they all formed and lie in the planetary plane. Pluto looks and acts like thousands of other Kuiper objects. Kuiper objects are not formed in the same manner. Kupier objects do not lie in the planetary plane, except perhaps by sheer chance. Kupier objects have a distintly different composition. Kupier objects are enormously numerous. Kupier objects appear to continuously vary down to tiny sizes.

A comet is a very different object than an asteroid. A rocky planet is basically "giant asteroid". Pluto and other Kuiper objects are a heck of a lot more like "giant comets" than "giant asteroids".

Social acceptance is a good metric for whether a classification actually makes sense.

Yeah, but it is only in the last few years that anyone knew that Pluto was merely the first body of an entirely different zone. Pluto was accepted as an "oddball" off-kilter "planet" simply because there was no known better catagory to stick it in. It's only in the last few years that we discovered Quaoar and thousands of other bodies in a new zone, and that bodies in this new zone look and act different than the usual planets, and that Pluto looks and acts far more like this new catagory than it looks or acts like a planet. Instead of Pluto being an oddball off-kilter icy planet, it is instead merely the closest, but otherwise typical, Kuiper object.

"Social acceptance" that Pluto obviously fits in this second different catagory will come naturally as school kids grow up learning that there are 8 planets lying in a nice neat plane (4 rocky planets and 4 gas giants), and that farther out there is a cloud of thousands of randomly swarming icy bodies (giant comets). Students will likely learn the names "Pluto" and "Quaoar" as the largest and most famous objects in this group, much the same way students may hear the names "Ceres" and "Vesta" as large famous asteroids.

There's no reason not to call Quaoar a planet (and likely hundreds or thopusands more) if to do call Pluto a planet. There's an easy obvious dividing line between Uranus and Pluto... but no easy logical dividing line between Pluto and Quaoar and the rest.

(1) 4 Rocky planets in the planetary plane (miniature = rocky asteroid)
(2) 4 Gas Giant planets in the planetary plane (no miniature version)
(3) thousands of randomly tilted icy bodies (miniature = comet)

-

It's the same reason aspirin is non-prescription

[davidwr]

History and inertia.

People have called Pluto a planet for 70-odd years now. That's a lot of nostalgia to overcome.

If Pluto were discovered today it probably wouldn't earn the mark. If aspirin were invented today it would probably be prescription-only.

Moola

[jrmiller84]

I wonder how much a membership costs

Wronge dept

[Anonymous Coward]

Guys, file planet naming stories under the joke category. Or fold astronomy into the joke category. For the sake of science, you know.

Re:Heartwarming

[exp(pi*sqrt(163))]

war, disease, famine, and poverty killing thousands daily

Much of it caused by people fighting over beliefs in non-existent entities. I think my sympathies lie with the people arguing peacuefully about things that actually do exist.

Glad To Hear

[gomaze]

I am thinking Natalie from SportsNight is going to be in high spirits over this news.

What is Sedna, then? (No, not Xena)

[remsleep]

Xena has really stolen the spotlight, and it seems everyone has forgotten about Sedna. If Kuiper belt objects are now planets, then why should we exclude planet-like objects in the Oort cloud? http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~mbrown/sedna/

Why not fix the "official" number of planets

[lildogie]

Well, that would be like legislating the value of pi, wouldn't it?

Re:Why not fix the "official" number of planets

[susano_otter]

Not really. "pi" is a mathematical constant, that describes a specific, precise, and unmistakable relationship between a platonic circle and its radius.

"Planet", on the other hand, is an arbitrary term, convenient for differentiating between different types of celestial bodies, but not actually bound to a specific natural phenomenon or physical law or mathematical principle.

Dodged a bullet?!

[techstar25]

If Pluto needs to worry about damage from bullets, then it must be a lot smaller than I thought. Maybe they should reconsider.

Let's just end the discussion

[DaveM753]

Blow it up!

Doesn't qualify.

[Minstrel Boy]

Any object maneuverable enough to dodge a bullet can't possibly be considered a planet.

KeS

Who Freaking Cares

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm an avid amateur astronomer so I don't say this with disdain for the topic of space in general but: "who freaking cares how THEY decide to classify if". This is just like the biologists spending endless hours trying to fit some abnormal beast into one of the human-imposed classifications. Classifications are only useful "en masse", to understand the major shared features of a large group of individual things. Spending time making sure every individual fits in one group or the other is counterproductive. Obviously the choice had to be made, but all this fanfare just suggests to others that the classification itself is somehow important when it is not..... and now I've spent time ranting... blah.

Nope, you're wrong

[geekoid]

There not just saying Pluto is a planet, there saying objects within this size are a new classification.

" but strives for as much exactness as possible."
when you create a group, by definition not everyting in that group will be 100% defined by the group name.

It puts a silly arguement to bed. Thats all.

I don't really think there is a scientific term for 'planet' any how.
Do you bitch that a gas giant is called a planet?

Find your dystopia elsewhere.

We should feel sorry for Pluto...

[PenguinBoyDave]

I mean heck, it would probably be the first planet to be demoted. How frigging humiliating. Kind of like being the first schmuck voted off Survivor and having to appear on the finale.

I'm pretty sure that

[porkchop_d_clown]

Vesta and Ceres were considered planets before astronomers realized how many asteroids there were.

Re:I'm pretty sure that

[john83]

Much as I hate to quote Wikipedia when we're discussing a scientific topic, here's a quote from the Vesta entry and the discovery section of Ceres entry. It makes for quite interesting reading.

After the discovery of Vesta in 1807, no further asteroids were discovered for 38 years. During this time the four known asteroids were counted among the planets, and each had its own planetary symbol.

Ceres was discovered by accident. Piazzi was searching for a star listed by Francis Wollaston as Mayer 87 because it was not in Mayer's zodiacal catalogue in the position given (it eventually transpired that Wollaston had made a mistake -- the star was in fact Lacaille 87). Instead, Piazzi found a moving star-like object, which he thought at first was a comet.

Piazzi observed Ceres a total of 24 times, the final time on February 11, when illness interrupted. On 24 January 1801, Piazzi announced his discovery in letters to fellow astronomers, among them his fellow countryman, Barnaba Oriani of Milan. He reported it as a comet but "since its movement is so slow and rather uniform, it has occurred to me several times that it might be something better than a comet" [4]. By early February Ceres was lost as it receded behind the Sun. In April, Piazzi sent his complete observations to Oriani, Bode, and Lalande in Paris. They were shortly thereafter published in the September, 1801 issue of the Monatliche Correspondenz.

To recover the asteroid, Carl Friedrich Gauss, then only 24 years old, developed a method of orbit determination from three observations. In only a few weeks, he predicted the path of Ceres, and sent his results to Franz Xaver, Baron von Zach, the editor of the Monatliche Correspondenz. On December 31, 1801, von Zach and Heinrich W. M. Olbers unambiguously confirmed the recovery of Ceres.

Johann Elert Bode believed Ceres to be the "missing planet" that Johann Daniel Titius had calculated to exist between Mars and Jupiter, at a distance of 419 million km (2.8 AU) from the Sun. Ceres was assigned a planetary symbol, and remained listed as a planet in astronomy books and tables (along with 2 Pallas, 3 Juno and 4 Vesta) for about half a century until further asteroids were discovered[5]. However, Ceres turned out to be disappointingly small, showing no discernible disc, and so Sir William Herschel coined the term "asteroid" ("star-like") to describe it.

That reference five is When Did the Asteroids Become Minor Planets, and is worth a read too.

You hit the nail on the head

[geekoid]

there is no definition based on size.

I could just as easily argue that saturn isn't a planet, it's a gas giant.

Re:You hit the nail on the head

[Anonymous Coward]

Jupiter is a failed star. We need to encourage it and rebuild its self esteem so it can grow up and be a real star someday.

Errr. Okay.

[porkchop_d_clown]

Please give us a scientific definition of a planet that includes Mercury but excludes Pluto and Titan.

"Planet" - like "hacker" has always been a very vaguely defined term and meant different things to different people. The line between "planet" and "Kuiper belt object" is as blurry as the line between two species of galapagos finch.

Re:Errr. Okay.

[Alsee]

It's hard to make a "universal" and detailed definition based on a single known solar system, but our solar system appears to be clearly delineated into three distinct zones. The inner zone is the rocky planets, from Mercury out to the asteroid belt (with asteroids apparently having a very wide and distinct sub-size divide below planetetary size class). Then there are the gas giants, Jupiter out to Neptune. And then the outtermost volitiles/icy Kupier belt objects.

Separate names for the rocky bodies and gas giant bodies would be reasonable, but grouping them together under one superclass "planet" is also reasonable and is well established. Draging Pluto in under the heading of planet gives no reasonable dividing definition to avoid dragging in an enormous number of other Kuiper objects of continuously diminishing size.

Kuiper objects (including Pluto) also appear to have a some other characteristics that divide them from "planets". For example it appears that the rocky planets and gas giant planets form and lie in a very strict planetary disk, while Kuiper objects form very differently and they ignore the planetary plane. So one could even define "planet" pretty much on the basis of that planetary plane, yet still exclude some random object in the middle of the Kuiper zone that merely coincidentally lines up with the planetary plane.

At this point I don't think tossing out hard defining numbers is appropriate. We just haven't seen enough sample planets to know exactly where the natural dividing lines tend to be. But we do see enough to know that these three rocky/gas/icy-volitiles classes of bodies exist and appear to be clearly divided Pluto appears to be clearly in a different class than the other planets, and Pluto clearly appears to be in the same class as an enormous number of Kuiper objects.

I don't think we should leave the "planetary dividing line" open to a limitless number of continuously shrinking Kuiper objects, and I don't think we arbitrarily lay the line between Pluto and the second icy body for the sole reason of protecting a few decades of tradition calling it a planet. There seems to be a very clear line between Uranus and Pluto, lets use it.

-

As susano said...

[porkchop_d_clown]

"Pi" is a mathematical discovery, "planet" is a social construct. "Planet" can't be defined any more precisely than other social concepts like "art" and "obscenity".

It's no big deal, really. No doubt when we reach other stars, we'll classify their planets according to which solar planets they resemble - and that will be as useful as any other definition.

Historical importance...

[posterlogo]

Pluto really has more of a historical importance than anything else. We do have good definitions of what a planet is (condensed remnants from star formation's accretion disk), and it should be pretty easy to prove that Pluto does not fit the bill. Size is not the important thing -- Mercury isn't huge, but it certainly is a planet. I guess NASA's New Horizons mission should help clear this up in a decade or so, but I don't think that will have to result in changing the status of Pluto -- leave it alone as a planet (even though it isn't), purely for historical reasons. The search for an object to help explain discrepencies in Neptune's orbit formed a major part of Pervical Lowell's life, and he made significant contributions to astronomy. I think the IAU astronomers may want to leave Pluto a planet as an honor to those who discovered it at a time when such discoveries were very difficult. More and more KBO's will be discovered, but will inevitably be farther and farther away. So -- 9 planets it is, even though it's really 8.

Nonsense.

[porkchop_d_clown]

The truth of the matter is that Pluto is a KBO but every time the popular press runs an article pointing that out, astronomers are flooded with calls from Auntie Mabel demanding to know where they get off changing what she learned in school.

This isn't even remotely like a dispute between two theories - it's a simply argument over nomenclature and science has no problem at all simultaneously supporting multiple naming conventions.

And that, in the end

[porkchop_d_clown]

is really the only effective stance to take. Pluto was called a "planet" because we didn't know about KBOs and now people are used to calling it a planet. Since I strongly doubt we're going to bother naming all the KBOs we will discover, why worry about it?

Pluto dodged a bullet?

[Cro Magnon]

Wow, it must be even smaller than I thought!

Re:Pluto dodged a bullet?

[swordgeek]

Not smaller, just much more agile. And let me tell you, agility counts!

Summary Stinks

[Anonymous Coward]

Did anyone else notice that the summary read like it was written by a 12 year old? 'its so tiny', 'big meeting' etc?...

The problem is not with just Pluto

[ChrisA90278]

People seem to be mising the point. The problem here is not to vote on if Puto is a planet or not. The problem is to define what is a planet. Many people have proposed ways to define "Planet" but then what you apply the proposed definition to our solar system yu get undesired results. Almost every resonable proposed definition results in a solar system with either 8 planets or more than 9. Next problemis that you want your new definition to "work" outside the our solar system on the 100+ planets that have been discovered around other stars.

Re:The problem is not with just Pluto

[Baron_Yam]

A planet should fit the following

1a) Orbits a star or
1b) Has a common center of orbit shared with another body that is outside both their masses, and orbits a star (this covers double planets, but not our Moon)
2) Has enough mass to maintain a roughly spherical shape (ignore the little stuff)
3) Has insufficient mass to produce heat (ignores the near-stars & stars)
4) Does not share its orbit with other bodies (excludes 'belts', regardless of object mass)

I imagine I've missed a few things. You'd need a name for big rocks not orbiting a star, to begin with... even though we're unlikely to ever find any because they're not lit up, and they're tiny.

It seems silly that the current argument is more geared to 'how do we define a planet to keep the Solar System at 9 planets' instead of 'we need to define a planet and that might change how we categorize bodies in the Solar System'.

That's no moon

[Anonymous Coward]

When asked for comment, Pluto gave this cryptic reply "Brr! I'm cold!"

New solar system

[Per Abrahamsen]

It would be a good chance to introduce a better model of the solar system for the teaching purposes.
The solar system consist of the Sun, the inner rocks, the asteroid belt, the gas giants, the Kuiper belt, and the Oort cloud.
This would probably give a better picture of the solar system, than the old model with a sun and nine planets.
(For historical resons, the inner rocks, the gas giants, and the first discovered object in the Kuiper belt, are called planets).

Ymir was a giant . . .

[j_w_d]

not a midget.

Pluto, the definition of a planet, and the IAU

[chongo]

BTW: This is not intended to be a complete history of the topic, I'm only pointing out a few highlights that others might find interesting.

A number of years ago, the question of a definition of a planet was raised as a result of discoveries of "planets" outside of our solar system as well as a growing number of Kuiper Belt Object (KBO) discoveries in our solar system. The IAU Division of Planetary Systems Sciences technical committee wisely chose to delay a decision on a definition until a more significant body of data was obtained.

In the mean time, a well meaning but widely misunderstood suggestion from an esteemed Astronomer suggested that the planet Pluto also be given a nice round minor planet number (i.e., reserve the next multiple of 10000). His intent was to recognize the special nature of Pluto as a large member of the KBO (Kuiper Belt Object) family. He never intended to demote Pluto from planet status. However, the press took the phrase "making Pluto a minor planet" and blew the controversy way out of proportion.

An executive committee recommendation on Planet definition was formed to draft a proposal for a definition of a planet. Minutes from the IAU executive committee indicated that they favored definitions that were based on measurable physical properties over arbitrary values. For example, they signaled that they were NOT inclined to look favorably on proposals such as "limit the number of 9 planets", or proposals that set an arbitrary minimum size of a Planet.

Last January at the AAS conference, an IAU liaison announced that the IAU executive committee was scheduled to produce a report on its recommendations just prior to the IAU 26th IAU General Assembly in Prague (Aug 14 to 25, 2006). The liaison recommended that any final comments and recommendations be submitted to the exectuive committee at least a month prior to the IAU general assembly.

I was part of a group that submitted a recommendation that the definition of a Planet encompass a requirement that "it must orbit a primary fuser with sufficient mass to deform it into an spheroidal / oblate spheroidal shape". We realized that our proposal could result in redefining several bodies as planets including the large asteroid Ceres. We proposed that a new sub-class of Planets could be defined (again based on measurable physical properties) to acuminate these new dwarf planets.

We were told that a number of other groups had submitted similar of very similar proposals. I have not examined the executive committee report in detail, however it appears that IAU executive committee agrees, in principle, with such proposals.

On Tuesday 2006 August 22, 12:45-13:45 (local Prague time), in Forum Hall, executive committee recommendation on Planet definition will be presented. Based on the unanimous recommendation of the executive committee, I am hopeful of a favorable outcome form the IAU General assembly.

Canonization.

[EnsilZah]

Sounds like canonization to me.
People arguing for and against the title, an official body deciding.

Geeze, just come up with a definition for a planet and stick with it.
Or just decide that whatever enough people call a planet is one.
You can call it a giant-dirtball-of-doom for all it matters.

Held together by gravity=yes. Chemisty = no.

[mc6809e]

It's been suggested that the best way to decide what is or is not a planet is to determine if the mass is held together the force of gravity or electrostatic forces (like metal bonds).

If by gravity then it should be considered a planet. If by chemisty then it's just a hunk of rock.

This makes the most sense to me.

Re:Held together by gravity=yes. Chemisty = no.

[Anonymous Coward]

There are asteroids that are loose piles of rubble that could very easily be shaken apart, yet the agglomeration of rubble is held together by its own gravity. Almost all asteroids include some dust on the surface held on by gravity.

Your proposal doesn't have a clear planet/non-planet line, and even if you somehow propose a threshold we'd have to investigate in great detail (probably seismography) to work out if any given lump of rock is a planet.

As an aside, molecular (gas) clouds are held together by their own gravity! You wouldn't get one orbiting a sun (they'd evaporate, plus they're too big), but it's something to think about.

This debate is stupid anyway. Labels only have meaning for shallow people.

Re:Held together by gravity=yes. Chemisty = no.

[SamSim]

Um, everything in the universe is held together, to some extent, by gravity. There's no threshold mass before gravity starts affecting things.

parent post overrated

[Travoltus]

Don't we already say enough crap on here to scare off geek women? *rolleyes*

Re:parent post overrated

[Cornflake917]

I totally agree.

*Goes back to masturbating to a Night Elf*

Re:parent post overrated

[Buran]

I mostly haven't been scared off yet, although the amount of sheer crap posted on here by a lot of people puts me off joining into the discussions much of the time.

Re:parent post overrated

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't expect to see many High Kings of Ireland posting again either :(

Thanks a lot grandparent post!

I've solved it in under 5 minutes

[FreeUser]

OK, here's the answer. Make the definition arbitrary and exact, using values we can measure and be certain of, that won't change with whatever the planet-formation-theory de jour is.

1. A planet is an object that orbits a star and has a mass greater than X and has a radius large enough to not be a black hole
2. A moon is an object that orbits a planet, planetoid, or astreroid
3. A planetoid is an object that orbits a star and has a mass greater than Y but less than X, and has a radius large enough to not be a black hole
4. An planetesimal is a rocky object that orbits a star and has a mass less than Y, and a radius large enought o not be a black hole.
5. A star is an object that burns (more precise definition of nuclear processes to differentiate between brown dwarf and star can be inserted here)

Now, please feel free to fight to the death over appropriate values of X and Y. And frankly, who gives a shit whether pluto is a planet, planetoid, or planetesimal? It's not like it is suddenly going to fall out of orbit because it doesn't like our definition.

The most important criteria

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course Pluto is a planet. It has an associated Sailor Senshi -- Sailor Pluto.

Keeping the solar system in line with beloved anime series is by far the most important criteria.

A proposed definition

[Phat_Tony]

Not that anyone cares, but I propose the following definition for a planet:

- Its primary orbit must be around a star
- It must be approximately spherical due to its own gravitational field being sufficient to make it so (the allowable eccentricity from a perfect spheroid would have to be defined)
- It is not itself a star

I see the following potential problems with this:

- It may be hard to judge shape accurately enough to tell if an object is close enough to spherical to qualify
- There may be very soft things that stay gravitationally round even when very small (what happens to a drop of mercury in space?)
- Given something such as a spheroidal asteroid smaller than Pluto, it may be difficult to distinguish if it's randomly spheroidal or spheroidal due to its own gravity.

Still, I like it better than other definitions I've seen.

Now proceed to tear it apart, add to it, etc.

Then why is there a problem?

[Chris Burke]

The problem is to define what is a planet. Many people have proposed ways to define "Planet" but then what you apply the proposed definition to our solar system yu get undesired results. Almost every resonable proposed definition results in a solar system with either 8 planets or more than 9.

If there are so many reasonable definitions of a planet, then that tells me that there is not a fundamental, useful difference between the objects that may or may not be included in the set of planets. Stars, planets, and comets are fundamentally different objects, and identifying something as one of the three conveys useful information. Possible planet of size A vs possible planet of size B is not a fundamental difference. Do any of these proposed definitions of "planet" vs "planetoid" convey truly useful information in the same way "reptile" vs "mammal" does? If not, it's really just a matter of human naming convention, and I'm perfectly happy with a rough definition of planet such that Pluto is a planet while some other, possibly larger object is not.

Re:Then why is there a problem?

[jc42]

Stars, planets, and comets are fundamentally different objects, and identifying something as one of the three conveys useful information.

Actually, one of the problems is that Jupiter and Mercury are such fundamentally different objects that using a single term for both means that the term "planet" is not very meaningful. This is why scientists haven't developed a strict definition. Terms that general are mostly useful for informal speech; they have little value in technical discussions.

For another example, Mercury is more like Luna and Ganymede than it is like Earth. And Earth is more like Titan than it is like Mercury. Part of the problem here is that "orbits the sun" isn't a very useful property. If instead of Luna as Earth's orbital companion, we had a gas giant, it would make our night sky more spectacular. But wouldn't change the Earth at all, even though Earth would be a "moon" instead of a "planet".

All this is part of the earlier observations that this isn't a scientific question at all; it's a lay (and media) pseudo-controversy.

The only reason the IAU got involved is that the media (and /.) kept getting distracted by the issue, so it interferes with good science journalism.

Hurray For Pluto!

[Warg! The Orcs!!]

I like Pluto sooooo much I think that all the tiny ice "planets" should be called 'Plutoids'

Definition

[christurkel]

To me a planet is an object this large enough to be round, never has had fusion in it's core and orbits it's star in an orbit clear of debris left over over from it's birth. Pluto would be in, Ceres out.

Support in rhyme

[dthree]

Here's a song that 2 Skinny J's did (live, kind of a rough recording) where they support the definition of planethood for pluto.

"So lend me all ears and let me state my case,
about all the types of satellites we must embrace "

Re:Support in rhyme

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting. Pity it's unintelligble garbage from a musical point of view.

Re:Support in rhyme

[dthree]

Yeah, I think it was recorded with a 20 year old walkman, and the band had no monitors.

Anyway, here are some probably accurate lyrics

Another debate rages

[pgfuller]

Meanwhile in the Empire of Superconducting Intelligences debate rages as to whether those rocky 'inner' planets and moons should be reclassified. Are they Plutoids that strayed too close to the central star or were they simply formed in the wrong place to begin with. Proponents argue that any place that is too hot to allow for Argon to freeze and therefore support superconducting life cannot be regarded as a planet and instead belongs to the realm of Hot Glowing Objects (HGOs)that ranges from minor stars such as Jupiter to those hellishly hot infernos of 'Earth', 'Venus' and 'Mercury'. Grand high inquisitor JargorFingleBishamRagnakarf MCLIX of the Stellar Region Observatory says that it is really a minor issue and only of interest from a historical perspective. Eventually of course the argument is irrelevant since the HGOs will be swallowed as the star undergoes expansion in the forthcoming 10 billion years or so. Says JargorFingleBishamRagnakarf - "We'll wonder what all the fuss was about and only a few academics will care at all".

But we're running out of greek/roman gods.

[Ungrounded Lightning]

I think Pluto should retain its status as a planet.

If that means we need to declare more things planets, to be fair, that's fine with me.

Of course we're running out of old gods' names to borrow.

So lets name the next two "Mickey" and "Goofy".

Then Pluto can have the distinction of being a member of BOTH naming systems. B-)

The problem with the vote is this:

[Anonymous Coward]

It is immediately followed by a question that is so tangentially offtopic that it tends to cloud the more important issue.

When you load a new roll of toilet paper, do you load it so it dispenses tissue over the roll or under the roll?

Sorry, all these Uranus jokes got to me...

Criteria

[jafac]

Should not be based on size alone, but should also be based on spin, complexity of orbital perturbations (and I understand that Pluto's orbit is fairly unique in many ways).

Because my wife always told me that it's not size, it's the technique.

Recognizing a planet, reminds me of

[swordfishBob]

We're back. Here's the news. All the news that's new and approved by the US Army...
the sweetest-smelling army in the world.

Great Britain recognized the island state of Singapore.

How do you recognize an island? Do you go, exc-- Hey, wait. No, don't tell me.

Wait, wait. Didn't we meet last year at the Feinman bar mitzvah? You look a lot like Hawaii. Didn't we meet last year at the Peninsula Club? No.

Is the Moon is still A moon ?

[Anonymous Coward]

If being a large celestial object in orbit around the sun is required to be a planet,
then the Earth's moon, the Moon. is not a moon but a planet. The Moon orbits the sun in a
closed, perturbed ellipse, never accelerating away from the Sun. IE technically The Earth and Moon
are in a co-orbit around the sun and one is not strictly orbiting the other. all the conventional moons in the solar system accelerate away from the sun toward there 'planet'

yes, yes the our moon is just barely bound to the Earth. Space 1999 was only a billion times wrong, not a trillion.

g.

What would Clyde say?

[Terminus32]

...i'm sure he'd be turning in his grave!

MOD PARENT TROLL!!

[Lissajous]

Like OMFG you're a grrl?? Really??!! Send pic N0Wz0rz!!!!!!!!!!! a/s/lhangonaminutethisisslashdotnevermind....

--
See what happens when you *do* join in?

Truthiness.

[I am Jack's username]

When Ceres was discovered it was considered a planet. After several other asteroids were discovered, making Ceres just one object in a belt of similar object, the big ones lost their planet status.

When Pluto was discovered it was considered a planet. After several other Kuiper belt objects were discovered, making Pluto just one object in a belt of similar object, we get:

"I think we have done something that will make the Plutocrats and the children of the United States happy." - Gingerich

"People love Pluto, children identify with its smallness. Adults relate to its inadequacy, its marginal existence as a misfit." - Dava Sobel

How about we let historians keep making the children from the USA happy, let writers continue relating to Pluto's inadequacy; and let scientists call Pluto just another KBO until they have more information? Kinda like how a lay person would call an untestable idea "just a theory", while scientists keep faffing around with their theories of evolution, anthropogenic climate change, etc.?

Re:Truthiness.

[Alsee]

let scientists call Pluto just another KBO until they have more information?

What more information do you want?

I'd say it's well established that Pluto is an ordinary KBO, with the single most notable fact that it just happens to be the first and most famous KBO. There is virtually no one who thinks that hundreds or thousands of KBOs should all be considered planets, and virtualy no one who thinks that "arbitrarily toss in the first KBO" makes a reasonable definition for planet. I don't understand what "more information" you want or expect. The only real argument for keeping Pluto as a planet is to protect a few decades of public tradition. I don't think that is a good enough reason, but in any case waiting around for "more information" doesn't really have any bearing either way on that argument.

Kinda like how a lay person would call an untestable idea "just a theory", while scientists keep faffing around with their theories of evolution, anthropogenic climate change, etc.?

Maybe I'm misreading you, but you seem to be implying that evolution and anthropogenic climate change are "untestable just a theory"-s. If so, then you simply have no familiarity and appreciation of the science. Both have been subject to exhaustive tests, and both have been overwhelmingly supported by those tests. Both are considered to be absolutely confirmed by essentially 100% of the actual professional experts in each field.

Saying that evolution and anthropogenic climate change are "untestable 'just a theory'"-s is just plain false. In fact I have PERSONALLY run experiments and personally witnessed the proof that the process of evolution does in fact work and that it does in fact spontaneously organizes random variation to create new usefull complex structured information. Evolution has been tested and cross tested in a thousand different ways.

Not only has anthropogenic climate change been tested, but denying it basically amounts to a denial of basic physics. Basic physics: sunlight passes down to the earth through the atmosphere. Basic physics: thermal radiation gets trapped by the blanket of various (greenhouse) gasses in the atmopsphere. Basic physics obvious to a second grade child: if you make a blanket thicker, then it gets warmer under the blanket. The natual blanket of greenhous gasses already keeps the earth about 50 degrees warmer. If the greenhouse effect weren't real and didn't exist, the earth would be an iceball. Humans have increased the CO2 in the atmosphere from a level of 200-something to nearly 400, and we have dumped lesser amouts of other far more powerful greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. In order to seriously dispute anthropogenic climate change one would need to come up with some explanation why this would mysteriously have no effect at all. For two decades or more, there has been essentially scientific no dispute of anthropogenic climate change at all. For two decades or more, the only actual science questions have been "how big is it" and "what effects will it have" and "what other factors are involved". Thouse are complex and widely argued questions. But there has been no seriosu scientific argument over the reality of anthropogenic climate change a long time now.

If something is "untestable" then it is completely hollow wild speculation. You can certainly engage in wild speculation in the brainstorming stage of science, but wild speculation is not science, wild speculation never qualifies as real accepted established science. Evolution and anthropogenic climate change are not wild speculation. Evolution and anthropogenic climate change are accepted established science. Evolution and anthropogenic climate change are exhaustively tested and supported science.

-

Re:Truthiness.

[I am Jack's username]

virtualy no one who thinks that "arbitrarily toss in the first KBO" makes a reasonable definition for planet

Scarily, in 2005-10 "A narrow majority of 11 [of the IAU's working group] members favoured deeming anything larger than 2000 kilometres a planet.". Pretty arbitry, tho 2003 UB313 would be allowed to join Pluto.

The eminently better definitions: "any object in orbit round the Sun whose shape is stable due to its own gravity" and/or "any object in orbit round the Sun that is dominant in its immediate neighborbood" received only 8 and 6 votes (approval voting) respectively. What I was trying to say in my post is that this desicion seems to be based on making school kids in the USA happy and crap about identifying with a misfit planet, instead of, logical thinking (I think, option 3).

The "more information" I was talking about was about Ceres being a planet, but loosing that status under option 3; being applied to Pluto, the other KBOs being that more info. What is or isn't a planet isn't as important as the fact that "tradition" is an idiotic reason for defining what a planet is. I think tradition is fine for defining what gods or souls are tho - for people who haven't figured out how good the scientific method is.

As for "evolution, anthropogenic climate change", I was being sarcastic and that in the same way that flat-earthers/IDers/ACC-deniers think "theory" is just any old idea; "planet" for them could be something that includes Pluto, but ignores new KBOs or Oort cloud objects that are several times bigger, on the ecliptic, and in it's own empty orbit. Because, well, Pluto has always been a planet, and they don't wanna learn about no new planets.

Re:Truthiness.

[Alsee]

Ah, sorry. I totally missed your sarcasm. Chuckle.
That misunderstanding probably colored my entire post. Ok, seems like we're on the same page on pretty much everything.

-

Better Headline

[ash1213]

Pluto hasn't dodged any bullets yet since the plan isn't even approved yet. But if it was adopted, the headline would not be "Pluto Saved" it would be:

"Definition of planet expanded to include 'Dwarf Planets' such as UB313"

OR the tabloid version:

"Xena named 10th planet!"

You missed my point.

[porkchop_d_clown]

I understand planetary astronomy fairly well (I built my own dob, which, I think is the moral equivalent of a PHd in astrophysics (I'M KIDDING ABOUT THAT PART)).

Anyway, my point was that the 9 planets cover an incredibly broad class of phenomena and that there's no good scientific reason to try and squeeze them all into a single classification.

The only reason for giving Pluto and Jupiter the same classification is historic and social. Now, that is a powerful reason and should not be ignored, but it has no place in science itself. This whole controversy is due to the collision of culture and science and miscommunication between the two.

Spiffy.

[porkchop_d_clown]

Okay, for the second part. Please explain the scientific value of your definition and why the IAU would want to lump all orbiting bodies into one group instead of, say, defining several classes of stellar companions, ranging from gas giants on the large side to KBOs on the small end.

Re:Spiffy.

[FreeUser]

Okay, for the second part. Please explain the scientific value of your definition and why the IAU would want to lump all orbiting bodies into one group instead of, say, defining several classes of stellar companions, ranging from gas giants on the large side to KBOs on the small end.

do both. "planet" as a generic term, specific types of planets, planetoids, etc. in parallel. We already do that with gas giants vs. ice giants vs terrestrial planets.

Ssssshhhh!! You're blowing it!

[porkchop_d_clown]

The IAU's whole plan in this is to create a new classification, "dwarf planet" that sounds enough like the old classification that outsiders won't complain. If you go around pointing out that "dwarf planet" != "planet" you might ruin everything!

Come on guys, admit it...

[i41Overlord]

You know who you are- you know that there's someone out there that will spout technobabble for 5 pages and fight viciously to keep Pluto a planet... all because Pluto is your favorite planet.

IAU Congress live transmission

[oookcz]

Hi, it is possible that today (August 24th 2006) will IAU issue the final decision. Visit Live broadcasting announcement portal to tune up live transmission from Prague. MK

Was time to have a strict definition.

[Nowhere.Men]

With the next generation of telescope, we should be able to see earth size planets around other stars than our sun.

In a few generation, we may see Pluton size objects.

In Our Solar system, we may see shoe size object around pluto. Would that be a moon of Pluto?

Teatcher : What are the name of the 394956874 moons of Neptune?

Re:Was time to have a strict definition.

[susano_otter]

With the next generation of telescope, we should be able to see earth size planets around other stars than our sun.

And this affects Pluto's status how?

In a few generation, we may see Pluton size objects.

And this affects Pluto's status how?

In Our Solar system, we may see shoe size object around pluto. Would that be a moon of Pluto?

We may indeed. And calling it a Plutonian moon works for me. Do you have a problem with such a thing?

Teatcher : What are the name of the 394956874 moons of Neptune?

Would this be the same teacher that quizzed me on the names of all the asteroids in the Asteroid Belt, the names of all the nebulae in the Milky Way, and the names of all the galaxies in the Universe?