Pluto Decision Meets with Frustration 464
fuzzybunny writes "The BBC reports that the IAU's controversial Prague vote on demoting Pluto from planet status was irregular. 'There were 2,700 astronomers in Prague during that 10-day period. But only 10% of them voted this afternoon.'" On a less serious note, lx writes "Nonplussed by Pluto's recent downgrade from Planet Status, Fox News's own John Gibson does an incredible Stephen Colbert impersonation to correct the 'revisionist history' of the IAU's decision. Exemplifying 'truthiness,' from the article: 'Long ago I learned it was a planet and I see no reason to unlearn it. Why should I?' "
No reason to unlearn it? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:No reason to unlearn it? (Score:5, Insightful)
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Long ago I learned it was a planet and I see no reason to unlearn it. Why should I?
Actually I don't know why Pluto got itself unmade as a planet. I didn't even read the rest of the story, frankly.
I wouldn't be surprised in the slightest if Stephen Colbert quoted this articl
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John Gibson is just pissed off that someones with no accountability to the public decided to redefine 'the facts'.
The only thing that has changed about Pluto is its classification, 'the facts' are still the same.
You'd think someone at Fox News would know that defining 'the facts' is more important than 'the facts'.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1141096,00.h tml [guardian.co.uk]
Re:No reason to unlearn it? (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh yes dear me, because information never changes and people should not EVAR be required to use their brains after their youthful indoctrination.
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>Oh yes dear me, because information never changes and people should not EVAR be required to >use their brains after their youthful indoctrination.
isn't that what religion is all about - that the "almighty" is absolute and no debate is allowed ?
thank goodness i dont belong to brain-washing propaganda-spewing groups, frequently known as "bible study"
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isn't that what religion is all about - that the "almighty" is absolute and no debate is allowed ?
On the contrary, I'm pretty sure that religion allows debate. Granted, there are tenets in a given religion which are to be adhered to, but people are allowed to ask questions. The exact "rules" as it is seem to be very open to debate and actually rather vague in some cases.
Look at how many different sects there are in all religions. People in the organizational structure are always arguing and debatin
There is no scientific reason to unlearn (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:There is no scientific reason to unlearn (Score:4, Insightful)
well what has actually happened is that nomenclature has caught up with the facts. The new(ish) fact is that there is a big belt of pluto like objects in similar orbits to pluto. The final straw came when it was discovered that pluto wasn't even the biggest in that belt.
It's also useful in education, because we ask our kids to learn the names of the planets, not every body that orbits the sun. There is really very little useful value in writing new textbooks here.
well you could say there is very little value in teaching our kids the makeup of the solar system at all. After all its not as though any significant number of people leave earth and the only bodies with significant impact on everyday life are the sun and moon.
what we have really discovered here is that pluto was not a one of a kind in a pretty unique orbit but part of a belt of very similar lumps of rock. School textbooks talk about the asteroid belt but not ceres in particular. Similarly they should talk about the kuiper belt but not pluto in particular.
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And certainly not during
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And if other bodies ( such as xena )...
Wow.
That just sparked a minor epiphany. IIRC, Xena was a mortal woman who acquired the power to destroy the Gods. And now her namesake celestial body has demonstrated the similar power of destroying a planet named after one of those Gods, by stirring up a bunch of astronomical hot air many AU from its center of gravity. That's heavy, dude. I mean, isn't it amazing how reality recapitulates fiction?
I think "Xena" should definitely become the official name of this
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'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful tone,' it means just what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less.' 'The question is,' said Alice, 'whether you can make words mean so many different things.' 'The question is,' said Humpty Dumpty, 'which is to be master - that's all.'
Bully for Brontosaurus.
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People are just unfamiliar with the concept of namespace. I have no trouble in accepting that Pluto is a planet in the mainstream namespace and it is or isn't (I'm waiting until the dust settles and we get a decision) in the scientific namespace.
A
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Another exemple of people not groking namespaces is the "it's just a theory" rethoric. Theory does not mean the same thing for scientists.
My favorite example of this is "quantum". A while back, I read a story about a company that had just had a "quantum leap" in in
Re:No reason to unlearn it? (Score:5, Funny)
Pluto downgraded. President still fucking Goofy.
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Re:No reason to unlearn it? (Score:4, Funny)
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A modest proposal... (Score:3, Funny)
In memory of Pluto, 1930-2006
Beloved 9th planet of our solar system, dwarf planet, and now intercosmic dust, we will remember you...
...wait... (Score:3, Insightful)
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So wait.. let me get this straight. Fox News is trying to copy a show that is a direct parody of the Fox News network? There's got to be some irony in there somewhere.
There's probably a patent being violated somewhere...
summon the army o' lawyers!
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Re:...wait... (Score:5, Funny)
Wait, I'm confused. Is this guy copying Colbert or slashdot?
In Other News... (Score:2, Interesting)
After the ambush by the Dwarf Planet camp, on the last day, the IAU appears ready to fragment into smaller sub-unions, or dwarf unions.
Meanwhile, astrologers going out of their minds over the contentious issue of what constitutes a planet, how many of them there are and how it will impact births, weddings and divining portents, have finally had enough. This evening Seoul, Mumbai and San Francisco are in flames as astrologers and their clients rampage.
today's lesson: if you don't like the result of t
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They are astronomers. Any two numbers within an order of magnitude are equal (on an astronomical scale). Thus 472 = 270 = 2,700/10
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I don't get this either - that's from a quote from a Harvard professor who drafted the proposal to increase the number of planets. From somebody from such a background, I'd hope for more accuracy - even if he'd doubled that figure, it'd have been closer (since the actual figure is ~15.7%).
It's also interesting that, out of the two quotes in the article against this decision, one is from somebody leading a mission to Pluto, the other is from somebody who helped
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I guess he's using the definition of "percent" that ended as a draft proposal, because it was "better".
Pluto (Score:5, Insightful)
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A whopping majority, don't you think? If it had been in an American election that is - which it BTW wasn't, for you who haven't rtfn.
Re:Pluto (Score:4, Insightful)
Why? Well, first of all it's a lot of fun to argue about stuff like this--and I never could resist a good argument. It's too bad, though, that the astronomers turned this question into a pissing contest--shows they don't know how to have a proper argument. A vote, for cryin' out loud! Now if you want to see the fur fly with panache, call in the philosophers.
Seriously, there are some interesting astronomical questions that are brought up by this "is Pluto a planet?" debate. When Clyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto, astronomers were expecting to find another planet, because there were some irregularities in the motions of the known planets that could only be explained by more mass out beyond Neptune. So when Tombaugh spotted Pluto, everyone shouted "hurray", the problem was solved, and we had nine planets. Only it wasn't quite solved--Pluto didn't have enough mass to really account for all the observed perturbations. Well, at least that's what I remember reading about Pluto...feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.
Eventually, I think astronomers--and normal human beings--will come to a consensus, and I believe that consensus will indeed confirm Pluto's debasement. Like the guy in one of the articles said, Pluto just isn't that big, so if it qualifies for planet-hood, then a lot of other rocks do too. Clearly, that would get too confusing--it was bad enough just having to remember nine planets...think of the children!
One thing that makes this such a productive argument is that it forces us to acknowledge that the solar system is a more complicated--and vastly more interesting--place than we thought. I think that's a good thing...even if it means the last true thing I learned in school has just gone down the tubes.
I'll tell you what, though--while we're cleaning up astronomical nomenclature, let's do something about The Unmentionable Planet--you know the one just this side of Neptune, which was discovered to have rings around it. Ever since that joke went around, no one has been able to say--or even think--the name without dissolving into a fit of hysterical laughter. My personal favorite solution is to Greek-ify the spelling and pronunciation a bit to render it harmless: maybe "Ouranos".
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Jesus, did people in the 1850s cry this much when Ceres was downgraded?
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It feels almost like they're finally fixing a mistake made 70 years ago.
But since people more often than not resist change and there are so many different opinions on this, this is an impossible matter to define (and I believe we need stricter definitions with the late Trans-Neptunian Object discoveries) without upsetting groups of people. Bear in mind that some complaining about this may be people that would rather hav
Re:Pluto (Score:4, Funny)
How about this? (Score:5, Insightful)
Pluto: Neptune's Canada (Score:5, Funny)
Much like how the United States still refers to Canada as a soveriegn nation, instead of a 51st state.
Re:Pluto: Neptune's Canada (Score:4, Funny)
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Define a planet as 'one of the nine classical planets, or any body meeting the following definition'
Problem solved already.
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Although it's interesting that we don't seem to have a proper definition of "moon" other than being a natural satellite of a larger object. In fact, the same problem is occurring as more and more "moons" are discovered - for example, 45 of Jupiter's 63 moons was discovered since 2000, and includes "moons" only 1 km across! ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jupiter's_natural_sat e [wikipedia.org]
Re:How about this? (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:How about this? (Score:4, Insightful)
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They were called planets for quite a bit of time. There's a number of precedents for such demotion.
bad diet? (Score:3, Funny)
Well then, it sounds like they need more fiber.
I learned everything I need to know on Fox News (Score:5, Funny)
Don't fret it. Long ago Romans learned it was a god. They didn't have to unlearn it. Their empire simply collapsed.
We got it wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
Long ago I learned it was a planet and I see no reason to unlearn it. Why should I?
Because we were wrong. It's orbit is incredibly un-circular, it wildly off the plane of the solar system, and it's smaller than the moon! It never belonged in the pigeon-hole we've labelled "planet".
Part of science is accurate classification. We can't label something just because we want to.
Re:We got it wrong (Score:5, Insightful)
Exactly! It's like saying "I learned the earth is the center of the universe and I see no reason to unlearn it." It's plain and simply factually *wrong*, and people who react this way betray an alarming inability to accept new facts, instead clinging onto their pre-existing notions with near *religious* ferver.
Yes, that last bit was flamebait.
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I firmly believe that geological features and activity should define the lower bound of what we call planets. Pluto has a atmosphere during parts of its year, and most like
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Yes, but *no other planetary object* has such a highly elliptic, inclined orbit. Pluto is the only one. I think that's sufficient reason to believe that it belongs to another class of objects (Kuiper belt objects, to be precise).
Also, Saturn's moon Titan is bigger than the planet Mercury, so si
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So you're saying tradition doesn't matter?
Yes, I am. Tradition has no place in science. We can't keep believing that the Earth is flat just because it's traditional.
This is a change in definition, not in knowledge (Score:5, Informative)
The people who want to stick with Pluto as a planet are at least as rational and justified in their belief as the people who want to change it.
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It's difficult to be wrong about a definition especially when we lacked one.
It is possible to be wrong, however, in statements like: "Pluto is so similar to the eight planets that it deserves the same name." - because it isn't really similar at all, and so therefore it doesn't.
Considering... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Considering... (Score:5, Informative)
As such:
See this [nineplanets.org] for more.9planets.org? (Score:3, Funny)
boy are they pissed. time to get a new domain eh?
Re:9planets.org? (Score:4, Informative)
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Check it yourself! (Score:3, Informative)
Item 4.7.3. "The case of Pluto and Neptune" explains why they will never collide, and gives the source code for implementing the simulation. Sorry, it's in BASIC, but you can easily reimplement it in Perl or Python, or whatever your favourite langage is, it's just one page of code.
Recount (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Recount (Score:4, Funny)
He says he is "committed to helping deliver the Republicans to Pluto next year".
Reclassifying Astronomers (Score:2)
Personally I think Pluto makes a fine 9th planet.
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Persoanlly, I think the whole planet category idea is flawed.
orly (Score:5, Insightful)
Before five hundred years ago [wikipedia.org] I learned that the Earth was flat and I see no reason to unlearn it. Why should I?
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It took over 50 years to locate Pluto. I think that calling Pluto a "planet" is, among other things, fitting recognition of the countless thousands of astronomer-hours that eventually led to its discovery.
Anyway, I don't care if we wind up with 100 planets in the Solar System. I like planets.
A question of fairness and integrity (Score:5, Interesting)
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My favorite definition of politics (verb): "V
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Yup; that's the way it's usually done. Most scientific fields have an international organization for deciding classification and terminology issues, and changes are usually made after the members vote in favor of the changes.
Of course, this is typically done rather differently from the typical political vote. There is a general consensus among scientists
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LOL. Most of the astronomical objects I study have about 15 names. See this one, for instance:
MRK 0586 aka KUG 0205+024 aka 2E 0526... [caltech.edu]
But voting on a definition of an unscientific word?
Scientists have their own definitions of words like force, mass, gravity, charge... now add "planet" to the very long list.
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Two things really bothered me about this decision, and neither of them are the decision that Pluto is not a planet, but have to do with the way the decision was made.
1) When asked about applying this definition to other stars and their potential planets, the committee that proposed this definition said that the definition on the table only applies
John Gibson == dumbass (Score:5, Interesting)
He says, "All of a sudden Ringo isn't a Beatle? All of a sudden somebody changes a standard and Curly isn't a stooge, or Zeppo isn't a Marx, or Ari isn't one of the "Entourage"? Actually I don't know why Pluto got itself unmade as a planet. I didn't even read the rest of the story, frankly."
My god. Yeah, because Ringo Starr's status as a Beatle hinges on statistics and his orbital ellipse, just like Pluto's. Look out for that 'Two Stooges' DVD also. John Gibson sounds like a prick -- if our understanding of the universe evolved John Gibson's way, we might still be afraid to fall off the edge of the world, or the Sun might still rotate around the Earth. The changing of 'standards' is inevitable as a better understanding of the universe becomes available. The more technologically advanced we become, you can bet laws, theories, and yes, even TEXTBOOK PRINT may become outdated.
(Note: this rant directed toward John Gibson's stupid 'rebuttal,' regardless of the IAU decision whether Pluto should be considered a planet or not.
Why? (Score:4, Interesting)
Ever look at the price tag on a Textbook?, those things are expensive.
To pay for the textbook publishers political action committee.
Think of the money that will need to be spent by schools for new science textbooks; just after they got done replacing them to give equal space to 'Intelligent Design'.
You might think it's unimportant, but when the federally mandated standardised test asks how many planets are in the Solar System...
Dear Stephen Colbert... (Score:5, Funny)
Revisionists! (Score:2)
The prague convention reclassified it, they didn't "invent" anything, he just conjures up his own version of what happened and denounces it as a revisionist act based on no authority whatsoever. It's actually precisely the reaction I'd expect from a person like Gibson and he shows his superficial apreciation of the scientific process by publishing it. I bet he was pissed when the french standardised the meter too.
Oh, an
NASA's new mission: to set foot on a planet (Score:5, Insightful)
(2) looks OK, but the IAU folks have taken the (IMHO) insane view that a "dwarf planet" is not a subtype of "planet" at all (contrast "dwarf pine tree" or "dwarf sunflower" or "dwarf hippopotamus", all of which are subtypes of their source nown). That destroys a potential way to finesse the Pluto issue -- by calling it a dwarf planet, they could have let everyone have their semantic cake, and eat it too.
On a different note, another scientist friend of mine just told me his six-year-old daughter burst into tears when she found out Pluto isn't to be considered a planet anymore. :-(
Re:NASA's new mission: to set foot on a planet (Score:5, Informative)
Earth is not a planet, because it has not cleared the neighborhood around its orbit -- there exist Near-Earth asteroids and Earth-crossing asteroids. (One might argue that this is getting worse, what with all the space debris we keep flinging into near-Earth solar orbit).
To quote a response from Wikipedia: Even if you don't neglect the Trojan asteroids and other such objects, all the gas giants have cleared their orbits. The Trojans are at very specific points along Jupiters orbit that are defined by Jupiter's gravity. If Jupiter hadn't cleared its orbit they would not be restricted to those points. A massive body collects all bodies near it either into itself, its orbit, its L4 and L5 points with the sun, into resonant orbits, or it ejects them. Its just like cleaning your room. It doesn't mean nothing is in your room, but simply that it's all neatly put away.
Also, I highly recommend that you read this paper [arxiv.org].
Neptune and Pluto (Score:4, Informative)
Correct decision, IAU, well done
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Think of the children.
The last thing we needed in this debate.
Oh wait. Mentioning Nazi's too. These IAU guys are acting like nazi's in their ruthless decision process, aren't they?
OK, I'm done.
Only 10%? (Score:2)
Back in the day (Score:5, Interesting)
"I grew up with eight planets. Now some know-nothing radicle tells me there are nine? This 'planet' Pluto is nothing but a rock of ice in space."
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Wasn't it? I thought the talk started as so many TNO's were discovered in the Kuiper belt. Where some were almost like Pluto clones too. But maybe you would've rather had these added to our solar system instead. Or maybe you wouldn't want any change at all, proposing a static solar system model and being blind to observations made after 1930 saying e.g. Pluto is pretty much a caught Kuiper belt object. Heck, in the 30's, people hadn't even direct
Never should've been a planet anyway (Score:5, Insightful)
Now we've discovered UB313, Sedna, Ixion, Quoar and others, and it's clear that Pluto's only the most prominent representative of the Kuiper belt, just as Ceres is the most prominent member of the asteroid belt. The media that are causing this furor are ignorant of the real issues involved and seem merely interested in running stories about Mrs. Johnson's 3rd grade class being upset about Mickey's dog.
Pluto is still there. It's still the same size and mass it always was, and New Horizons is still going to visit it. But it never would be called a planet if it were discovered today.
Way to end the debate (Score:5, Funny)
This is not a scientific matter (Score:3, Insightful)
I got so worked up I wrote a song about it. (Score:3, Funny)
(Sing it to the tune of "Always a Woman to Me" by Billy Joel)
They can harp on its size
They can call it a dwarf planet
And they can say that it's wise
To just keep on ignorin' it
They can say it's remote
And just too hard to see
They can talk about Pluto
But it'll always be Yuggoth to me
No, the Mi-Go are far
from concerned what we say to it
Put your head in a jar
And they'll fly you away to it
And you'll learn how to speak
Buzzing just like a bee
Blame it all on Lovecraft
'Cause it'll always be Yuggoth to me
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"Most ridiculous", eh? I would point out that CNN's "Latest News" banner carries links to the following stories, any one of which will make you stupider than reading about a meeting of astronomers:
# JonBenet suspect to face court Monday
# Former President Ford undergoes angioplasty
# DNA shows
MOD UP (plus my own two cents) (Score:3, Insightful)
As s20451 points out, this has been a week full of idiotic bullshit. In a week where the JonBenet thing dominates the news, I think griping out Pluto getting a few minutes of coverage on the nightly news is really that much of a disaster.
But unlike the JonBenet crap, this Pluto case actually touches on something that *is* interesting. I didn't RTFA (c'mon, this is slashdot!) but the summary sounds pretty familiar. As stated above, conservatives see this as one more example of how the pinko-commie-libera
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sadly.
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At least in my life, it was the Terri Schiavo "story".
As Manson said, "I was crazy when crazy meant something". Well, I remember when controversy was controversial.
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My Very Energetic Mother Just Served Us Nachos. (or Nine Pizzas for the Pluto fanatics).
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My Very Exotic Mistress Just Showed Up Nude.
Now that's news.
Re:PLUTO IS STILL A PLANET (Score:4, Funny)
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The other random rocks had to be included (for consistency) if pluto was to be declared a planet. I don't believe any of them had regular orbits, nor wre they properly spherical. Meanwhile, they were as big or bigger than pluto.
So yeah. Lose Pluto, or accept Xena. Your choice.