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Our Moon Could Become a Planet
anthemaniac writes "Earth's moon is drifting away from us more than an inch every year. In a few billion years, if the system survives, the moon would be reclassified as a planet under the new IAU definition. You gotta wonder if the astronomers who dreamed this definition up had thought of that."
That's no moon!
In a billion years propably the defintion of planet will have a few thousand updates.
The problem will fix itself in time I guess.
...oh well, forget it, it's still a moon.
...at least the tallest ones.
Reminds me of that old joke telling that a quick computation on the evolution of this distance placed the moon 4 meters away from the earth 65 million years ago and thus explained why the dinausors died.
...and we will still be waiting to play Duke Nukem forever on our Vista machines.
liqbase
Seriously though, the International Astronomical Union better give this a second thought. I may be woefully ignornant on the subjecct but I really don't see why sticking with the current definition is a problem. I wish the article gave more information as to why they're 'fixing' that which doesn't appear broken.
In fact we'll only be able to take one item of baggage, which will be a clear plastic bag containing essential items only.
And no electronic devices. Or Liquid.
Orbiting balls of rock won't even fit through the scanner.
"I would gladly send my kid to this elementary school if they could prove that they could teach concepts like orbital decay and barycenters to to nine-year-olds."
I would only send my kid there if they LEARNED it. I have a feeling they most nine-year-olds would be picking boogers during that class.
If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.-TJ
Nah, we'll all be using Slackware with 2.6 kernel (released a few weeks earlier).
We can just build a new moon. With blackjack. And hookers.
Don't blame me; I'm never given mod points.
People are already arguing over things that may happen in a few billion years? I don't even buy green bananas!
Slashdot Burying Stories About Slashdot Media Owned
In fact, forget about the moon.
It was a joke! When you give me that look it was a joke.
Remember when that radioactive waste dump on the moon blew up and sent big chunks of it all over the place? Yeah, that was some kind of fireworks. Good thing it was on our side of the planet when it happened or we'd have missed all the fun.
Too bad about that moon base that was on one of the smaller chunks. That thing really hauled ass. Oh well, so it goes.
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
The moon does not have to escape the Earth's gravitational pull in order to be re-classified as a planet.
Well thank God for that. My head would probably asplode if they decided Mars wasn't a planet, although the Big Ass Red Round Thing has a nice alliterative ring to it.
KFG
I'm almost 26 and I'm picking boogers right now while reading these comments. (I'm serious)
I am hopefully looking forward to this "Golden Age" in just a few billions of years, when our biggest problem definitely will be the fact, that the moon would be reclassified as a planet under the new IAU definition. ;-)
Greetings,
Chris
"An operating system must operate."
Calling Jupiter a "failed star" is like calling me a "failed super model" - I mean, yeah, there's some similarities between me and a super model but it's extremely unlikely anyone would ever mistake me for one.
IIRC, Jupiter has only about 1% of the mass needed to achieve fusion, so it's a long, long way from being a star. I, on the other hand easily have ten times the mass required to be a super model.
Clear, Dark Skies
If what?
Oh, say does that Star-Spangled Banner entwine / The myrtle of Venus with Bacchus's vine?
Phew!
i ate crayons when i was a kid and now i have two braincells and the blue ones taste nicer
yea it would be annoying if astronomers stopped paying attention to space and only talked about balls and gas
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
Copy paste that post into a wiki then you'll have a source!
Czech language for absolute beginners
Ah, forget about the blackjack too.
Fanatically anti-fanatical
ah, screw the whole thing.
You can't handle the truth.
There once was an orbiting entity /.-ers snickered
Neither planet nor moon in identity
The IAU bickered
It was too close to Earth; no Pluton, pity.
Give a man a fish and you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish, and he'll say "WHERE'S MY FISH, YOU IDIOT?"