Wait, did I say “make sense?” I really meant “makes arbitrary.”

Also, the definition of “clearing the orbital path” doesn’t hold water, either. Earth crosses paths with more than 10,000 REGISTERED objects, Jupiter has more than 100,000 objects that are in its “immediate” (again, such a horrible usage of language. What is “immediate”? 2,000,000 kilometers? Less? More?)

GAH!

That’s what happens when you let astronomers do a definition (incidentally, only 424 astronomers of actually 2,500 voted on this…the others, apparently thinking that the aforementioned definition would be waved through…simply had already left the conference. What is this? The US presidential election?)

Oh, I agree. But although the specific language in IAU Proposition 5A “Definition of a ‘planet’ ” doesn’t quantify matters, I gotta believe there’s somewhere some sort of specificity to what they’re talking about. Astonomer Steven Soter’s journal article at http://arxiv.org/ftp/astro-ph/papers/0608/0608359.pdf , for instance, contains a whole host of mathematical formulae–more than I can follow. I ain’t a mathematician and I ain’t an astronomer (and I haven’t studied this particular article) so I can’t tell offhand if Soter’s math is talking about clearing the neighborhood, or orbital shapes or distances, or whatever else–or if it’s related to the IAU definition at all–but clearly astronomers are able to fall back on some sort of quantifiable mathematics for whatever they decide.

> Also, that definition precludes even the notion of a
> binary planet system, since one of those objects a) either
> must clear its path or b) you immediately have to conclude
> that one object is a moon, even though they might orbit
> each other.

Right, like Oph1622. I would imagine, though, that the IAU could just create another classification for such things. They’ve already created the “dwarf planet” designation; surely they can classify such things as, say, “binary planets.”

One interesting semantic hiccup to the IAU’s decision is the counter-intuitive consequence that something called a “dwarf planet” is not a “planet”. Which sounds like saying an “accoustic guitar” is not a “guitar.” Going down that road, I wonder if they’ll ever make a new retronym designation for the eight-current planets, in which case, the general term “planet” could be opened up again to include Pluto. And Ceres. And a whole lot of other things…

hm, planet Xena. bring on PLANET BRISCO COUNTY, JR.

Not to go all German here, but “similar-sized” is a bad, bad, baaaaaad definition. What is “similar-sized”? 90 percent? 80 percent?

Also, that definition precludes even the notion of a binary planet system, since one of those objects a) either must clear its path or b) you immediately have to conclude that one object is a moon, even though they might orbit each other.

And then it again comes down to: when do we say with what size is that other object a moon? 90 percent? 80 percent?

Also, a moon can only orbit a planet, two objects cannot orbit each other.

What that jury has done is tighten their definitions based only on their current view of OUR solar system, and that is bad science.

For example, the LA Times article about Pluto’s demotion describes that for a planet to be said to “clear its area”, it must “[sweep] up other matter in its area and preventing the formation of other *similarly sized* objects.” If that “similarly-sized” part is a key part of that criterion, then I guess that’s why Neptune can still be said to have cleared its path (since even if Pluto is its orbital path, it’s nowhere near Neptune’s size) when Pluto (and Ceres, Charon, and Xena) do not, since they’re orbiting in the midst of a whole bunch of similar stuff (be it the Ceres in the Asteroid Belt, or Pluto in the Kuiper Belt…)

The “Bieser Flaw” should be handed into the scientific community at once!

He’s using logic, and in this day and age, that is considered blasphemy!

Not *quite* as much of a revelation, however, as the one Sam, the comedic hero I’m lucky enough to work with, encountered earlier this year. The look on his face upon hearing that Jesus Christ WASN’T an electrician deserved far more than the sight of me weeing into my underpants as I rolled around on the floor, laughing my bollocks off.

I almost hope he was joking. But only a little bit.

No ma’am, I don’t like modern science. Give me my mystery back.