Magazine readers to name newly discovered planet


log in or register to remove this ad


Kaodi said:
The *exceptions* would be any object that is not large enough to initiate fusion, but large enough to emit light, making them dwarf stars...

You probably need to be more specific. Every single body in the solar system emits light, especially in the infrared. Many (including, I believe, all the gas giants) emit more energy than they recieve from the Sun.
 

Umbran said:
You probably need to be more specific. Every single body in the solar system emits light, especially in the infrared. Many (including, I believe, all the gas giants) emit more energy than they recieve from the Sun.
Not to mention the fact that you risk having the exact same problem at the opposite end of the spectrum with a number of quasistellar objects like brown dwarfs and whatnot. When does a large gas giant planet become a brown dwarf, etc.? In fact, although I wasn't aware of this, the IAU has recently released guidelines to this effect for extrasolar planets, but they are problematic. "Planets" that drift in interstellar space (of which some claims of observation have been made, but I don't know if they're confirmed or not) can't actually be planets, for instance, and have to be "sub-brown dwarfs."
tarchon said:
I believe there are now about 7 or 8 total largish ones, Quaoar, Sedna, Orcus, Charon, the three new ones (all of them are pretty hefty), and it looks like there's one other larger than Ceres that hasn't been named.
How in the hell did I miss out on a planetoid officially being named Orcus!? Damn, that's cool! Sounds like I need to start camping on all communications from the IAU's Committee on Small Body Nomenclature again; I'm behind on my Kuiper Belt discoveries! :(
 
Last edited:


Got to go with Yugolo... err... Yuggoth.

*tosses Lovecraft and a bunch of fiends into a box and has them fight over who has the cooler name idea for the new planet*
 

Joshua Dyal said:
I'm behind on my Kuiper Belt discoveries!
Shocking! Absolutely shocking!! Fancy not knowing your Kuiper Belt objects. That's a really serious offence. It's 20 years' hard labour for you. ;)
 


Zander said:
Shocking! Absolutely shocking!! Fancy not knowing your Kuiper Belt objects. That's a really serious offence. It's 20 years' hard labour for you. ;)
I most humble apologize for this grevious dereliction of my duties. I have toh. I ask for the favor that you help me meet my toh.
 


Remove ads

Top