Pluto DEMOTED!!!
The decision is made: Pluto has been demoted! One question: HOW MUCH will it cost to edit school books? This money could be used in a much more sense-making way. And to be honest: Most people will still remember Pluto, no matter if it is a planet or not!!!
24. August, 2006 at 20:55
That’s a very good point. Think of all the science books they’ll have to re-write! Go Pluto!
24. August, 2006 at 21:23
You’re kidding, right?
The status of a methane ball orbiting the sun should be decided by the cost of editing textbooks?
It won’t cost anything at all, assuming textbooks are occasionally edited (catch it on the next update) and teachers are willing to explain what changed (a real good opportunity to explain how science works.)
In fact, this is probably the worst argument ever.
24. August, 2006 at 21:26
We should create a new category of Trans-Neptunian Objects called PLANETS!!!, per this blog.
Kudos, Pluto! Win the race!
24. August, 2006 at 21:27
Should this even be an issue?
24. August, 2006 at 21:43
No, it shouldn’t.
Had Pluto remaind a planet, the addition of other traditionally non-planetary objects (like Ceres) would also have required textbooks to be edited.
24. August, 2006 at 22:08
Pluto is still a planet and has not been “demoted”. There is nothing that specifies in law that people must accept the IAU definition and teach it. If you want to accept and teach that
Pluto and Charon are a double planet system and that Ceres, 2003UB313 (aka: Xena), Quaoar, Sedna, 2005FY9, etc.. are planets you are certainly entitled to do so. Just because a group of scientists get together and a small majority agree on a definition doesn’t make it an undisputable fact. The IAU today issued an opinion of what a “planet” is. This opinion was far from universally accepted by the 2000+ scientists in attendance.
If the third part of the definition approved by the IAU is applied (”has cleared the neighborhood around its orbit”)any “planet” with a satellite or satellites, or with asteroids or commets crossing its orbit hasn’t techinically
“cleared the neighborhood around its orbit.” There is no definition of what is the size of the neighborhood around a body’s orbit. What is a neighbohood? 120Km, 120,000Km, larger, etc…? Is the neighborhood where the “planet’s” gravity no longer influences the gravity of another object. If so Mars is no longer a planet since Jupiter’s gravity affects it. What is considered “cleared?” Is it all mass or some of the mass has been
cleared? If it is ALL mass then there are 0 planets. If it is some mass, then at what size does an object need to be to be considered “an uncleared object” and the body under question is not a “planet?”
The IAU opinion created even more questions than trying to “solve” one question.
Based on the IAU’s new definition there are only
2 objects that may meet the criteria of planet, Mercury and Venus.
24. August, 2006 at 22:22
Preposterous… in any case it is only a definition, Pluto will still be there for you to watch (e-hem) if you love it that much. But claiming that “If you want to accept and teach that Pluto and Charon are a double planet system and that Ceres, 2003UB313 (aka: Xena), Quaoar, Sedna, 2005FY9, etc.. are planets you are certainly entitled to do so” is just hilarious if not worrisome. Of course you are. As well, you are free to teach that the Sun revolves around the Earth, that the universe is 6000 years old, or that some races are by divine right more “human” than others. Feel free to believe that. Do not feel free to teach that. And please don´t get anywhere near my kids if you really insist in teaching it.
I know I am taking it too far… but the sentence was verbatim. Amazing.
24. August, 2006 at 22:27
Indeed! That money used to edit textbooks should be saved! Likewise, textbooks which mention the Brontosaurus need not be edited! And if we find a new gas giant out there, orbiting beyond Neptune? Why waste money editing textbooks to add that?
24. August, 2006 at 22:32
Funny, I never heard of the Brontosaurus hoax, so I learned the wrong name at school …
24. August, 2006 at 23:36
>Chris L Peterson wrote:
>> Whether Pluto remains a “planet” or not is largely a
>> matter of public usage. I’ll certainly continue to
>> teach the classical nine planets in the classroom.
>> I predict it will be a long time (if ever) before most
>> people stop considering Pluto to be a planet.
Tell the truth. Let them know that Ceres was once thought to be a planet until astronomers came to realize that there were a lot of other objects in the asteroid belt (the gap between Mars & Jupiter.) Once astronomers knew that there were 15 asteroids and that they would be finding many more, they defined the asteroid belt and demoted Ceres from planet status.
I am glad that Pluto & Ceres are now known as Dwarf Planets. I am glad that Vesta, Pallas, and Hygiea will be evaluated as potential dwarf planets.
>It may well be true that among the common people, in the
>vernacular, Pluto might be considered to be a planet.
Probably for the next 25 years.
>Since the “dwarf planets” are still elevated to a status
>higher than run-of-the-mill minor
>planets/planetoids/asteroids, though, one could certainly
>say planets* *includes dwarf planets, and then go on as if
>the *other* proposal had been accepted… Ceres, Xena, and
>probably Sedna and Quaoar too then keeping Pluto company.
I believe that is the point IAU was trying to make. Besides I think a Dwarf Planet and a Planetoid are the same thing.
>Of course, there’s just *one* thing wrong with their
>definition of dwarf planets.
>Although Ceres is the *largest* of the asteroids, it is
>still not a planet, because although all the other
>asteroids are smaller than it, that doesn’t count as
>having ‘cleared’ its orbital neighborhood.
Thus, Ceres is a Dwarf Planet.
>The orbital neighborhood of Pluto isn’t the Kuiper Belt,
>home to Sedna, Quaoar, and Xena. It’s the orbit of
>*Neptune*.
>
>Thus, clearly, Neptune is a dwarf planet.
Neptune is the gravitationally dominant body in it’s neighborhood. This is why Pluto orbits in a 3:2 orbital resonance with Neptune.
Beginning in the 1990s, other trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs) were discovered, and a certain number of these also have a 3:2 orbital resonance with Neptune. TNOs with this orbital resonance are named “plutinos”, after Pluto.
>Then, of course, there are Geographos and Toro. That
>makes Earth a dwarf planet, doesn’t it?
No.
Toro orbits the Sun in an 8:5 resonance with Earth, and a 13:5
resonance with Venus.
Geographos is Mars-crossing asteroid and a near-Earth object. It does not challenge either Mars & Earths gravitational dominance in their respective orbits.
>What about the Trojan asteroids? Clearly, as any fool can
>see, Jupiter is a dwarf planet!
The trojan asteroids (1691 of them) are kept at Lagrange points that balance the gravitational pull of the Sun and Mighty Jupiter. Let’s see Pluto pull that off.
>But it’s the largest planet in our solar system!
Hey, you got one right.
>John Savard
I would like to personally congratulate Ceres for being promoted from asteroid to Dwarf Planet status! This reverses a mistake made 150 years ago.
History will judge us all…
– Kevin Heider
25. August, 2006 at 01:44
Pluto is smaller than the moon. Why should it be considered a planet?
25. August, 2006 at 02:31
The IAU may not think that Pluto is a planet but that doesn’t mean the rest of the world has to agree. In the words of Humpty Dumpty, (from Alice in Wonderland) “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.”
Spread the word, Pluto is a planet whether the IAU likes it or not. In fact I now know there are 12 planets, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Ceres, Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune, Pluto, Charon, and 2003 UB313.
25. August, 2006 at 02:35
Oops, I left out Uranus.
25. August, 2006 at 03:57
Go Pluto!
Down with the IAU!
Pluto is a PLANET!!!
My teacher taught me so!!!
If she was wrong about this… what is next? 2 + 2 = 5????
NEVER!!!!!
Pluto, RESIST! We will never leave you!!!
25. August, 2006 at 05:02
Pluto should totally stay a planet just for the…fact that it is so renowned. Aswesome awesome planet. And you know what. People who demoted it suck.
25. August, 2006 at 06:29
randomperson wrote: “Pluto is smaller than the moon. Why should it be considered a planet?”
By that standard Mercury shouldn’t be a planet because Saturn’s moon Titan is bigger than that planet. It isn’t the size of the object, but how that object appears based on its gravitational pull (enough gravity to make it spheriod) and what it revolves around directly (IE: the sun). The Moon (or more properly Luna as there are many “moons”), though spheroid in shape primarily revolves around the Earth, unlike Pluto which revolves around the sun.
Speaking of Moons, although Mercury and Venus lack satellites one would agree that an object which resolves around the sun, is spheroid in shape, and has moons is most definately a planet. The Pluto-Charon “double planet” has not only the first two criteria, but also have two moons revolving around them, Nix and Hydra which were discovered last year.
25. August, 2006 at 06:32
“Pluto should totally stay a planet just for the…fact that it is so renowned. Aswesome awesome planet. And you know what. People who demoted it suck.”
And Ptolemy’s geocentric universe should continue to be taught as fact in school, since it is so renowned. That rebel Copernicus has no right promoting his new heliocentric heresy! The Catholic Church did right to reprimand that troublemaker Galileo! “Earth moves,” indeed.
25. August, 2006 at 08:31
There is a problem with the historical usage.
For almost 100 years Pluto has been labeled as a planet.
Hwhy is this important you ask?
Well look in ght music world. A Trumpet (as well as other brass ans woodwind instruments) has its pitches label wrong. If you write a C on a musical staff and ask the Trumpet plaer to playu that pitch the sounding pitch will be a Bb - not a C. Why is it this way? Because of the centuries of use by trumpet players to call that pitch C even though it is a Bb, and the extensive collection of music in which the actual pitch of Bb is labled as C.
So you have the same situation here with the Pluto issue - except for the fact that the Trumpet issue has been around much much longer.
So if Pluto can be renamed then all those Cs in trumpet music should be renamed Bb - But I don’t see that happening anytime soon.
Anyways why doesn’t the UIA modify the definiation inorder to have Pluto meet the classification. THe situation isn’t discovering more info about the PLANET - but rather the UIA modifing the definition of one.
25. August, 2006 at 12:29
pluto stays a plane or I K.O. everyone in my way by hitting them on the head with a shotgun. (no ammo)
25. August, 2006 at 12:54
check out my petition here:
http://www.nerdcore.de/wp/2006/08/25/save-pluto/
25. August, 2006 at 13:57
Check out some cool bring back Pluto shirts here:
http://www.cafepress.com/bringbackpluto
My favorite is the ‘vote for Pluto’
Support the little guy!
25. August, 2006 at 19:41
You guys are all great! Head on over to the official Save Pluto site and leave a comment to help sign our petition!!!!!!
http://www.saveplanetpluto.org/?p=1
25. August, 2006 at 20:43
hi, I support PLuto too! In my weblog there`s a campaign to save Pluto, so I, and a lot of others guys, are joining the fight!
greetings from Chile.
26. August, 2006 at 04:29
How do I start a online petition to stop this???
26. August, 2006 at 04:31
The web is a free place to speak! Just grab a domain and start posting!
26. August, 2006 at 04:52
Required reading by an astronomer: The Eight Planets. The writer, Michael Brown, is the astronomer who helped discover Pluto-like non-planetary objects such as Quaoar, Sedna, and UB313.
26. August, 2006 at 13:55
I wonder if anybody has a “personal relationship” to Pluto? Maybe someony had a dog that name or so?
27. August, 2006 at 19:10
Here is a german initiative to send a petition to the IAU: http://www.save-pluto.de
27. August, 2006 at 23:19
Help save Pluto!
http://www.petitiononline.com/solnine/petition.html
27. August, 2006 at 23:43
C’mon guys, go get a life! Why don’t you setup a “Save the AIDS-stricken children of Africa” blog or something more useful. Let the small dirty ice ball be demoted, it has not a slightest importance to anyone, not even you. About the textbooks, are the teachers in the US so darn stupid that they must teach strictly what’s written, can’t they tell the children that this or that has changed????
Sites like these make me laugh when I think they aren’t serious, and fear for the future of man when I am afraid they may be…
28. August, 2006 at 02:15
well that sux, all those ppl that changed it are stupid
29. August, 2006 at 05:07
The problem I have with the last-minute IAU criteria:
Pluto is a Planet
29. August, 2006 at 16:56
The problem I have with the Save Pluto rationalizations:
Pluto is not a planet.
30. August, 2006 at 05:53
The IAU’s new definition of planet says a planet is a body that “has cleared the neighbourhood around its orbit”. Many people do not yet understand why this type of orbital-clearing criterion is so scientifically significant, nor do they understand how this criterion could be clearly quantified. I recommend the excellent and readable paper by Steven Soter named “What is a Planet” (http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0608359). Soter explains why mass dominance is significant. The IAU’s definition is not exactly the same as Soter’s, but it is the same idea, and they both conclude that there are eight planets. Soter defines a planet as “the end product of secondary accretion from a disk around a primary body”. He has a couple of parameters that can measure this. Lambda quantifies the extent to which a body scatters smaller masses out of its orbital zone. Lambda = kM^2/P, where k is a constant, M is the object’s mass, and P is the orbital period. Mass and orbital period are pretty easy to measure even for extra-solar planets. A second parameter is mu = M/m where M is the object’s mass and m is the mass of everything else in its orbital zone. In Soter’s paper, if mu is greater than 100, then the object is a planet. The remarkable thing is that both these measures (Lambda and mu) show an immense gap of five orders of magnitude (!) between the eight main planets in our solar system and all the other debris, like Pluto and Ceres. The log-log plots at the end of Soter’s paper show this gap very starkly. There is no gray area between planet and non-planet. Soter convinced me that nature has clearly sorted solar system bodies into two very distinct classes, the dominant (eight) objects and the non-dominant objects.
31. August, 2006 at 14:31
Lots of school textbooks contain out of date science - in some cases, science that was thrown out 50 years ago. New editions of science textbooks will slowly appear, though not all schools will buy new books, and, in any case, very few school science teachers keep up to date with the latest discoveries, so little extra damage will be done by leaving Pluto in old books as a planet.
31. August, 2006 at 14:45
I don’t know how the system with school books is elsewhere, but here in Austria every student gets new books almost every year. If nothing changes they are re-published, but if they need to be corrected huge costs are the consequence. And we have to pay for that directly or via tax.
2. September, 2006 at 18:24
leave our favourite planet alone! its the PLANET OF HEARTS!
5. September, 2006 at 13:48
Well, thats a new approach “pluto stays a plane” (glopnotishboober). That would be quite good because than the PLANE Pluto could visit us and tell us what it feels …
7. September, 2006 at 17:35
The Kuiper Belt Object Pluto is a dwarf planet with little gravitational dominance over its orbital neighbors. IAU made the right decision.
“After all, it’s not a great idea to let cultural attachments dictate scientific categories.”
http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~mbrown/whatsaplanet/nytimes.html
7. September, 2006 at 23:32
Hear my demoted pluto song!
http://www.purevolume.com/jimmyandthekeyz
Jimmy
8. September, 2006 at 01:12
HEY JIMMY!!! COOL!!!
14. September, 2006 at 14:37
Marla Geha: “Protesters at New Mexico State University where Pluto’s discoverer, the late Clyde Tombaugh was a professor emeritus, argued that because only about ten percent of astronomers voted for the change, the electoral result is unrepresentative. The difficulty with this argument is that astronomy is a diverse field with many different areas of specialization. The majority of astronomers don’t work on planets. It would be like questioning the results of a Republican primary because the Democrats failed to vote….So, why change Pluto’s status now? While I doubt Pluto cares very much about its “demotion,” clearly humans do. The answer is science. New discoveries highlighted a flaw in our nomenclature that needed to be corrected. And while we do not learn anything new by calling Pluto a ‘dwarf planet’, the discussions around its renaming may lead to new ideas about how planets form. Pluto’s downfall isn’t the work of mean-spirited Grinches, it is a necessary part of the same process that got Pluto discovered in the first place.”
- http://www.thenation.com/doc/20060925/pluto
18. September, 2006 at 18:18
Pluto deserves more he’s like the little kid who sits in the corner and does nothing wrong but yet we still pick on him let Pluto rise above this stereotypical choice and shine. AS A PLANET!
20. September, 2006 at 13:49
Are they still sending that probe to Pluto or does this recent decision by the IAU cancel NASA’s plans?
5. October, 2006 at 19:05
lol where I live they still use textbooks that I’ve used in elementary school so it’s gonna take a toll on the expenses of the school having to change the textbooks. But overall, the definition of a planet is man made anyways not a pre-define logic like the earth being round when it was originally thought of as flat.
10. November, 2006 at 07:28
Pluto has been, in fact, “demoded”. No big deal. I prefer that to a 12-planets solar system; full-fledged planets have formed on the same “solar plane” and have non-excentric orbits. Anyway, whatever happens, Pluto is an important and interesting part of our solar system. It will still be visited by the New Horizons probe in a few years. And by the way, introducing the concept of “Minor Planet” has sparket interest for Ceres and other objects of comparable size.
8. December, 2006 at 13:20
I personally would suggest defining 3 types of objects in space:
1 objects big enough for nuclear fusion.
2 objects big enough to be round, but to small for nuclear fusion.
3 objects even smaller.
The first category of objects would always be stars, the second category would be planets if they orbit a star, this would make earth a pretty normal planet, it would make both Pluto and Ceres (which in my opinion is the fifth terestial planet) planets, but would also make earth and moon a double planet, not to mention Jupiter, and in a few centuries this would lead to lots and lots and more lots of planets in our solar system (most notably the oort cloud). A smaller object orbiting a planet would be a moon, but orbiting a star they are just small solar system bodies, and flying loose through space it’s just debris.
The ’schoolbook’ argument is nonsense, there are new prints of those books all the time, just edit it next time you bring out a book. Yes, people will remember Pluto, for now, so what? Does that make it a planet? I don’t like the definition of ‘clearing the neighbourhood’ because it’s to vague, I’dd rather go with something else, but I don’t need to change the definition just because an American discored the chunck of ice we now today as Pluto. Face it, Pluto is one of many round objects out there. You either make them all planets, or make them all something else. If Pluto is a planet, it may be remembered as ‘the first of that type to be discovered’, but it will be no more special then when it isn’t a planet.
6. February, 2007 at 18:40
Harm Niekus wrote:
“1 objects big enough for nuclear fusion.
2 objects big enough to be round, but to small for nuclear fusion.
3 objects even smaller.”
First of all, I would like to say that I found that rather amusing, so thank you for that.
Second of all, you missed an “o” on “to” -
It should be “but too small for nuclear fusion”, not, “but to small for nuclear fusion”.
Now that we’ve had that little grammar lesson, I would like to say that I am entirely in favour of pluto being demoted, and long live Eris and Ceres.
Thank you.