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In June, we broke the news that astronomers might get the chance to vote in September on a new definition for the word “planet,” a wording that will be proposed by a panel that includes historians, educators and other non-astronomers.
Yesterday, NPR’s David Kestenbaum did some nifty digging into what that definition might be. Several of the panel members favor dividing round objects up as terrestrial planets (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars), giant planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune) and a third class that would include Pluto, NPR reported. “We’ll call them dwarf planets or something,” said Iwan Williams, an astronomer at the University of London who served on the panel, according to NPR.
That’s the perfect solution, and one I suggested back in April. While the NPR story does not reveal exactly what will happen, look for the presentation of the new definition to be somewhat sugarcoated, so that it sounds like Pluto is still a planet. In reality, as I explained in April, this will be a rightful demotion for the tiny, way-out and whacky world. Pluto will be lumped with the handful of other diminutive round objects on offbeat orbits out beyond Neptune.
If all goes as it should—meaning if astronomers can put aside their quibbles and vote “yes”—in 20 years Pluto will probably still be popular with children, but rather than being known as the 9th planet, it’ll be known as the first object ever discovered in that sea of dozens or maybe even hundreds of dwarf planets that will have been found by then.
August 11th, 2006 at 2:05 pm
Rather than demoting pluto, I vote for demolition.
August 11th, 2006 at 2:27 pm
I’m just glad we’re finally on the way to visit Pluto, whatever we decide to call it.
August 11th, 2006 at 6:45 pm
If something is a “dwarf planet”, it is still a planet. If they want to demote Pluto, could they not come up with some terminology not using the word “planet”? Mercury could be a “dwarf planet”, it ain’t particularly big, either.
August 12th, 2006 at 8:23 am
The USA will not be happy to lose the only planet they have discovered so a compromise of some sort looks inevitable. Incidentally, the story of how Pluto was named by an English schoolgirl is rather interesting, as I described in my blog last month: http://skymania.blogspot.com/2006/07/pluto-probe-tribute-to-venetia-87.html
August 12th, 2006 at 6:45 pm
But why can’t the other bodies in the Kuiper Belt be named planets also?. It is pretty conceided for these guys to sit in judgment of what is and what isn’t a planet. If it circles the sun in a concentric and somewhat round or eliptical orbit, it is a planet. The circling of the sun is the must important feature. Comets and asteroids do circle the sun but in weird orbits and comets and asteroids are weird shaped as opposed to round planets like Pluto and whatitsname “edna”.
August 12th, 2006 at 7:14 pm
I both listened to and read David Kestenbaum’s piece on NPR on Thursday, and I think author (of the entry above) Robert Roy Britt is missing the point. The soon-to-be-released result (as purported by Kestenbaum) of the IAU’s panel is not a *demotion* of Pluto, but rather a *reaffirmation* of its status as a planet.
An exact quote from Kestenbaum’s NPR piece is as follows: “An international panel has unanimously recommended that Pluto retain its title as a planet, and it may be joined by other undersized objects that revolve around the sun.” How Britt has determined that this constitutes a “polite demotion” is a mystery to me.
Yes, there are classifications to be specified–Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars as “rocky” or “terrestrial” planets; Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune as “gasseous” or “giant” planets; and Pluto, along with possibly Ceres, 2003 UB313 (currently referred to as “Xena”) and others as “dwarf” planets. But the continued reference to Pluto as a planet is key. Simply placing the word “dwarf” in front of the word “planet” does not equate to a “demotion,” any more than referring to Jupiter a “gas giant” would be a PROmotion.
Kestenbaum’s NPR piece speaks for itself. Full text and audio of the NPR segment may be accessed here:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5631291
Perhaps Britt should go back and re-read/listen to it. In the meantime, we can wait for the IAU’s official announcement.
JCC
August 13th, 2006 at 5:57 am
If we have “Terrestrial Planets” why don’t they call the new class “Plutonian Planets” thereby guaranteeing full support from all Pluto-buffs out there?
August 13th, 2006 at 9:02 am
I both listened to and read David Kestenbaum’s piece on NPR on Thursday, and I think author (of the entry above) Robert Roy Britt is missing the point. The soon-to-be-released result (as purported by Kestenbaum) of the IAU’s panel is not a *demotion* of Pluto, but rather a *reaffirmation* of its status as a planet.
An exact quote from Kestenbaum’s NPR piece is as follows: “An international panel has unanimously recommended that Pluto retain its title as a planet, and it may be joined by other undersized objects that revolve around the sun.” How Britt has determined that this constitutes a “polite demotion” is a mystery to me.
Yes, there are classifications to be specified–Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars as “rocky” or “terrestrial” planets; Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune as “gasseous” or “giant” planets; and Pluto, along with possibly Ceres, 2003 UB313 (currently referred to as “Xena”) and others as “dwarf” planets. But the continued reference to Pluto as a planet is key. Simply placing the word “dwarf” in front of the word “planet” does not equate to a “demotion,” any more than referring to Jupiter a “gas giant” would be a PROmotion.
Kestenbaum’s NPR piece speaks for itself. Full text and audio of the NPR segment may be accessed here:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5631291
Perhaps Britt should go back and re-read it. In the meantime, we can wait for the IAU’s official announcement.
JCC
August 13th, 2006 at 4:54 pm
It is embarrassing that in all this time there has been no official definition of the word “planet.” It seems to me that if we’re going to create one, we might as well go ahead and put some other definitions on it. Dwarf, Terrestrial, and Giant (or Gas Giant) would make a lot of sense. Further defining that they have a round shape would keep most asteroids out of the planet definition.
August 13th, 2006 at 6:03 pm
Spiff:
Pluto would remain a planet in the expected plan. But it’ll be demoted to “dwarf planet”status, a category that will likely include hundreds of other small round objects when they’re found. So you’ll have the 8 big planets and a sea of dwarfs. That’s what I mean by “polite demotion.” It does a good job of satisfying all concerns. It’ll be real fun if they find an object in the Kuiper Belt that’s as big as Mars or even (as some astronomers expect) as big as Earth. Even though it’s way out there, it’s sound silly to call such a thing a dwarf, but would it be a terrestrial?
August 13th, 2006 at 7:33 pm
Pluto will always be a planet regardless of its true astronomical nomenclature. There will always be The Nine Planets. This cannot be erased from history by a simple re-classification of everything. History can not be erased. In the US, Rhode Island is just as much a state of the Union as California is a state. Puerto Rico is not a state, but it could be. Is Maine more of state than Texas? Maine was part of Massachussetts at time and Texas was a independent country, yet as it stands right now both are still states. Just as the US has the Thirteen Original Colonies, our home system will always have the Nine Planets, regardless of further additions to the group which inevitably will happen.
Pluto is a planet.
August 14th, 2006 at 4:40 am
Since we already have a category of ‘minor planets’ - the asteroids - then I’d have thought to add a class of ‘dwarf planets’ might simply bring confusion. Perhaps another option would be to call them ‘ice worlds’. I spoke to Patrick Moore about this for my own article http://skymania.blogspot.com/2006/08/pluto-to-lose-planet-status.html and he suggested we should simply call them what they are, Kuiper Belt Objects.
August 14th, 2006 at 10:18 am
In reply to Robert Roy Britt’s response of 8/13:
Again, I think you’re mis-stating the crux of the NPR piece, which is the primary topic of your original post. (Yes, the IAU announcement, when it comes, may not *necessarily* match the outcome that Kestenbaum has projected, but I’m speaking strictly toward what Kestenbaum’s segment leaned toward–and which you commented upon).
In your 8/13 response to my previous comment you mention Pluto’s new “demoted” status will land it in “a category that will likely include hundreds of other small round objects” and “you’ll have the 8 big planets and a sea of dwarfs.” However, Kestenbaum’s piece clearly quoted Iwan Williams as stating, “We’re talking about no more than four or five new planets.”
It seems to me that you’re attempting to take Kestenbaum’s obvious “Pluto-retaining-its-status-as-a-planet” piece and twist it into a “Pluto-being-demoted-to-a-lower-class-object” validation of some pre-determined stance of yours.
Whatever the IAU deems the officially correct status of Pluto to be, the point of Kestenbaum’s segment was to herald Pluto’s *retention* of its status as a planet, whether dwarf or otherwise.
JCC
August 14th, 2006 at 11:15 am
Yes, Kestenbaum’s piece said “no more than four or five new planets.” But if that’s the case, then we need to factor in the dozens or hundreds of other objects that have yet to be found but which will fit into this category, whatever it is. Those are the prognostications of the astronomers who study the realm beyond Neptune. Hope that clarifies.
Meanwhile, we have more detail on the whole issue now. See today’s story.
August 16th, 2006 at 1:02 pm
The greeks named the wandering stars “Planets” because of all the stars, only these wandered about. Planet simply means “wanderer.”
By that definition, none of our planets are actually planets, because none of them wander, by our definitions of the cosmos. They have their orbits that they stick to nigh-unwaveringly (except for gravitation tugs, if I remember correctly).
Perhaps we need to go back to ancient greek and look up the word for colosal orbiting ball.
Or get the ancient greek way to transform the word planet into “little wanderer” and rename non-asteroid objects to that. Maybe hypoplanet, paraplanet, microplanet? But I am not an ancient greek scholar so don’t take anything I say without one of those huge chunks of salt you get for water softeners.
August 17th, 2006 at 7:13 pm
Congratulations to myself (logged in as “omnologos” above) as there appears to be a consensus on defining a new class of “plutons”
Actually, some complain that there could be hundreds of planets out there in the solar system. One wonders what would be wrong with that?