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Space Science

New 'Planet' Discovered in Solar System 184

Posted by michael from the plutino dept.
Greyfox writes: "This USA Today story tells us that astronomers have discovered a puny little "planet" between Neptune and Pluto. Significantly larger than your average asteroid, it falls just shy of qualifying as being planet sized." Plutino?
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New "Planet" Discovered in Solar System More

New "Planet" Discovered in Solar System

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  • There goes the neighborhood.
  • Plutito
    Plutolein
    Pluto-chan
    Plutette

    More?

  • ... a planetoid?

    Kierthos
  • Maybe it's the dreaded "Planet of the Apes"!

    Waitaminute.. Statue of Liberty... that was our planet! You MANIACS!!! YOU BLEW IT UP!! DAMN YOU ALL TO HELL!!


    -----------
  • The Plutonic Ideal
  • It's only cartman's ass.
  • Why did it take them so long to find it? I'm thinking independance day. It's really an alien ship bent on destroying the earth, and they are trying to cover it up. Run while you can!!!
  • I vote for "Planet X"!

    aw wait, that excellent name is already taken. I guess I could live with the name "Planet Who-Cares".

    "I can only show you Linux... you're the one who has to read the man pages."

  • If a planet circles in darkness, does it exist? (Score:3)

    by WillAffleck ( 42386 ) on Monday October 23, 2000 @07:55PM (#681314)
    Seriously. Let's say you're in a solar system with twelve major planets, but two of them are airless, have less effect than asteroids and meteors, and pretty much are only found when you look really hard for them.

    Are they planets? Or just statistical anomolies intended to distract us from sending extrasolar probes to avoid the inevitable destruction of this solar system? Because, if we don't get out of the solar system, human life is an historical footnote in the history of the universe, a leaf fluttering from a tree in a vast and empty forest, which falls and decomposes with noone ever seeing it.

  • hrmmm (Score:4)

    by Nate Fox ( 1271 ) on Monday October 23, 2000 @07:56PM (#681315)
    I wonder if it came out of Uranus? :)

    -----
    If Bill Gates had a nickel for every time Windows crashed...
  • Maybe it can be used as a kind of gas station, or as a prison, or as a scientific station for radio telescopes (it's outside heliosphere)...

  • You think they'd notice it sooner if it's "just shy of planet sized". Yea, something else for our kids to memorize in elementary school!
  • ..that is no planet, that is an alien space ship...hiding.
  • So what happened to planet X that was in the news so many years ago?

    Does the gravity of EB173 account for the unseen mass on that end of the solar system?
  • planetoid?
    --
  • Running isn't going to do us any good if they're going to destroy the earth, no matter how far you run you're still going to be on earth. Even if you did manage to get off the planet, where to then?

  • Re:Other possible names (Score:5)

    by Black Parrot ( 19622 ) on Monday October 23, 2000 @08:03PM (#681322)
    > More?

    Plutanium - naw, Intel already has that one.

    Plu.net - naw, Micorsoft already has that one.

    Plunix - naw, The Open Group already has that one.

    Plutoe - naw, Dan Quayle already has that one.

    I give.

  • IANAA (Score:1)

    by matman ( 71405 )
    I am not an astronomer/astrophysicist, but, maybe its this, or other large asteroids that gives pluto/neptune (i dont remember which) it's weird orbit. Perhaps one of these big asteroids struck one of the planets as the large asteroids moved around?
  • Yay! Now they can have one more sailor senshi on Sailor Moon!

    Or not...

    BBK
  • Well, there's supposedly a brown dwarf out there [msnbc.com]. It used to be called "Nemesis" since it was supposed to kill us all in a blaze of displaced comets and the terror and the ow ow ow it hurts me, but that seems unlikely now apparently.


    -----------
  • a plumarhoid?

    It IS out there past Uranus.
  • if they are hiding, they have certainly done a spectacular job.

    illegal aliens?
    --
  • According to the article this large rock falls short of the defenition of a planet. Shoot some people don't consider pluto a planet. If we call every large rock in the solar system a planet then there is a good chance there a dozens perhaps hundreds of planets out there. Yea think 3.6 billion is far, I wouldn't be surpised if they start finding "planets" 50 billion out there Still I like the idea of there be more planets out there.
  • It's a Death Star!

  • well... (Score:3)

    by zenith744 ( 210415 ) on Monday October 23, 2000 @08:06PM (#681330)

    it was bound to happen. time to sew another star into the flag...

    wait a minute...

  • The only thing this discovery will do for the scientific community is allow us to make sure that our toy space probes don't wrap themselves around it.
    Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that it isn't neet, but really, it dosn't have much to offer. Couldn't we be spending our space research resources in a better way, like say researching dark matter [berkeley.edu]?
    just my $.02
    ---
  • It must be Pioeer 10, merged with a sinister alien space probe, turned into a planet eater.
  • It's too big to be a Death Star! Wait...

  • ...ain't that always the case? Welp, time to pack the bags.
    ---
  • That's no planet... ...it's a space station!
  • Chuckle...

    This post has no purpose other than to undo my bad moderation; I meant to mod the above up to "Funny", but I must have hit "Overrated" instead. D'oh.

  • Isn't the moon a planet? (Score:4)

    by cperciva ( 102828 ) on Monday October 23, 2000 @08:15PM (#681337) Homepage
    Broadly, the IAU group agrees that a planet should independently orbit a star, possess enough gravity to shape itself into a sphere and weigh at least 100,000 billion billion grams. EB173 just misses the last mark, Boss says.

    Judging by this definition, earth's moon should be considered a planet. It is easily massive enough, and it has greater gravitational attraction to the sun than it does to the earth.

    A planet which shares the same orbit as the earth, sure, but still a planet.
  • What about this [slashdot.org] planet, or this [slashdot.org] one? Same or different? How many friends did Pluto invite to this party anyway? Or is USA Today struggling to take the coveted "Best Reporting of Old News" award away from MSNBC?

    For that matter, is Pluto even a planet? [slashdot.org]

  • Re:Isn't the moon a planet? (Score:5)

    by KFury ( 19522 ) on Monday October 23, 2000 @08:20PM (#681339) Homepage
    I don't know what the astronomical distinction is between an asteroid and a planet, but I know what defines a moon.

    A moon is a natural object that orbits a planet, where the center of mass of the planet-moon system lies within the planet. the irony is that although 'the Moon' is the archetypical moon, it doesn't fit this definition, as both the Moon and Earth rotate around a point in space between the two and outside the Earth. In truth, the Moon-Earth system is a binary planetary system, as is Charon and Pluto. All other 'moons' in the solar system are true moons by this definition.

    Kevin Fox
  • Are they planets? Or just statistical anomolies intended to distract us from sending extrasolar probes to avoid the inevitable destruction of this solar system?

    WHAT?? Are you saying there's a Galactic (or Universal??!!) conspiracy against mankind?

    Damn, it was bad enough when I thought we were just up against the multinationals and political fanatics. At least they're all from Earth.
  • Plutitia
    Plutarchus
    Pluto-gigio
    Pluto-pluto-mo-muto-banana-fana-fo-futo-fi-fie-f uto
    Plano, TX
  • Hemos, of course. :-)


    ---
  • ...why this isn't just called an asteroid, when they say it's smaller than Ceres, which is called an asteroid. What's the real difference? Is it because it's spherical? That's a somewhat odd distinction. How "spherical" does it have to be? Even the earth isn't exactly spherical.

    Don't get me wrong. I mean, I think it's cool that there's a really big rock floating out there and someone spotted it. But if anyone out there understands this and can explain better, please do.

  • Forgetting something? I don't mean to sound insulting, but perhaps you've forgotten how to click links and read stories?

    The first link you post is about a proposed Planet X that lies 30,000 AU from the Sun (Pluto's at about 40 AU). That puts it well outside the Solar System.

    The second link you post is about a free-floating "planet" that was discovered by gravitational microlensing. It is also well outside the Solar System.

    The story talks about a body (a tad too small to be considered a planet) that's orbiting between Neptune and Pluto. That puts it within the Solar System.

    Before you go shooting your mouth off about old news, try reading articles.
  • Well, they did day that it was a _New_ platet- or whatever they wanna call it...
    They dont say, but I'm guessing it was just passing through and graviy did it's thing... blah blah blah...
    but I really dont know...

  • No, it orbits the Earth (Score:3)

    by Lish ( 95509 ) on Monday October 23, 2000 @08:33PM (#681347)
    Look at your quote. "... should independently orbit a star ...." Earth's moon does not orbit the sun independently, but rather as a satellite of Earth. If your interpretation were correct there would be no such thing as a large moon.

  • One debunkable point that often comes up in various metaphysical/religious debates is the issue of the ancient belief in the sun orbiting the earth. In our society we are rather led to believe that this "Earth centered" view was the only one anyone around (along with the Flat Earth concept) until Copernicus came along and suggested the opposite arrangement. This is plainly untrue. To wit:
    "Most people think the Earth lies at the center of the universe... but the Italian philosophers known as Pythagoreans take the contrary view. At the center, they say, is fire and the Earth is one of the stars, creating night and day by its circular motion about the center." - Aristotle,
    de caelo 293a
    Note that here, even in the age of Pythagoras (sixth century BC), Earth is reduced to an insignificant star among the multitude, at least as far as philosophy was concerned. It even comes up, in slightly different form, in Ptolemy's Almagest, the standard astronomical text of the middle ages, a classic that was required reading for formally educated members of society, particularly clergy and government staff.

    This theory has been known as one possibility among several ever since; it was not "discovered" by later astronomers as most textbooks would have us believe. Sure, mathematics and, later, telescopes helped to prove it correct, but the idea was current long before.
  • The previous reply says:

    the irony is that although 'the Moon' is the archetypical moon, it doesn't fit this definition, as both the Moon and Earth rotate around a point in space between the two and outside the Earth.

    So who is right?

  • In the name of planet linux I shall punish you!

    Linux thunderbolt slashdot effect!

  • Images of EB173: (Score:5)

    by Anne Marie ( 239347 ) on Monday October 23, 2000 @08:59PM (#681351)
    Here're [geocities.com] some clear images of EB173 captured by the Fort Bend Astronomy Club [fortbendweb.com]. It seems they imaged it without necessarily knowing EB173's significance at the time.

    And while I'm at it, here's [www.klet.cz] a considerably grainier shot taken at the Klet observatory.

  • Text of Rabinowitz's paper: (Score:4)

    by Anne Marie ( 239347 ) on Monday October 23, 2000 @09:08PM (#681352)
    The actual paper discussed in the article can be found here [yale.edu] .
  • It's V'GER and it's back !

    --
  • I christen thee "Elbow Macaroni"
  • Surely a planette.
    --
    01 13 19
    TVDJC TDSLR AZNGT NWQSH KPN
  • You know, even though I've always been a "Pluto is not a fucking planet!" advocate, you have to wonder: why does it matter what we call a planet? I mean, precise classification is a good thing, but usually when people fight over classification, it's because of political reasons. But who benefits from something being a planet or not? I mean, it's not like anyone living on Jupiter gets more federal tax dollars money than those people living on Asteroid M- or Pluto.
  • time to sew another star into the flag..

    Let me get this straight - we should sew on another star and proclaim Planet X.11 as a State of the United States of America and Peurto Rico still isn't even a state yet?

    I don't think so ...

    Hey, concept, let's GPL it! Or maybe we can patent it and grant the patent to Linus for a birthday present?

  • It will be called Rupert! And the scientific community will call it Persephone.
  • The first link you post is about a proposed Planet X that lies 30,000 AU from the Sun (Pluto's at about 40 AU). That puts it well outside the Solar System.

    I may be missing something painfully obvious here (and not for the first time either), but if this Planet X orbits the sun as the BBC article behind the first link says, wouldn't that make it make it part of the Solar System?

  • I was suprised to learn that the Earth at the center myth is still belived by some people.
  • And fling it out of the system. Preferably with someone on it. I can think of a few.

    Realistically, though, we ought to think about this as another usefull small planet.
    There aren't any good, seperate planetoids in the outer areas. So many gas giants, moon, all of that gravitational hassle.

  • Takeuchi-sama's next doujinshi (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    *nifty transformation music*
    *nifty psychadelic demi-nudity*
    "Linux Planet Power!"
    *ribbons*
    *less ribbons*
    *ooooohhhhh*
    "Appearing minutely, I am Sailor Linux!"

    "In the name of the God Torvalds I shall..."
    -- a. Punish You!
    -- b. Chastise You!
    -- c. Flash You!
    -- d. Integrate You into a Multi-User Developers' Enviroment!
    -- e. Shut the #*(@ up and return to non-anime posts because the viewer is bitterly biased about things that don't blink and make buzzing sounds.

    Choose.... wisely.
  • I'm surprised the Douglas Adams fans here haven't jumped all over this one. The obvious choice is 'Rupert'. Okay, it's not beyond the orbit of Pluto, but it's close enough, give or take a few zillion miles.

  • Ceres is larger (Score:3)

    by Jalal ( 190479 ) on Monday October 23, 2000 @10:10PM (#681364)
    Pluto = 1440 miles in diameter

    Ceres = 584 mi

    EB173 (Plutino) = 373 mi

    Pallas = 365 mi

    Vesta = 358 mi

  • The author of the post missed some words. This objec a planetesimal or _minor_ planet. Yes it may be too small to be called a planet but that mention in the article that "should independently orbit a star" is just ridiculous:

    Pluton - Charon - which of them are to be considered to be the planet and the ????

    Earth - Moon. Yes it is the Moon that mostly looses in this game. However this stuff is too heavy that it is hard to consider Earth moving "independently" around the Sun. So people we are living in a planetesimal...

    Moons from the Jovian planets. One of them seems to be even bigger than Mercury if I'm not mistaken.

    And to end. Recently there was some discussion sbout a "wandering planet". Well an object bigger than Jupiter but short of being a star. Wandering away from any star at high speeds. So, according to this article that is not a planet. So what it is? Flash Gordon's Mongo?

  • Not quite... (Score:4)

    by isaac ( 2852 ) on Monday October 23, 2000 @10:38PM (#681366)
    The barycenter (center of mass) of the earth-moon system is some 1707 km below Earth's surface. The Earth/Luna mass ratio is larger than any other planet/moon system in our solar system, bar Pluto/Charon, but I wouldn't go so far as to call the moon a planet.

    Bottom line, your thesis is based on a faulty assertion. (i.e. Earth and Luna don't revolve around a common point in space - that point is comfortably beneath the earth's surface.)

    See this link [raytheon.com] for greater detail.

    -Isaac

  • BEN (Score:2)

    by Duxup ( 72775 )
    BEN: That's no moon! It's a space station.

  • Re:BEN (Score:2)

    by Duxup ( 72775 )
    HAN: It's too big to be a space station.
  • LUKE: I have a very bad feeling about this.
  • BEN: Yeah, I think your right. Full reverse! Chewie, lock in the auxiliary power.
  • The pirateship shudders and the TIE fighter accelerates away toward the gargantuan battle station.

    LUKE: Why are we still moving towards it?
  • HAN: We're caught in a tractor beam! It's pulling us in!
  • LUKE: But there's gotta be something you can do!
  • HAN: There's nothin' I can do about it, kid. I'm in full power. I'm going to have to shut down. But they're not going to get me without a fight!
  • Ben Kenobi puts a hand on his shoulder.

    BEN: You can't win. But there are alternatives to fighting.


  • Pluto? No, don't go there, that's a Mickey Mouse planet!

    -- Mork

  • I'm gonna be a nitpick here and note that your quote is incorect. Here's the lines from the script:

    BEN: That's no moon! It's a space station.

    HAN: It's too big to be a space station.

    LUKE: I have a very bad feeling about this.

    BEN: Yeah, I think your right. Full reverse! Chewie, lock in the auxiliary power.

    The pirateship shudders and the TIE fighter accelerates away toward the gargantuan battle station.

    LUKE: Why are we still moving towards it?

    HAN: We're caught in a tractor beam! It's pulling us in!

    LUKE: But there's gotta be something you can do!

    HAN: There's nothin' I can do about it, kid. I'm in full power. I'm going to have to shut down. But they're not going to get me without a fight!

    Ben Kenobi puts a hand on his shoulder.

    BEN: You can't win. But there are alternatives to fighting.
  • Thanks for the images.
    Not being much of an astronomer myself I can't help but look at them and say:
    "Oh, well there it is! How could they miss that hazy dot, surrounded by other more or less hazy dots." :-)
  • Um, 'oops'. What can I say? You're exactly right. Maybe some day the moon will be a member of a binary planetary system, but it still has a lot of moving away to do...

    I know I heard it somewhere though. Must've been someone with a broken calculator or someone else with blind faith in what they see and hear.

    You may now mod me down.

    Kevin Fox

  • This object belongs the the Knuiper Belt [hawaii.edu] a class of objects similiar to asteroids. Pluto is thought to be the largest example of a Knuiper object>.

  • It's likely someone who has take Astronomy 101 will tell you they learned that today, many people "in the field" believe Pluto falls closer into the category of an asteroid than as a planet. With this new object being smaller than Pluto, there should be no question that this is just an asteroid.

    It seems as if many people want there to be a planet X, but in reality chances are quite slim that anything of a substatial (I.E.: planet) size existing beyond Neptune.
  • Hmmm. Not sure if this is exactly right... the main reason that the earth-centre-universe viewpoint lasted so long was religious dogma, and the fact that they imprisoned everyone who disagreed!

    Copernicus just suggested a detailed model for it, and so got the Extended Copernicus Principle named after him, which takes the idea further, saying that all points in the universe are equally unimportant.

    There's a short article here [ex.ac.uk] which extends the argument further... to a dim end to everything :-(

  • You forgot about the third dimension. Pluto's plane of orbit is inclined by 17 degrees to the orbital plane of the other planets. Therefore a collision is not possible.

  • A Little Light Astronomy (Score:5)

    by JazzManJim ( 196980 ) on Tuesday October 24, 2000 @03:31AM (#681411)
    Wow...finally a slashdot article that allows me to use a hobby of mine that's really obscure! Yay!

    Okay, first, this object will probably not be called "Plutino", because that name's already pretty much taken and has been used for a class of objects which astronomers decide are larger than the average asteroid, but smaller than the traditional definition of a planet. They've been discovering plutinos for years now and there's even a circular which goes out in the astronomical community a couple times a year which outlines the information on all the plutinos.

    These plutinos, and even Pluto itself, is believed to have come from, or may still be part of a large group of chunks of rock called the Kuiper Belt. This belt rings our solar system just beyond the orbit of Pluto. The important factor influencing these object is the planet Neptune which, because of its orbit, will occasionally pull an object from the Kuiper belt and drag it into the solar system proper. Also, bodies in the Kuiper Belt run into each other, and the collision will send a body into our solar system. This is where astronomers believe Pluto and this new rock may have come from. Astronomers believe that there are even more bodies orbiting more closely than the Kuiper Belt, probably tucked in between the orbits of Neptune and Pluto, and just beyond Pluto.

    Beyond the Kuiper Belt is yet another conglomeration of chunks of rock and dust called the Oort Cloud. This also surrounds our solar system and may actually protect us from some of the things that could zip into the system and strike another planet or disrupt things. The Oort Cloud also provides us with debris which will come floating into the solar system from collisions with object in the cloud, or from objects that arrive in the cloud from outside. We don't quite know how large the cloud is, for sure, nor how many objects are in ot, mostly because the cloud doesn't reflect what little light it might get. We make our guesses based on fairly obscure measuring methods. It has been suggested that perhaps the Oort Cloud has a good amount of Dark Matter in it, but that's pretty much conjecture right now.

    The upshot of the whole thing is that, the harder we look, the more we find in our own backyard. Our methods of studyign the heavens have gotten more and more sophisticated, and allow us to see smaller objects, orbiting farther away. I, personally, hope that we realize that, as long as we're looking out there anyhow, it wouldn't be a bad idea to look systematically, especially for objects that could pose some sort of threat to our planet directly. The tech is cheap, and what we'd need to build to deal with any intruder that might run into us is also quite cheap. Maybe it's not a bad idea at all.

    -Jimmie
  • I couldn't agree with you more - and I think that the reason they are claiming things like this to be 'planets - whoooo!' is really for self promotion. What does it matter what size a solar entity is? Sure, it's nice to explore things and all, but I don't find this to be any more exciting of a discovery than finding another large asteroid in the belt. Of course now the people who 'discovered' this sphere are going to be more well known in the astoronomical community and will probably get more grant money or whatever - but what does anyone else benefit from it?

    Humans are so busy classifying things that we often neglect to realize why things like this 'planetoid' are really important - perhaps it will shed some new light on our solar systems evolution or whatever, but I hardly think debating whether or not it is a planet is at all important, after all, what makes a planet any different from a big rock?

  • But it's about fourteen years too late [geocities.com]. I expect the Cybermen will arrive shortly to drain the earth of its precious energy...

  • Planet Order Mnemonic (Score:4)

    by empesey ( 207806 ) on Tuesday October 24, 2000 @03:54AM (#681416) Homepage
    Now, the mnemonic to remember the order of the planets work any longer. I'll have to change My Very Easy Mother Justifies Sex, Unless Not Paid to something else.

    &nbspMy Very Easy Mnemonic Just Sucks - Useless Now, Extra Planet.

  • The debate (Score:3)

    by Veteran ( 203989 ) on Tuesday October 24, 2000 @04:15AM (#681418)
    National Observatory Six astronomers were injured and two hundred were arrested when police had to step in to stop a riot at the observatory. Fighting broke out between the Politically Correct Revisionist Faction and the traditionalist branches of Astronomy.

    Phillip Narf a spokesman for the P.C.R.F. said: "The traditionalists are pooh heads. Pluto is the smallest planet, and as such it needs to be called an asteroid". "Nonsense" replied Arnold Dweeb of the traditionalist school "if we call Pluto an asteroid it would be by far the largest asteroid ever discovered, and as such would automatically be promoted to planetary status."

    In a related story computer nerds around the world were seen dancing in the streets. A post on Slashdot - the computer nerd news web site explained the jubilation: "Finally we have found a group even more pathetic than we are; at least we could go out at night if we wanted to. And everybody used to say that we needed to get lives."

  • Pluto-Lite
    Bluto
    Nanuto
    Planet Nike®
    Gnutella
    Bob
    Doug
    Nivlem (Tax Haven for the Rich 'I pay taxes on Nivlem!')
    Skippy, the intergalactic planet of evil twins

    And of course...

    Foobar



    --
  • Actually, Pluto and Charon are just a system of two kuiper belt [hawaii.edu] objects. My astronomy buddy mentioned that it was recently decided that Pluto is no longer a planet by an astronomical committee (not sure whom), leaving us back with 8 planets again -- I'm sure this means that this new tiny object will also be ruled a kuiper belt object.. NOT a planet :-)
    --
  • Indeed. Chiron is a Centaur [nasa.gov] with a very elliptical orbit taking it into the Kuiper Belt. Possibly because of this it has a coma, more like a comet than an asteroid. It was one of the first clues, aside from Pluto itself, that there might be a broad new class of objects -- the Trans-Neptunians.
    ----
  • The original Planet X (where X stood for unknown value, not Roman ten) was derived from small perturbations in the orbit of Neptune, which in turn had been the way Neptune and Uranus were discovered, through gravitational effects on the orbits of their inner neighbors.

    The search for Planet X began in earnest around the turn of the 20th century. Percival Lowell (justly famed but also justly taken with a grain of salt) claimed to have found it at least once. But it wasn't until Clyde Tombaugh engaged in the tedious exercise of studying thousands of glass photographic plates (using a special machine like a ViewFinder) that he found a blip that moved from one to the other. This was Pluto.

    Pluto, alas, was far too small to have caused the perturbations ascribed to Planet X, so the controversy continued for a number of years. Only in the 1980s was it finally proven that the perturbations in Neptune's orbit were due to imprecise measurements from Earth-based observatories. Voyager 2 was instrumental in demonstrating this point by determining Neptune's mass during its flyby to a much higher degree than was formerly possible.

    Now that Neptune is known to be, as it were, unperturbed, all but a few diehards agree there is no Planet X.

    Read the Search for Planet X [arizona.edu] for detailed information.
    ----
  • Why did it take them so long to find it?

    Of course you're joking, but the search for Trans-Neptunian objects has barely begun, with about half the objects discovered being found just this year. Partly due to "SpaceGuard" type concerns (hitting Earth), and partly due to better Earth-based telescopes, we can now undertake this systematic search. Once people began looking with the latest instruments, the planetoids started turning up by the bucketful.
    ----
  • No, no, no! It was the Twenty-Fourth and a halfth Centuuuuury!

    They were claiming Planet X as the only known source of Eludium Phosdex, the shaving cream atom.

    The eager young space cadet found out how to get there by following the lettered planets!
  • SO, is that the planet from which all the pesky Cling-ons come from?
  • Follow this link [umd.edu] and be the life of the next party!

    Unless the next party includes any of the following: Actors, actresses, models, recording artists, professional athletes, amature athletes, sports agents, literary agents, lawyers, lawyers with doberman pinschers clamped onto one or both ankles, used car salesman, RIAA scum, MPAA filth, pencil pushers, paper shufflers or accountants.


    --
  • very poetic, but we're not even a footnote in the long run.

    In the long run, the book gets swallowed by a black hole, and evaporated as hawking radiation until there's nothing left.
  • the funny thing about this definition is that Earth isn't even a planet. It's not a sphere. It's flat!

    No just kidding, but it IS an oblate spheroid!
  • I don't know what the astronomical distinction is between an asteroid and a planet...

    You've wandered into my jurisdiction.

    Pre-telescope, a planet (for the Greek word for "wanderer") was any sky object that moved against the "fixed" background of stars. These obviously didn't include Uranus, Neptune, or Pluto, which can't be seen with the naked eye, but did include the Sun and Moon. (The makes the mystical number 7, which happens to be why we have 7 days in the week, a survival from Middle Eastern religious astrology.)

    This terminology was not very useful after telescopes revealed a bunch of lot of objects not visible with the naked eye. So "planet" was redefined as an object that moved and resolved to a disk in a telescope -- except for satellites of planets, which became "moons" with a little M.

    But telescopes turned up a lot of objects that moved agains the starry background (like planets) but didn't resolve to a disk (like stars). These earned the adjectives "planetoid" (planet-like) and "asteroid" (star-like). "Asteroid" seems to have become the standard noun, leaving "Planetoid" for Star Trek writers to play with.

    Elsewhere in this discussion somebody argues against getting caught up in artificial distinctions. Despite my professional obssesion with words and taxonomies (or maybe because of it), I have to endorse this POV. You can argue about whether Pluto is a planet or a moon (a issue that would be clearer if it either Pluto or Charon were either closer or father from their comon center of rotation) or whether Jupiter is a hot planet or a cool star (just a few million degrees either way...) But words are just for communicating between people. The universe laughs at our petty distinctions.

    __________

  • um - I think that was a /. article a few months back. . .
  • I don't even understand how it could be of political benefit to anyone other than a Sailor Scout whether Pluto is a planet or not. But if this new object IS a planet, then we better alert Buckaroo Banzai, because that means Pluto is Planet 10!
  • no no no! Planet X is where Apple's Human Interface group did it's usability testing for Mac OS X!

    (No humans on Planet X, hence, no humans used in testing - only engineers).
  • Very, very good point. It's not like they get a tax break if they're a planet but not if they're an asteroid or moon. there only reasons to make a hard distinction are lexical, not functional.

    Kevin Fox
  • Is it just me or is this the highest moderated troll ever? Moderation Totals:Troll=4, Total=4?!

    J
  • Just what we need, another Sailor Senshi.

    Trans-Neptunian Object EB173 Planet Power, MAKE UP!

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