[meteorite-list] 'Plutons' Push Planet Total Up To 12

From: Sterling K. Webb <sterling_k_webb_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Wed Aug 16 17:24:51 2006
Message-ID: <007801c6c17a$64772aa0$6b7f4b44_at_ATARIENGINE>

Hi, Chris, List,


    Actually, the IAU does have the authority, beyond the support of
every working scientist in the field. The IAU was founded in 1918/9 to
clear up a horrific mess of everybody naming the SAME Lunar and
Martian features with their own choice of names, so that you had to
refer to "the crater Prof. X calls Backscat and Prof. Y calls Gribniz
but Prof. Z calls Tinkerbelle" for anyone to know what feature you're
talking about.

    Under a whole array of International Treaties, most of which
the US is signatory to, they are designated to be the official arbiter
of this and that, so many times and in so many treaties, that their
authority is virtually statutory. For example, the GPS timing would
be impossible with the geodetic-celestial coordinate transfer, which
they defined and implemented. Would you like to be flying around
the world and have the GPS system change at every national border?
No thanks. The list of things they do that are essential and absolutely
necessary is very long.

    They're not the Acad?mie Fran?aise; they're a lot more
authoritative! All the Acad?mie Fran?aise does is try to bully
the French into talking like it's the eighteenth century. Prithee,
what harm in that, sirrah? And while I like to tease them,
like any European French Model bureaucracy, they do a
huge service and this nomenclature debate is actually quite
a unique and rare return to their roots in the midst of all the
snazzy things they do. (Did I just call them "snazzy"?)

    And the ordinary users of English are common-sense
people; they're not going use names for things that are not
common to all listeners and other talkers. If most people
call Ceres a planet, after a while everybody will. I predict
that in 2015, when the highly detailed images flow back from
the Dawn Mission and a new and strange and fascinating
world unfolds, everybody will be talking about the "planet"
Ceres.

    I think of it as "Dangerfield's World." It don't get no
respect. But that'll change.


Sterling K. Webb
--------------------------------------------------------------
----- Original Message -----
From: "Chris Peterson" <clp_at_alumni.caltech.edu>
To: "Meteorite Mailing List" <meteorite-list_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Sent: Wednesday, August 16, 2006 8:54 AM
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] 'Plutons' Push Planet Total Up To 12


Loonie indeed.

It doesn't matter how they vote, the IAU simply doesn't have the
authority to define "planet" (they aren't the Acad?mie fran?aise, after
all <g>). IMO they are fools for attempting to do so, as there is no
need for a technical definition. The ordinary users of English (and
other languages) have long since decided what the planets are- and that
they don't include Ceres (with its own history), nor Charon, nor any big
iceballs floating around in peculiar orbits far, far beyond Pluto.

At most, this will cause a few authors of technical papers to adjust
their jargon- and I'm not even sure of that.

Chris

*****************************************
Chris L Peterson
Cloudbait Observatory
http://www.cloudbait.com


----- Original Message -----
From: "Sterling K. Webb" <sterling_k_webb_at_sbcglobal.net>
To: "Sterling K. Webb" <sterling_k_webb_at_sbcglobal.net>; "Ron Baalke"
<baalke_at_zagami.jpl.nasa.gov>; "Meteorite Mailing List"
<meteorite-list_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Sent: Wednesday, August 16, 2006 12:58 AM
Subject: Re: [meteorite-list] 'Plutons' Push Planet Total Up To 12


> The IAU proposal for 12 planets is as follows:
> 1. Ceres 'cause it's big and round and orbits the Sun,
> 2. 2003UB313 ("Xena") 'cause it's big and round and orbits the Sun,
> 3. Charon, Pluto's Moon, 'cause it's big and round and orbits the Sun
> and constitutes along with Pluto a DOUBLE PLANET system!
>
> All other planetary bodies have to apply for membership
> and present credentials, at some future date.
>
> Still think the vote's a toss-up.
>
> I predict the IAU will get some really nasty letters from the
> Luna City Chamber of Commerce, demanding the the Earth-Moon
> System be recognized as a DOUBLE PLANET, since it meets
> all the criteria applied to Pluto-Charon System.
>
> Those guys up there are, well, Loonie...

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Received on Wed 16 Aug 2006 05:24:43 PM PDT