So Pluto is a planet!?

[worir4]

Take a look at this article.

There is hope for Pluto yet!

[Albert VDS]

Why does everyone care about Pluto not being a planet anymore, it's not like it stopped existing when it was classified as a dwarf-planet.

What about all the other dwarf planets?

Ceres is a dwarf-planet, and it's closer to home.

Shouldn't it have a huge "It's a planet" following?

Well it doesn't, because "no one" knows about it, and if they did they wouldn't care.

It's like the people who think that our Sun is called Sol, it might be in some languages, but it's just the Sun in English.

[s3rg3antKBAR]

For the record, the Sun's proper name is Sol. The fact that we don't refer to it as such is due to the fact that it wasn't named by humanity as a somewhat space-fairing civilisation until recently. If you were to look at a proper map of the local cluster, the Sun would be designated as Sol for the purpose of navigation and differentiation from other stars, which are classified as "Suns" if they have planets orbiting them. It's just like the simple fact that the Moon has a proper astronomical name: Luna. We simply refer to it as "The Moon" because we were unaware that other planets had moons for thousands of years.

[N_las]

If we would define Pluto as a planet, we would live in a solar system with THOUSENDS of planets. So to keep it practical, it is better to exclude it. And this article has nothing to do with "hope for Pluto". They just asked an american audience what they would like. And we all know that americans LOVE their "planet".

[Albert VDS]

For the record, the Sun's proper name is Sol. The fact that we don't refer to it as such is due to the fact that it wasn't named by humanity as a somewhat space-fairing civilisation until recently. If you were to look at a proper map of the local cluster, the Sun would be designated as Sol for the purpose of navigation and differentiation from other stars, which are classified as "Suns" if they have planets orbiting them. It's just like the simple fact that the Moon has a proper astronomical name: Luna. We simply refer to it as "The Moon" because we were unaware that other planets had moons for thousands of years.

No it's not called sol.

Also this.

[sal_vager]

I, like most of us, grew up with Pluto being a planet, to have that changed is weird.

[worir4]

But why is it called the solar system???

sal_vager

I feel you man.

[Ralathon]

Note to writers: If the answer to your title question can be summed up as "No" don't bother writing the article...

[Superfluous J]

But why is it called the solar system???

For the same reason we're referred to as Terrans but the official name of our planet is not Terra.

[worir4]

Are you directing that at me or the guy that wrote the article?

If the article:

I agree, i suppose they get money for it!

If me:

[ZedNova]

Pluto just doesn't fit in with the rest of the planets. It's still a planet, it always was. Calling it a "dwarf planet" helps categorize solar objects better.

If you want to ditch the whole definition of what a planet is, then you'd better start counting Eris and Ceres as planets too.

[worir4]

Well it's a dwarf planet so it is still a planet.

There there Pluto, you will always be a planet to me...

[Kryten]

Well it's a dwarf planet so it is still a planet.

That'd also apply to minor planets, of which there are well over half a million.

[Alshain]

5thHorseman said:

For the same reason we're referred to as Terrans but the official name of our planet is not Terra.

That's not a good analogy. Terra is the name of our planet... in Latin. Not sure about Sol, I thought it was the Latin name too.

[Dominatus]

... Right, I suppose I can kinda see the reasoning behind dwarf planet vs planet...

What I really care about is Sol. It is Sol, or it should be, anyways. The Sun and The Moon are just so boring compared to Ceres, Pluto, Mars, Saturn, Europa, Enceladus, Titan, Jupiter... These names sound super cool. Sol and Luna should be right up there IMHO. It not only sounds cool it also differentiates them from what they are and what they are called. Good idea if FTL ever becomes a things, for star charts and stuff.

[ZetaX]

While "moon" is generally used for certain satellites of other planets, "sun" is not that often used for other stars in non-fiction. Just get used to saying "that was a nice Alpha Centaury A rise this morning" and you are ready for the future

I, like most of us, grew up with Pluto being a planet, to have that changed is weird.

But that's not a good reason against it. Just take any example where things changed, be it scientific, political or other, and imagine what would happen (or actually happened, think about Galileo) if people would insist on their old versions staying true.

[Red Iron Crown]

Its status as a planet doesn't really matter to me. It's still an interesting celestial body, what with it and Charon orbiting each other around a barycenter not within either of them.

It is kind of weird that I grew up in a solar system with nine planets and now there are only eight, sounds like some astronomical disaster destroyed a planet.

[DarkStar64]

That is the answer.

Edited October 2, 2014 by DarkStar64

[Streetwind]

... Right, I suppose I can kinda see the reasoning behind dwarf planet vs planet...

What I really care about is Sol. It is Sol, or it should be, anyways. The Sun and The Moon are just so boring compared to Ceres, Pluto, Mars, Saturn, Europa, Enceladus, Titan, Jupiter... These names sound super cool. Sol and Luna should be right up there IMHO. It not only sounds cool it also differentiates them from what they are and what they are called. Good idea if FTL ever becomes a things, for star charts and stuff.

I'm gonna copypasta something I wrote on that topic before:

"Sun" is a recognized proper name for our star by the IAU, making it suitable for use in scientific literature. It is not the *only* recognized proper name though - all celestial objects that were discovered and named before the formation and formalization of the IAU in the early 1900's have many different names in many different languages. All of them are recognized proper names. "Sol" is just as correct as "Sun", but it is the name in Latin, not English. A scientist writing a paper in English would use the English proper name, not the Latin one.

Basically, saying that "Sol" and "Luna" are proper names for our local star and our planet's natural satellite, respectively, is correct. Saying that "Sun" and "Moon" are not proper names for these same objects, or that there exist no other names besides Sol and Luna, is wrong. They are the same thing in different languages.

Just like "Köln" and "Cologne" refer to the same city and both names are correct, accepted and widely used. It's just that one of them is German and the other is English.

[DarkStar64]

this is the answer too.

[Kryten]

Its status as a planet doesn't really matter to me. It's still an interesting celestial body, what with it and Charon orbiting each other around a barycenter not within either of them.

Even that isn't too unique anymore; there are over a dozen binary KBO's, at least two also large enough to be dwarf planets (Orcus and Quaoar). The Earth-Moon system itself will be a binary within a few hundred million years.

Edited October 2, 2014 by Kryten

[ZetaX]

The whole solar system satisfies that. Jupter and the sun alone already do if I remember correctly.

[Fingal]

I'll go with the Star Trek method. If it looks like a planet on the viewscreen, it's a planet. Basically, if it has enough mass to reach hydrostatic equilibrium and doesn't produce nuclear fusion, it's a planet.

[TheShadow1138]

Even that isn't too unique anymore; there are over a dozen binary KBO's, at least also large enough to be dwarf planets (Orcus and Quaoar). The Earth-Moon system itself will be a binary within a few hundred million years.

Strictly speaking the Earth-Moon system cannot become a binary system as the center-of-mass of the Earth-Moon system will never move from within the Earth. They will eventually enter a completely tidally locked state like the Pluto-Charon system, but will not become a binary.

As for Pluto's status as a planet, I think many people want it to be a planet for various reasons (some or all of which have been mentioned here); many people grew up with Pluto being one of the nine planets of the Solar System and to think of it differently is weird, or some may view its demotion as a hasty and unnecessary act. Many people don't know that Ceres was itself considered to be a planet until the discovery of more and more objects in similar orbits leading to its reclassification as an asteroid. This is pretty much what happened to Pluto, we discovered more and more similar objects in similar orbits giving it more in common with these objects than with the other eight planets and so a call was made for it to be reclassified.

The debate about Pluto's status, of course, isn't just in the public but among some scientists. Some take issue with the definition agreed to by the IAU for a planet, they consider its third criteria "has cleared the neighborhood of its orbit" to be somewhat vague. What constitutes the "neighborhood of its orbit"? When is the orbit considered "cleared"? Some have even suggested that by the current definition Neptune is no longer a planet because it has never "cleared" Pluto, which crosses orbits with Neptune. Some may yet argue that Jupiter's orbit isn't clear because of the Trojan Asteroids, though this is easily countered by remembering that it is Jupiter's gravity that dominates these objects. Then there could be the argument that the Earth hasn't cleared its orbital neighborhood because there are Earth-crossing asteroids. Some also point out that the definition only holds for objects in our Solar System because the definition states that the object mud "orbit the Sun".

It will take several years for the debate to run its course, we just have to accept that unless the definition is revised by the IAU in the future, or they promote Pluto, that as far as textbooks and all other scientific literature and facts are concerned Pluto is now a dwarf planet. I personally consider Pluto a planet for old times' sake, but would not teach anyone that it was a planet while the scientific community considers it otherwise.

[Beowolf]

I, like most of us, grew up with Pluto being a planet, to have that changed is weird.

Yeah, but I grew up with 105 elements, and protons, neutrons and electrons were elementary particles that couldn't be subdivided. Not to mention an unstoppable American space program that was going to have a colony on Ganymede by now.

Lots of things will change. More every decade, at an increasing rate, through your entire life. You'll adapt.

Of course, some things won't change. Fifty years later, commercial fusion power is still forty years in the future.