So despite the announcement yesterday, reliable sources tell me that some members of the astronomy community are hoping that there is still maybe a small window of opportunity for Pluto.
Some members of the community are preparing a petition which protests the IAU planet definition! They don’t agree with the decision, and point out that a rather small percentage of the astronomical community actually voted at the Prague IAU. They give the following additional reasons for their questioning of the decision:
They say that the community voted….
… for a definition of ‘planet’ that uses dynamics (location) rather than intrinsic properties to decide if an object is or is not a planet. This result is counter to other classification schemes in astronomy (e.g., stars, galaxies, nebulae, even asteroids) in which dynamical context does not play a controlling role. Furthermore, it produces results that are incongruous and cannot be extended within our own solar system or to extra-solar planetary systems without producing immediate results that are patently absurd: e.g., a Neptune-sized object discovered beyond 150 AU could not be a planet, the presence of an Earth orbiting its star between a Jupiter and a Saturn would mean the Earth could not be considered a planet since it could not clear its “neighborhood”. This definition also excludes Pluto from planethood in our solar system, something that is both scientifically questionable and publicly problematic. Both Pluto and a distant Neptune would be classified as a “dwarf planet”, which is not to be considered a subcategory of “planet”.
The petition is to be among the community only, so I will not give you details about how to sign it. Also, I don’t know if I have permission to reveal the names of the people who put forward the petition, so I will not do that, at least until I know more.
This is rather unexpected and quite interesting, I hope you agree.
-cvj
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Thanks for your thoughts. Do read some of the several followup posts on the matter (this is a 2006 post). Search under the planets category.
-cvj
Quote : “This definition also excludes Pluto from planethood in our solar system, something that is […] publicly problematic.”
In fact, Pluto’s reclassification is not a problem for the public. The public is a problem for Pluto’s reclassification. When will you understand that “being excluded from planethood” is not a sanction ?
Pluto is supposedly a dwarf yet it has three moons orbiting it? I think that constitutes “clearing the neighborhood”. I believe Pluto is a binary planet with Charon to be honest. I wonder what would happen if an earth sized one was found in the Kuniper Belt?
I am an amateur astronomer and I have seen all the planets except Pluto (and I have also seen Ceres). Why can’t we acknowledge that Pluto, “Xena”, and all round objects (that are not stars) that orbit the sun are planets?! Out of thousands of astronomers only 414 voted on this issue! The third condition (about having a “clear orbit zone”) is a crock. It would disqualify other planets from planetary status. This “dwarf planet” business is a bunch of crap. Pluto is a planet, and there are other small planets in our solar system – some we haven’t found yet. Pluto and “Xena” and other bodies are planets, no matter what an “elite” group of people say.
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I sarted becoming interested in the sky when I was five years old when my maternal grandfather bought me a star map and introduced the stars to me. I have avidly kept abreast of astronomical knowledge since I was twelve.
It is most unfortunate that educated scientists have demonstrated such emotionalism about defining what a planet is. Science is supposed to be based on quantitative measurements, not on emotional I-want-it-to-be this way definitions.
The initial proposed definition of “planet” was better than the final one. However, I think that it too was faulty. To call Charon a planet, and say that our moon is not, is illogical. I think that the definition should include all bodies with a mass that has caused it to form a sphere, from the lower mass to the mass that is just before a brown dwarf. So, it was, rightly said that Pluto and Charon are planets. However, I believe where the preliminary definition fell short, was that there should be the distinction, primary and secondary planets. For example, we can say that the Earth is the primary planet for its orbit, and the Moon is a secondary planet. Jupiter is the primary planet for its orbit, with secondary planets and asteroid like bodies orbiting around it. To have said that Pluto is a primary planet for its orbit, and Charon a secondary plamet may have been more palatable for many of the scientists who were upset with the idea that two planets could be in the same orbit.
I do hope that the IAU comes to its senses and redefines what a planet is without the emotionalism. At any rate, the future will force the IAU to redefine the term “planet” because the day will come when we will know about millions of planets of all sizes in the galaxy.
It will then be understood that there are dwarf planets, earth sized planets, giant planets, supergiant planets. Indeed, there will have to be a scale of planets just as there is for stars.
It’s more than a handful of people supporting the original IAU 12 planet proposal, the Division of Planetary Sciencies committee supported it (the DPS body consisting of a few thousand members I think, and we just elected our representative DPS committee). It would have been better for all of the DPS and AAS members to weigh in though.
I don’t see how the new proposal leads to any deeper understanding of solar system bodies than the previous proposal; the outer solar system’s dynamical _and_ intrinsic properties are still not known well. Neptune didn’t clear Pluto in it’s orbit but can anyone can say if UB313 cleared bodies in _its_ orbit? (Does anyone even know at what location UB313 and Pluto originally formed?) The new proposal is not without flaws. I wonder if a compromise encompassing both intrinsic and dynamical properties can be made.
The problem is not so much in the concept of “clearing the neighborhood” as it is with the hasty drafting of the language explaining the concept. The IAU definition of a planet refers to a body’s gravitational potential to dominate its orbital environs. While Neptune may not have “cleared” Pluto from its orbit, Pluto has been forced into a 3:2 orbital resonance with Neptune, along with other Kuiper Belt Objects like it, called “Plutinos” — of which Pluto is the largest. This is counted as a “clearing” in the language defined by the IAU.
Demoting Pluto was the right thing to do, and is the first step towards a deeper understanding and simpler classification of solar system bodies. This way, we won’t need to update our list of planets everytime a new large Kuiper Belt Object is found; we simply treat Pluto as first-discovered of several large KBOs. It’s still in the textbooks as a minor planet, but not counted among more major solar system bodies which have far greater gravitational influence over their orbital neighborhoods.
http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~mbrown/eightplanets/
The third criteria is vague and unscientific in my mind:
Pluto is a Planet:
http://www.ideonexus.com/default.asp?article=theories-plutoisaplanet01
The third criteria is vague and unscientific in my mind:
Pluto is a Planet
Click my name
It’s not a petition so much as a banner movement…
The louder we are, the more noise is made, the more chance I hope the change will be reversed!
Check out http://www.adrianspeyer.com/pluto-is-a-planet-in-my-heart.html
It’s not a petition so much as a banner movement…
The louder we are, the more noise is made, the more chance I hope the change will be reversed!
I’ll bet some of the people on that petition will also claim that a planet has to be
something orbiting a star – which is itself a dynamical criterion!
Does anyone know of a petition that supports the IAU decision? For all the whining
about the “small fraction”, my informal sampling of the local astronomers suggests
that the majority agrees with the notion that Pluto is not a planet, although many
recognise that the accepted definition has some pretty substantial holes in it.
Ceres was a planet for fifty years. It should also be a planet.
My Very Enegetic Mother Can Just Serve Us Nine Pizzas (with Cheese and eXtras).
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Glenn,
Many thanks for posting these, but I will wait to see what,
if anything, the folks at Night Sky Network want to do.
Ed Murray
Maybe if Pluto grew a bit, it would have a stronger case.
I have also a petition of my mine that i would like to add to the cause
http://www.PetitionOnline.com/Stpp/petition.html
Its been a planet for many years, so i think its unfair to change it. Its a planet not a dwarf. Its sets an unwelcome precedent.
Amara:- Thats exactly my thinking. Both sides actually make a lot of sense. I think Ill watch from the sidelines on this one as I don’t have a “side”, and will keep trying to bring information here as I learn it.
cheers,
-cvj
On my own side, now I don’t know what ‘camp’ to be in, because both arguments: 1) planet as defined from its dynamics or 2) planet as defined from its intrinsic properties, have good merits. I’m doing my best to get the European/nonAmerican planetary scientists informed whenever I receive info from the American planetary science community (I have a foot in both worlds). A proper vote by the whole community should be made, I think.
There are at least tewo petitions in existance already that people can sign;
http://pleasesavepluto.org/
and
http://www.petitiononline.com/mvemjsun/
Feel free to sign either or both to support the cause.
Clifford,
I am a member of the JPL/NASA Night Sky Network which is a community of amateur astronomical clubs that do a lot of
educational outreach.
I’ve just sent and e-mail to Dawn Bair the Night Sky Network Coordinator asking if we could start a petition supporting Dr. Alan Stern’s quest to ask the IAU to re-name Pluto as a Planet. I have also contacted Ted A. Nichols of the Astronomical Society of Harrisburg…the young man who started the quest to send New Horizons to Pluto.
It is my hope that we could start with individual members of the Night Sky Network and extend it to other amateurs and then to schools and students across the United States.
If you are interested in helping please contact Dawn Bair at nightskyinfo@astrosociety.org.
Thanks,
Sincerely,
P. Edward Murray
Past President,
Bucks-Mont. Astronomical Assoc., Inc.
Hmm, very interesting stuff here. Thanks for putting the planetary debate into terms that a non-scientific person like myself can understand. I do think this whole issue will come down to another vote among IAU members (it just doesn’t seem right that a few hundred people can decde Pluto’s fate for all of us) and it might play out differently next time.
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