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...........eh?
Aug. 17th, 2006 06:30 amOk, so this whole pluto kerfuffle...
Read an article that said (and I quote) Much-maligned Pluto would remain a planet -- and its largest moon and two other heavenly bodies would join the planetary roster
...whafuck? Charon a planet? Since when? So we have a planet orbiting a planet? In that case why not redefine our moon as a planet! hell, it's a satellite, but it's bigger than ol' Pluto. Most of this rampant shitfuckery seems to be on the idea that a planet should defined by mass. O...k. Size does matter *points to icon* Never mind the fact that the size of Pluto is guesstimated at best by a pack of eggheads squinting in to a telescope, making indirect measurements and doing a whole lot of math. Yes, Pluto:Charon's ratio is crazier than that of Earth:moon, but our moon is piddly-small compared to most other natural satellites anyway.
Why is this so hard to work out? How about defining it as a celestial body with an atmosphere that revolves around the sun and shines by reflected light? Lifted and amended slightly from Dictionary.com, and it's used in a hell of a lot of other dictionaries but it makes a fuckload more sense than adding random chunks of rock willy-nilly. (and btw, what happened to the nomer "planetoid"?)
*le sigh* guess idiot questions like this are why I'm not an astronomer. And why I shouldn't post half asleep while at work. Still, we all know I'm an idiot, so I've nothing to lose. *shrug*
Read an article that said (and I quote) Much-maligned Pluto would remain a planet -- and its largest moon and two other heavenly bodies would join the planetary roster
...whafuck? Charon a planet? Since when? So we have a planet orbiting a planet? In that case why not redefine our moon as a planet! hell, it's a satellite, but it's bigger than ol' Pluto. Most of this rampant shitfuckery seems to be on the idea that a planet should defined by mass. O...k. Size does matter *points to icon* Never mind the fact that the size of Pluto is guesstimated at best by a pack of eggheads squinting in to a telescope, making indirect measurements and doing a whole lot of math. Yes, Pluto:Charon's ratio is crazier than that of Earth:moon, but our moon is piddly-small compared to most other natural satellites anyway.
Why is this so hard to work out? How about defining it as a celestial body with an atmosphere that revolves around the sun and shines by reflected light? Lifted and amended slightly from Dictionary.com, and it's used in a hell of a lot of other dictionaries but it makes a fuckload more sense than adding random chunks of rock willy-nilly. (and btw, what happened to the nomer "planetoid"?)
*le sigh* guess idiot questions like this are why I'm not an astronomer. And why I shouldn't post half asleep while at work. Still, we all know I'm an idiot, so I've nothing to lose. *shrug*
