[meteorite-list] Re: THE PLANETARY VOTE

From: Larry Lebofsky <lebofsky_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Thu Aug 17 16:59:17 2006
Message-ID: <1155848352.44e4d8a0e137c_at_hindmost.LPL.Arizona.EDU>

Sterling:

Comments below:

Quoting "Sterling K. Webb" <sterling_k_webb_at_sbcglobal.net>:

> Hi, List, Larry,
>
>
> The vote of the planet definition being on August 24th,
> Space.com ran an article about, not the definition: the vote,
> just like it was FoxNews reporting on an election. The full article
> is reproduced below. But just like real TV, I'm going to indulge
> in lots of "color commentary" first...
>
> Caution: Political Commentary: Brian Marsden, an former
> opponent of the idea, is now in favor. This means the he has
> been assured by the IAU that the data clearing house that
> he built over the decades and still runs will continue in its role
> (as it should), and his funding won't get cut.

I have known Brian for years: I think he is actually planning to retire after
this IAU meeting and so will no long be the Director of the Minor Pla, oops,
Small Solar System Bodies Center.
>
> Caution: Political Commentary: David Charbonneau (extra-
> solar planets) is a firm eight-planet guy, saying that the solar
> system produced eight "fully-formed" planets and that the rest
> is just leftover rubble. He's right ,of course, and that makes what
> he discovers more important because they're "real" planets.
> And, if he were an astronomer from the gas giants, he could say
> that the solar system produced FOUR "fully-formed" planets and
> that the rest is just leftover rubble. He'd be right, of course.
> And, if he were an astronomer from Jupiter, he could say that
> the solar system produced ONE "fully-formed" planet and that
> the rest is just leftover rubble. He'd be right, of course.
> Don't worry, David, your funding won't get cut.

The terrestrial (note not a real term) planets may have formed in 2 or 3
million years, not exactly leftover rubble. In fact, Jupiter and Saturn may
still have been growing which led to the late heavy bombardment (if I read
things right).

>
> Caution: Political Commentary: The planetary scientists, as
> a body, are in favor of the new idea: more planets means more
> objects of study means more funding for them. Example: would
> the idiots in Congress have cut (they restored it) the DAWN
> mission if Ceres was a PLANET and there would have been
> fewer of them muttering over their rubber chicken, "Ceres?
> Whathahell is a Ceres? You mean, the Wurld Ceres?"

                          [ha, lost on none-US readers, I missed it first time]

I thought you had a warm spot for Ceres? It is also my license plate (mentioned
this to you before). We need another female planet (no sure Xena counts). And
if you think we will get any more money out of NASA, ha!
>
> Caution: Political Commentary: The extra-solar crowd seems
> to be more opposed to the new definition than anybody else.
> Geoff Marcy, THE extra-solar guy, was very direct. What's the
> matter, Geoff? You didn't get famous enough fast enough?
> Ironic, when the scuttlebutt was that the Committee threw in
> the "double-planet" category as a sop to them. I guess they
> weren't sopped. In fact, they to hate it the worst. My advice:
> want more funding? Find a planet of less than 3 Earth masses
> that's not blazing hot nor freezing cold. Our ears will perk up
> a lot more than if you come up with two dozen more boiling
> super-Jupiters grazing a photosphere...


Yes, a lot of care went into doing things that would benefit the extra solar
people.
>
> Caution: Political Commentary: Nobody seems to be directing
> the focus of their dis-satisfaction on the idea that the Planet Ceres
> is the Planet Ceres, a very pleasing development to all us closeted
> Ceres lovers. I haven't found even one quote lambasting Ceres as
> worthless junk, a miserable rockpile, asteroidal po' icewhite trash.

I proposed ice on Ceres in 1980! Convinced myself otherwise (just water of
hydration), but may be vindicated!
>
> Here's the URL and Space.com's text just as they ran it. Well,
> I corected their spelling errors, but that's all:

Rob Britt is doing a poll of us planetary scientists too poor to go to IAU on
our real feelings. Oh I am one of the 12 by the way.
>
> Sterling K. Webb----------------
>
> http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/060817_planet_support.html
>
> Astronomers Sharply Divided on New Planet Definition
> By Robert Roy Britt
> Senior Science Writer
> posted: 17 August 2006
> 10:41 am ET
> UPDATED 2:30 p.m. ET
>
> A 12-person committee representing the world's
> largest group of planetary scientists today threw its
> support behind a new planet-definition proposal that
> would increase the tally of planets in our solar system to 12.
> More dissent emerged, too, from several prominent
> planet experts.
>
> Straw Poll
>
> SPACE.com conducted an informal straw poll of
> respected astronomers who study planets and other
> small objects in our solar system and around other
> stars. Not all of them are at the IAU meeting where
> they can vote, but the question is this:
> How would you vote on the planet definition proposal?
> Yes = 5 No = 7 Undecided = 0
>
>
> The definition, proposed yesterday at a meeting
> of the International Astronomical Union (IAU) in
> Prague, preserves Pluto's planet status and essentially
> classifies as planets all round objects that orbit the
> Sun and do not orbit another planet. The tally of
> planets is expected to eventually soar into the hundreds
> if the resolution is passed by a vote next week.
>
> The Division for Planetary Sciences (DPS), a group
> within the American Astronomical Society, has the
> opposite view. The 12-member DPS Committee,
> elected by the membership, "strongly supports the
> IAU resolution," according to a statement released today.
> "The new definition is clear and compact, it is firmly
> based on the physical properties of celestial objects
> themselves, and it is applicable to planets found
> around other stars. It opens the possibility for many
> new Pluto-like planets to be discovered in our solar
> system," the DPS statement reads.
>
> A SPACE.com survey of a dozen astronomers
> who study planets in and out of our solar system
> found five in favor of the resolution and seven against.
> A separate private straw poll being conducted by the
> National Academies of Sciences has so far yielded
> an overwhelming "No" response, a source told SPACE.com.
>
> 'Terrible definition'
>
> Clearly no consensus has emerged, however.
> "I think it's a terrible definition," said David Charbonneau,
> a researcher at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for
> Astrophysics who searches for and studies planets
> around other stars. Charbonneau joins two other astronomers
> close to the issue who sharply criticized the plan.
>
> Charbonneau said the definition was motivated by
> a desire to determine whether Pluto and another object,
> 2003 UB313, are planets. But the IAU now says there
> are a dozen other objects that might be planets but need
> further study.
>
> "It is ironic that we are left with more, not fewer
> objects for which we are uncertain of their 'planetary'
> status," Charbonneau told SPACE.com. "Perhaps
> astronomy will undergo a schism, with sects of astronomers
> proclaiming different numbers of planets."
>
> "As representatives of an international community
> of planetary scientists, we urge that the resolution be
> approved," said the DPS statement, signed by chairman
> Richard French of Wellesley College.
>
> In an email interview, French said he supports the
> definition but realizes its shortcomings.
>
> "My own personal definition would have been
> different from the final IAU resolution, but scientists
> have been stalemated for years by defending their
> own pet definitions," French said. "I understand
> the appeal of a simple declaration that Pluto is no
> longer a planet and that the solar system has only
> eight, but I also think there is value in the present
> definition that has applicability to planets around
> other stars as well."
>
> The DPS has about 1,300 members, at least one-quarter
> of which are outside the United States. The statement
> does not represent the views of all members, said DPS
> Press Officer Sanjay Limaye. "There has been some
> feedback saying, 'I don't like it,'" he said.
>
> 'Worst' decision
>
> The definition would make a planet of the asteroid
> Ceres and also reclassify Pluto's moon Charon as
> a planet, on the logic that the center of gravity around
> which Charon and Pluto orbit is not inside Pluto but
> rather in the space between them. (Earth's Moon orbits
> our planet around a center of gravity that is inside Earth.)
>
> Pluto and Charon would be called a double planet,
> and they'd also be termed "plutons" to distinguish them
> from the eight "classical" planets. Ceres would be termed
> a dwarf planet.
>
> The definition entirely misses the key element of a solar
> system object, namely its role in the formation of the
> solar system," Charbonneau said. "There are eight fully
> formed planets. The other objects-Ceres, Pluto,
> Charon, [2003 UB313], and hundreds of thousands
> of others, are the fascinating byproducts of the
> formation of these eight planets."
>
> David Jewitt, an astronomer at the University of
> Hawaii who searches for objects in the outer solar
> system, told SPACE.com that the proposal is "the
> worst kind of compromised committee report."
> Jewitt has long avoided the whole debate over whether
> Pluto is a planet "because I think it is essentially bogus
> and scientifically it is a non-issue." He waded in
> reluctantly this week.
>
> "Scientifically, whether Pluto is also a planet is
> a non-issue," Jewitt writes on his web site. "No scientific
> definition of planet-hood exists or is needed. Is that
> a boat or a ship? It doesn't matter if you are using it
> to float across the ocean. Scientists are interested in
> learning about the origin of the solar system, and
> setting up arbitrary definitions of planet-hood is
> of no help here."
>
> Geoff Marcy, who has led the discovery of more
> planets around other stars than anyone, called the
> definition arbitrary.
>
> "Pluto, its moon, and large asteroids cannot
> suddenly be deemed planets," Marcy said in an
> email interview. "How would we explain to students
> that one large asteroid is a planet but the next
> biggest one isn't?"
>
> Astronomers made a mistake when they deemed
> Pluto a planet in the 1930's, Marcy and many other
> astronomers say. "Scientists should show that they
> can admit mistakes and rectify them," he said.
>
> 'Just might work'
>
> However, one mild endorsement came today from
> Brian Marsden, who heads the Minor Planet Center
> where asteroids, comets and other newfound solar
> system objects are catalogued.
>
> Marsden was on an IAU committee of planetary
> scientists that tried for a year but failed to come up
> with a definition for the word "planet," which was
> never needed until recent discoveries of Pluto-sized
> worlds out beyond Neptune. The newly proposed
> definition was crafted by a second IAU committee
> of seven astronomers and historians.
>
> Marsden is a firm believer that there are eight planets,
> but the new proposal has him sounding more flexible
> than in the past.
>
> In an email message from Prague, Marsden said the
> new definition is "intended to satisfy the eight-planet
> traditionalists (such as myself) and the 'plutocrats.'"
> He added that he's "not against" the idea of using
> roundness as a determining factor.
>
> The IAU proposal will be voted on by IAU
> members Aug. 24.
>
> "It all just might work," Marsden said.
>

-- 
Dr. Larry A. Lebofsky
Senior Research Scientist
Co-editor, Meteorite                      "If you give a man a fish,   
Lunar and Planetary Laboratory               you feed him for a day.
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University of Arizona                        you feed him for a lifetime."
Tucson, AZ 85721-0063                                     ~Chinese Proverb
Phone:  520-621-6947
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e-mail: lebofsky_at_lpl.arizona.edu

Received on Thu 17 Aug 2006 04:59:12 PM PDT