12 Planets?

[crystal]

I will miss pluto, it was allways my fav.....

 

[Templetroll]

k, so the solar system party now has a couple of dwarf planets in it! It won't sell novels but to works for me!

 

[Hypersmurf]

I can dig that... They're essentially using the same proposed rules, but added in, "and has cleared the neighborhood around its orbit."

Although, it seems that's not the reason Pluto was actually disqualified... "Pluto is automatically disqualified because its oblong orbit overlaps with Neptune's."

I'm puzzled. If Pluto is disqualified because its orbit overlaps with Neptune's, why isn't Neptune disqualified since its orbit overlaps with Pluto's?

Isn't Neptune not-orbiting-in-a-swath-of-cleared-space, given Pluto's encroachment?

-Hyp.

 

[Ranger REG]

I'm puzzled. If Pluto is disqualified because its orbit overlaps with Neptune's, why isn't Neptune disqualified since its orbit overlaps with Pluto's?

Isn't Neptune not-orbiting-in-a-swath-of-cleared-space, given Pluto's encroachment?

-Hyp.

Unlike the Bible and fairy tales, the giants always trump the little guys.

 

[Umbran]

I'm puzzled. If Pluto is disqualified because its orbit overlaps with Neptune's, why isn't Neptune disqualified since its orbit overlaps with Pluto's?

No, despite Pbartender's quote, Pluto is disqualified by the definition, not because of the orbit overlap. A number of folks at the IAU, much to my embarassment, gave less-than rational reasons for disqualifying Pluto and other similar objects ("ruining the magic" is not a rational scientific reason, guys!)

Isn't Neptune not-orbiting-in-a-swath-of-cleared-space, given Pluto's encroachment?

No. Because they don't share orbital space. Pluto occasionally comes nearer the Sun than Neptune, but theoir orbits don't actually cross in 3-space (because Pluto's orbit is eccentric and inclined with the ecliptic) - Pluto is never within the space you'd expect Neptune should clear. Pluto's orbit does go back into the space we currently think of as being the Kupier Belt, which isn't clear.

Of course, if we ever find there's an empty gap between Pluto's orbit and hte rest of the KB, we have a planet again

 

[dragonhead]

Apperently they will add xena as the 9th planet as pluto has be come a comet. its a shame because pluto had water on it. move it closer to the sun and vwa-la you have earth anew. i just feel sorry for the future when they see that our 9th planet is named after a tv show. the renameing of stuff to cosby city or republic of sinfeld will be interesting (and people wonder why the youth is dependent on tv)

 

[Umbran]

Apperently they will add xena as the 9th planet as pluto has be come a comet. its a shame because pluto had water on it. move it closer to the sun and vwa-la you have earth anew. i just feel sorry for the future when they see that our 9th planet is named after a tv show. the renameing of stuff to cosby city or republic of sinfeld will be interesting (and people wonder why the youth is dependent on tv)

Um, no. "Xena" is an unofficial name, and it'll be changed when the IAU gets around to naming the thing. It is of the same class of object as Pluto - a "Kupier Belt Object", or "pluton", rather than a comet.

And no, moving Pluto in would not result in Earth anew. Pluto's small (smaller than our Moon), and a low enough density to guess that much of the mass is in frozen gasses, such that if you warmed it up, you'd not hold much of an atmosphere.

 

[Aaron L]

I'm rather hoping that they start naming all the new Kuiper Belt planets after Lovecraft's Great Old Ones... Zhar and Lloigor would make a much better pair of outer planets than Xena and Gabrielle.

Dang that would be cool


Planet Cthulhu!


...planet Azathoth... or do Outer Gods count?

 

[Aaron L]

Well, Occam, you get your wish.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/space/08/24/pluto.ap/index.html

Futher reading on the new definition, though, is interesting.

"Planet" is still not based on details of formation or composition. It is still basically a matter of size:

If it orbits the sun, is round, and is in a wide swath of cleared space, it is a planet.

If it orbits the sun, is round, but doesn't sit in cleared space (like Ceres and Pluto), it is a "dwarf planet".

Other bits that aren't round are "small solar system bodies".

So, basically, a planet is anything big enough to have swallowed up the debris in its orbit.

Ok, so now it goes...

My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us...

Noodles... ?

 

[paradox42]

Dang that would be cool


Planet Cthulhu!


...planet Azathoth... or do Outer Gods count?

Eh, forget the deities themselves- if you go with Lovecraft, then you simply must name the outermost planet Yuggoth.

Actually I remember reading a sci-fi/Cthulhu mythos story about the first human expedition to Yuggoth, with the most intriguing detail to my mind being that the story postulated that Yuggoth was a huge gas giant, even bigger than Jupiter IIRC. Current theories on the 'Planet X' that seems to be perturbing orbits out there in the Kuiper Belt and Oort Cloud suggest that it is indeed something (at least) that massive.