"Xena" To Be Named Eris 167
rdwald writes, "After over a year of hanging in maybe-planet limbo, newly-classified 2003 UB313, nicknamed Xena, now has a permanent name: Eris, goddess of strife. Its moon will be named Dysnomia, after the goddess of lawlessness — in Greek mythology, Eris's daughter — certainly not a reference there... I don't think I'm alone when I say, 'Hail Eris! All hail Discordia!'"
In the same IAU announcement (PDF), Pluto was given its official minor planet number: 134340.
DNA said it best (Score:4, Funny)
You cant use that popular name. We will give it our own name so that you know that its ours, not yours.
Or something like that. My copy is upstairs and I can't be bothered to check.
Not popular?!?! (Score:2)
Who says the goddesses Eris and Dysnomia weren't popular in ancient times? I'm sure the goddesses of strife and lawlessness were widely worshipped by ancient Greek and Roman hooligans, rioters, lynch-mobs and criminals in general.
Re:Not popular?!?! (Score:4, Funny)
We'd have to trace both the Bush and Kennedy family trees back that far to be sure though.
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Eris was popular (if you can call a goddess of strife "popular"), Dysnomia not so much so -- at least in the sense that Eris appears in literature a fair bit. I don't know offhand of any temples to either goddess outside civic complexes. Incidentally, both goddesses are in fact personifications, i.e. eris is the word for strife, dysnomia is simply the word for "bad governance"; but Eris in particular has a respectable provenance and
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I think UB313 was way cooler as a planetoid name (Score:3, Interesting)
Sounds more like a "film noir" or an old german submarine. Eris? It'll immediately be confused with Eros. UB313! UB313! UB313!
Re:I think UB313 was way cooler as a planetoid nam (Score:2)
Re:I think UB313 was way cooler as a planetoid nam (Score:2)
At first I wasn't sure if you meant the asteroid named Eros [solarviews.com] or just the similarity of the name Eros itself (also culled from Greco-Roman mythos). Then I realized it didn't matter because your statement applied regardless. You'd think someone would have thought about potential naming confusion for bodies in our own solar system. My Discordian friends are chortling with glee, though.
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Why not Xena? (Score:5, Funny)
Especially those outfits, that was one of the best parts. I can never get my wife to wear things like that.
You will be missed, Xena.
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Re:Why not Xena? (Score:5, Informative)
Xena -> Lucy Lawless -> Goddess of Lawlessness
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Didn't Hercules and Xena.... (Score:2)
Because.... (Score:2)
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No. Astronomy, like everything else, needs either barely clothed girls or the ability to kill lots of people to get funding. Why do you think they named it Xena in the first place ?
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http://xenaphan.com/Discord.jpg [xenaphan.com]
Good luck making your wife a hot evil midget, though.
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Partial Mystery solved (Score:1)
Come in CowboyNeal, your time has come...
I have no idea about the second one though.
First planet named after an IRC network! (Score:4, Funny)
sweet! First planet named after an IRC network!
Long live EFnet!
bye,
Till
Re:First planet named after an IRC network! (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:First planet named after an IRC network! (Score:5, Informative)
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Spectacles, testicles, brandy, cigars (Score:2)
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Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Monty Python (Score:4, Funny)
There's nothing so odd about that; Kemil Attaturk had an entire Solar System called Abdan.
Re:Monty Python (Score:5, Funny)
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That's no moon... (Score:3, Informative)
...it's a giant golden apple!
Kallisti!
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Though I do give them credit for issuing this on 14 Sept as they no doubt know that Sept 13 does not exist.
Boomtime, Bureaucracy 38, Year of Our Lady of Discord 3172
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Principia [trip23.com] Discordia [ology.org] (visual [principiadiscordia.com])... and there are many sequels, such as the apocrypha [23ae.com] and the errata [orangesquid.net]
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what?
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Yuggoth (Score:1)
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Eros would be better.
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uh oh my horoscope (Score:1)
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The Chinese operate under a lunisolar calendar, i.e., a (Chinese) 'month' is the time-period between two successive new moons. Now, the Chinese do use some solar calculations, but that's only for lunar correction, much like the Hebrew calendar does, and all of India's many lunisolar calendars do. As such, I'm struggling to understand how you deem the Mayan and the Chine
So... (Score:2, Funny)
Hail Eris :) (Score:4, Informative)
Today is Boomtime, the 38th day of Bureaucracy in the YOLD 3172
Hail Eris (Score:5, Funny)
Hail Eris, full of Taste, the IAU is with thee.
Funky art thou among Goddesses, and Blessed is the Golden Apple of thy planet, Eris.
Holy Eris, She who Dunnit, pray for all us humans now, and in the lifetime of our confusion.
Fnord.
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Kind of an appropriate name (Score:5, Insightful)
two kinds of strife. (Score:2)
The poet Hesiod [wikipedia.org] noted in his Works and Days that there were two kinds of Eris [wikipedia.org] and one of them good. The spirit of friendly competition and one-upsmanship on it's own are good for society. Those are the challenges which advance the state of the art. It's lawless harm to others that is dangerous and makes us all poorer. When a thing is destroyed, the world is that much poorer. When things are created, the world is richer. Those
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"Nobody the Spanish Inquisition!"
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Strife and Discord - Xena connection after all! (Score:4, Informative)
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Really ? Do you have links to pictures ? That should be a bigger boom than the Shoemaker affair :).
134340 (Score:3, Funny)
Oh great, (Score:2)
Objection! (Score:4, Insightful)
Moreover, the person who discovered them should have every right to name them wahtever he/she wants. Elitism is unacceptable.
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Dysnomia is Greek, but I've forgotten the name of the Latin counterpart.
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so now... (Score:5, Funny)
Pleas do not take this letter as me being bitter but I must say I am rather upset. I have been there with you during the good times and the bad. I know I am smaller than most other planets, but I never thought you would reject me for it. We've been friends for so many years and now you no longer wish to call me a Planet. Just know that when the astroid comes flying towards you I wont be there to try and stop it anymore. I guess what I'm trying to say is... SCREW YOU!!
Pluto
P.S. Eris, you suck too
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Welcome to the crowd of planet has-beens. And quit bitchin' ... at least you have one of those newfangled Earth satellites coming to greet you. I have yet to get a greeting card from those Earthilngs.
Ceres
Hail Eris (Score:2)
Aww Yeah (Score:2)
Strife and lawlessness, perfect names for the time (Score:3, Funny)
Why did the image of Iraq suddenly flash through my head as I read this?
-Eric
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Shouldn't the moon be named after the goddess of gonads [wikipedia.org]?
Re:Strife and lawlessness, perfect names for the t (Score:2)
So we see the esclation of Order, and an equal and proportionate esclation of Chaos, which is responded to by Order, which is countered with Chaos... and it will continue until the humans involved decide to stop.
Er
FNORD! (Score:2)
Follows the Law of Fives (Score:3, Insightful)
If you add up the digits in the name (2003 UB313, u=21 and b = 2), it adds up to 32, and then if you add up those digits in 32, 3 + 2 = 5. Also, there are 5 non-zero digits in the name of the planet.
Hail Eris! All Hail Discordia!
How am I gonna remember this? (Score:2)
Couldn't they have at least chosen something with a P since they've demoted Pluto?
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but you shouldn't forget ceres and ub313 so it will be
My very educated mother cleverly just showed us nine unusual exhibitionists.
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Pluto is still Pluto (Score:3, Funny)
Just because it has a number doesn't make the name go away. Let's see... I like the "Jelly Sandwich":
Mother Very Thoughtfully Makes A Jelly Sandwich Using No Persimmons... Everyday.
(Earnestly if you don't care for 'Terra')
(Jelly Sandwiches instead of A Jelly Standwich to keep the Asteroids out)
Eris? (Score:2)
Better start looking out for Damocles [wikipedia.org]!
Well, if you lived on Eris anyway...
for those who speak... (Score:2)
So, when we find a stable wormhole nest to Eris - will it be called the Erishole?
Was Pluto not enough, was there a problem with Uranus too? Did you astronomers feel that perhaps there were not enough double entendres already that you had to add potentially many, many more by using Eris?
Sigh, I thnk we should really consider not allowing astronomers to name things anymore. Eris - arse... seriously people!!!
lawless (Score:2, Funny)
A matter of time (Score:2, Insightful)
Hail Eris! All Hail Discordia! (Score:5, Informative)
Pronounciation (Score:2, Funny)
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Hail Eris, etc. (Score:2)
No, you're not [skytonight.com]. In fact, you probably aren't the first either. Slashdot isn't the *only* place that geeks hang out, you know.
No TV show names? (Score:2)
Reposting "jpatters" thoughtful critique. (Score:2)
Some people just seem to have a negative emotional response to the idea that there may be hundreds of planets in the Solar System, and that emotional response seems to be what has won the day here. There is no science behind this at all, it is a definition that is arbitrarily designed to permanently cap the number of planets to a small, manageable number. I see at least two big problems with this, first, the opening up to the possibility of there being hundr
There is no Xena in ancient Greek mythology. (Score:2)
Popular names (Score:2)
All of this is incredibly silly.
I propose that we take an existing planet, say Jupiter, and start calling it the planet "Vagina". A popular affectionate name we can all call it, petition the IAU and write protest songs about.
It will be the Flying Spaghe
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You can't call a planet "Bob"!
Dang (Score:2)
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All hail Eris!
Re:You are alone (Score:5, Insightful)
There are plenty of Discordians around, especially on Slashdot. It's just that whenever someone instructs a Discordian to "all hail Eris", most Discordian's first instincts are to do the opposite. Kind of goes with the territory.
Happily, there are also those like Kierthos, who even rebel against the disorder prevalent in Discordianism[1].
All Hail Discordia!
(Hah!)
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Hail Discordia!
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May Eris provide you with plenty of stuff to keep you busy!
Ratatosk, Squirrel of Discord
Chatterer of the Words of Eris
Muncher of the ChaoAcorn
POEE of The Great Googlie Mooglie Cabal
Tomorrow is official Erisian Eat a Hot Dog Day! (Score:2)
Hail Eris, All Hail Discordia!
FNORD!
ttyl
Farrell