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Vote Makes It Official: Pluto Isn’t What It Used to Be
The New York Times ^ | August 25, 2006 | DENNIS OVERBYE

Posted on 08/25/2006 10:52:01 AM PDT by neverdem

Pluto got its walking papers yesterday.

Throw away the place mats. Redraw the classroom charts. Take a pair of scissors to the solar system mobile.

After years of wrangling and a week of debate, astronomers voted for a sweeping reclassification of the solar system. In what many of them described as a triumph of science over sentiment, Pluto was demoted to the status of a “dwarf planet.”

In the new solar system as defined by the International Astronomical Union, meeting in Prague, there are eight planets instead of nine, at least three dwarf planets and tens of thousands of so-called smaller solar system bodies, like comets and most asteroids.

For now, the other dwarf planets are Ceres, the largest asteroid, and an object known as 2003 UB 313, nicknamed Xena, that is larger than Pluto and, like it, orbits beyond Neptune in a zone of icy debris known as the Kuiper Belt. But there are dozens more potential dwarf planets known in that zone, planetary scientists say, and so the number in the category could quickly swell.

In a nod to Pluto’s fans, the astronomers declared it to be the prototype for a new category of such “trans-Neptunian” objects, but declined in a close vote to approve the name “plutonians” for them.

The outcome yesterday completed a stunning turnaround from only a week ago, when the assembled astronomers were presented a proposal that would have increased the number of planets in the solar system to 12, retaining Pluto and adding Ceres, Xena and even Pluto’s moon Charon.

The reversal, said Dr. Alan P. Boss, a planetary theorist at the Carnegie Institution of Washington, speaks to the integrity of the planet defining process.

“The officers were willing to change their resolution,” Dr. Boss said, “and find something that would stand up...”

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: astronomy; astrophysics; planets; pluto; solarsystem; xplanets
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To: neverdem

Pluto is a planet and I personally don't care what a bunch of dimwits on a committee say it is or isn't because now they make the rules! Its been a planet for 75 years and is still a planet.


21 posted on 08/25/2006 11:31:53 AM PDT by Bommer
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To: neverdem

I want the next dwarf planet to be named Dopey, or Grumpy, or maybe Doc (but only if it looks intelligent).


22 posted on 08/25/2006 12:07:55 PM PDT by USFRIENDINVICTORIA
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To: USFRIENDINVICTORIA
What is to keep another group from releasing a statement that Pluto *is* a planet?

With people like Barbra Streisand, and Harry Reid, and Bela Pelosi around, absolutley nothinig.

However, the IAU -is- the chief governing body (in the scientific sense) for the world's astronomers. What they say, goes.

It won't happen overnight, but I think the law has been set.

23 posted on 08/25/2006 12:20:27 PM PDT by Izzy Dunne (Hello, I'm a TAGLINE virus. Please help me spread by copying me into YOUR tag line.)
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To: neverdem
Representatives from the outer planetoid Sedna were also in Prague petitioning the International Astronomical Union that their body be granted planetary status; however with the recent decision re: Pluto, the result was not unexpected. The lead representative of their delegation gave the following comments:


I took our letter to the IAU,
They put it in their stack.
Bright 'n' early next morning,
They sent our letter back.

They wrote upon it:
"Return to Sedna -- status unknown.
No such planet, go on home."
Hey, we're not Quaoar .... bigger than that
I wrote for details but my letter keeps coming back...

Again I dropped it at the Union
And marked it special "D"
Bright 'n' early next morning
It came right back to me.

They wrote upon it:
"Return to Sedna -- status unknown.
No such planet, go on home."

So I guess we're gonna-
Return to Sedna....
Return to Sedna....
Return to Sedna....

24 posted on 08/25/2006 12:28:01 PM PDT by mikrofon (Your Friday Earworm)
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To: neverdem
the new solar system as defined by the International Astronomical Union

Is this real science or is it like the man causing global warming crap?

25 posted on 08/25/2006 12:38:28 PM PDT by MosesKnows
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To: neverdem

"Pluto, the tribe has spoken." Poof.


26 posted on 08/25/2006 12:41:19 PM PDT by AHerald ("Do not fear, only believe." Mk 5:36)
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To: MosesKnows

It's gotta be a Global Warming issue. That President of ours...what a joker he is.


27 posted on 08/25/2006 12:42:12 PM PDT by truthluva ("Character is doing the right thing even when no one is looking" - JC Watts + Arbua is a cesspool)
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To: Hannibal Hamlin

My old roomate's doctoral dissertation showed how a trans-solar body made Pluto from a moon of Neptune (capture-release-capture). Or could have made, anyway. I can't remember how far back in time the trajectories had to go to make it work, but he did graduate :)


28 posted on 08/25/2006 12:43:02 PM PDT by Technocrat
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To: Bommer
Pluto is a planet

I tend to agree. A planet is a nonluminous celestial body larger than an asteroid or comet, illuminated by light from a star it revolves. Exactly what part of that definition does not describe Pluto?

In 1999, International Astronomical Union (IAU) reaffirmed that Pluto was a planet because of its size and its satellite, something no comet was known to have. What has changed?

29 posted on 08/25/2006 12:49:12 PM PDT by MosesKnows
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To: neverdem

>>...the International Astronomical Union, meeting in Prague...<<

The U.N. of astronomy.


30 posted on 08/25/2006 1:17:18 PM PDT by SerpentDove (Just think what Reagan would have done, with both houses of Congress.)
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To: neverdem
With Pluto no longer a planet, the saying to remember the planets in order from the sun no longer works:

Mary's Violet Eyes Make John Stay Up Nights Pining.

Now it has to be: Mary's Violet Eyes Make John Stay Up Nights....wondering what the hell happened to Pluto!

31 posted on 08/25/2006 2:20:00 PM PDT by Road Warrior ‘04 (Kill 'em til they're dead! Then, kill 'em again!)
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To: Izzy Dunne
Pluto was voted off the solar system...

Planetary deconstructionism.

(And Pluto is pourer for it.)

32 posted on 08/25/2006 4:31:01 PM PDT by nonsporting
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To: Technocrat

Planets tend to clear out their region eventually; nothing would have broken Pluto or Pluto's own moons away from Neptune. Pluto is more likely one of the (sub)planetary bodies in Neptune's region that did not get collected into Neptune nor sent elsewhere like happened with other such bodies because the harmonic resonance of its orbit is such that Pluto is always ans always has been elsewhere when Neptune comes by.


33 posted on 08/25/2006 4:37:40 PM PDT by RightWhale (Repeal the law of the excluded middle)
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To: Bushbacker1
Bushbacker1 said: "Mary's Violet Eyes Make John Stay Up Nights Pining."

My Very Elderly Mother Just Sold Us Nine Planets... Neptune!

34 posted on 08/25/2006 4:44:59 PM PDT by William Tell (RKBA for California (rkba.members.sonic.net) - Volunteer by contacting Dave at rkba@sonic.net)
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To: neverdem

I think I would have preferred to have 12 planets instead of 8.


35 posted on 08/25/2006 4:51:18 PM PDT by Centurion2000 (Islam is a subsingularity memetic perversion : (http://www.orionsarm.com/topics/perversities.html))
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To: RightWhale

That's what I told him, but he wanted to go with a third body solution. It does have a certain draw, since Pluto is so far out of the ecliptic...


36 posted on 08/26/2006 8:57:28 AM PDT by Technocrat
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To: neverdem
My Very Excellent Mother Just Served Us Nachos?
37 posted on 08/26/2006 9:00:05 AM PDT by Rightly Biased (Valor is a Gift.Those having it never know for sure whether they have it till the test comes)
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To: Technocrat

But, if in the model we allow objects to come from outside the solar system and pass through disrupting everything they can before they continue on their way, we could come up with a lot of possibilities. Those objects could be very large and very fast, and could be on the point of coming through right now; we couldn't spot them ahead of time and certainly couldn't do more than watch what happens.


38 posted on 08/26/2006 9:02:31 AM PDT by RightWhale (Repeal the law of the excluded middle)
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To: neverdem

How do you make something in the universe disappear? It is still Pluto. It is still there. The next thing you know they will be trying to tell us that humans are causing global warming. Sheessh. This people are really something.


39 posted on 08/26/2006 10:19:03 PM PDT by BJungNan
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To: Bushbacker1

I always remembered the planets by "My Very Eager Mother Just Served Us Nine Pizzas" Now she will have to serve us noodles


40 posted on 08/27/2006 1:19:00 PM PDT by ccwoman
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