[meteorite-list] Repost: PLANETS, PART ONE

From: Sterling K. Webb <kelly_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Wed Aug 3 04:30:23 2005
Message-ID: <42F08077.DB5D854D_at_bhil.com>

Hi, Everybody!

    This original must have been too log. It didn't post. Here it is in
parts. Part One:

    There is some intense behind-the-scenes maneuvering going on here.
In his initial press announcement, Brown spoke of 2003UB313 very much as
you would expect, in the jargon of the trade, referring to it as a KBO
(and TNO), by number and so forth.

    Then, on the fourth day, his press and website sprouted out with the
word "planet" in great profusion everywhere. It was a total turnabout.
On the same day, it was announced that the IAU in Paris, which was
scheduled to deliver a formal definition of "what is a planet?" in
"about a year from now," would MIRACULOUSLY have a full definition ready
in about a WEEK! They are so efficient, aren't they? Really marvelous...

    It does not take a seer, clairvoyant, or TV psychic to guess what
that new definition will do to the status of 2003UB313. Otherwise, why
rush it out?

    Brown has said, in effect, that he will see to it, via the press and
by the "cultural" definition, that everyone on this planet will be
calling that body a PLANET (whatever the IAU says, is implied) by the
time they issue their totally objective (naturellement!) academic
decision.

    There are three reasons for this.

    One, only three human beings (and no living human being) has ever
discovered a planet. Those names, Herschel, LeVerrier, and Tombaugh,
will be in history books for 500 years? 1000 years? getting more
important as we move out into that solar system, and Brown is staking
his claim to his place right beside them. He's got the right to.

    Two, 2003UB313 IS a planet under the "rules" that were in effect at
the time of discovery. You don't change the rules after the game is over
because you don't like the outcome, not even in Paris (or do ou?). This
is a familiar principle to us all, and has a strong role in the "science
game," as well as all other human spheres of activity.

    Three, he's IN THE RIGHT here. I happen to agree with this myself
and I thought so before I ever heard Brown's name. I said to my self, I
said, "Self, if it's twice as big as Pluto (a planet), then it's a
planet! Wonder who found it? Guy's gonna be famous!"

    My definition of a planet in my original post (WHAT IS A PLANET?)
was as follows: if it goes around the Sun and is demonstrably larger
than Ceres, IT'S A PLANET.

    As for sphericity, anything as big as Ceres is going to be
spherical, so that roundness is implied, since at this size no material
could withstand the crushing forces of gravity, neither the lightest
ices nor iron itself.


        Stay tuned for Part Two...


Sterling K. Webb
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Received on Wed 03 Aug 2005 04:29:43 AM PDT