August 24, 2006
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Alright everyone, take down all your solar system posters because instead of 9 planet, there are now only 8: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. Pluto has officially been demoted by the International Astronomical Union.
Its status has long been in debate. “Pluto… doesn’t make the grade under the new rules for a planet: ‘a celestial body that is in orbit around the sun, has sufficient mass for its self-gravity to overcome rigid body forces so that it assumes a … nearly round shape, and has cleared the neighborhood around its orbit.’ It is automatically disqualified because its oblong orbit overlaps with Neptune’s.” I wonder if there have been astronomers that have been pushing and rubbing their hands together for this day. They just despise Pluto, just not good enough. You never know, there are some very passionate people out there.
When I heard the radio announcer say that Pluto was no longer a planet, I thought it got blown up or something. It’s weird to think something like this that we were taught growing up is no longer true. What else will change and what else will we find? Space is huge. Well, it’s all very exciting.
Imagine all the new textbook editions to come.
Here’s a great timeline about this now “dwarf planet”.
Comments (10)
poor pluto! nobody likes to get demoted
What a drag. At least it’s the last one, so you can still use that thing to remember the names.
Does this mean we can eat meat on Fridays?
it used to be “my very excited mother served us nine pizzas.” now what’s it gonna be? “my very excited mother served us nothing”? yea, poor pluto..i really liked the name pluto too..like mickey’s dog. and what’re they gonna do with the books, posters, encyclopedias, etc. all that printed stuff? that sucks..how can a planet be demoted? =T
aawww poor Pluto!
wow! so interesting! you know i love this type of news…
and yes, i’ll hafta minus pluto from my planet collection/lesson illustrations! poor pluto. discarded.
WAAAT THE?????? plutooo???? not there anymore?? demoted???? thats horrible. i always like pluto.
hey judy, i jacked ur pluto site. hope you don’t mind. i’m so saddened by it.
when i read the news of the demotion this morning, i thought it was a joke. i told my coworkers that i’m going to start a coalition to reinstate pluto’s planetary status! hehe. but did you see this? http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060825/ap_on_sc/pluto_tombaugh_3 poor widow!!!
isn’t pluto also the Roman god of the underworld?? he must be pretty PO-ed about this whole thing.