The argument is not whether or not a particular sort of planet should or should not exist, but that our solar system does NOT predict what we should find around other stars. Our solar system seems, by comparison, to be a unique anomaly that should not exist. (Keep in mind that the popular idea of the formation of our solar system was proposed in the 1700s by the mystic Emanuel Swedenborg.)
These new discoveries begin to give some credence to the “Saturn Myth” (David Talbot) wherein long ago the Earth and Mars were moons of Saturn, from which Venus was expelled due to something unknown happening which may or may not have caused the creation of the existing solar system (which was previously like the ones observed around other stars) to ‘jump’ or change, moving the planets into the formation we see today.
Interestingly enough, this idea of Earth as a moon of Saturn would account for the single large landmass located around the current South Pole and for the ability of dinosaurs to stand up right without being crushed by Earth’s current gravity (The Problem with Big Dinosaurs).
Ping
The landmass that makes up Antarctica was not in the polar region during the age of dinosaurs. But the fact that the earth could have been a moon of the nearest gas giant is interesting.