[X] My Assistant

[mars loon]

Dear Friends,

Today I am extremely dissapointed that the Pluto Demoters have triumphed.

I respect their opinion, but disagree with it.

I strongly agree with Alan Stern's statement calling it "absurd" that only 424 astronomers were allowed to vote, out of some 10,000 professional astronomers around the globe.

This tiny group is clearly not at all representative by mathematics alone.

I believe we should formulate a plan to overturn this unjust decision and return Pluto to full planetary status, and as the first member of a third catagory of planets, Xena being number two. Thus a total of 10 Planets in our Solar System

Please respond if you agree that Pluto should be restored as a planet.

ken

Ken Kremer
Amateur Astronomers Association of Princeton
Program Chairman

[Guest_Sedna_*]

Even when discovered, it was doubted that Pluto was really a planet. Then, it was considered so "de facto". Now IAU's Assembly has corrected this historical mistake. Why did 90% of the delegates leave the Assembly before it had finished? It's their business... Pluto is NOT a planet. In addition, I think that Alan Stern's and company reaction is quite puerile...

[JRehling]

Even when discovered, it was doubted that Pluto was really a planet. Then, it was considered so "de facto".

When Mercury was discovered, it was doubted that it was a single object instead of two. Then it became a planet de facto.

Before the invention of the telescope, Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars were lumped into a single category with Jupiter and Saturn... de facto, despite the gross difference in nature of these worlds.

Now IAU's Assembly has corrected this historical mistake.

If there has been a year with more fumbling of the issue than 2006, I'd like to know when. The current definition puts Mercury (comes within 0.25 AU of Venus) in a group with Jupiter (29 times its size) instead of with Pluto (comes at closest within 11 AU of Uranus and not even that close to Neptune; half Mercury's size). And it creates a definition such that if we find two Mars- (or Neptune-!) sized objects in similar orbits, they will neither be considered planets -- but be called "dwarf" planets despite their size.

It's their business... Pluto is NOT a planet. In addition, I think that Alan Stern's and company reaction is quite puerile...

The IAU is running into the buzzsaw of a community much larger than their few hundred and the lack of a mandate to tell people what "planet" should mean.

Mind you, I think the odds of a non-foolish outcome are long, but this vote hasn't settled anything except that the IAU is good fodder for comedians.

[dilo]

When Mercury was discovered, it was doubted that it was a single object instead of two. Then it became a planet de facto.
[...]
And it creates a definition such that if we find two Mars- (or Neptune-!) sized objects in similar orbits, they will neither be considered planets -- but be called "dwarf" planets despite their size.

About your example of two Mars- (or Neptune-!) sized objects in similar orbits, I doubt this would be a stable configuration... anyway, example doesn't apply to Pluto because, in this case, you should consider at least 3 other objects with similar dimensions and orbit (and we all know this number will grow in the few nest years!).
In this plot, I reported distance from Sun of all known Centaurus and Trans-Neptunian objects vs their absolute magnitude, so biggest objects are on the left (points represent semi-major axis while bars show range covered due to orbit eccentricity-note the logarithmic scale):


PS: Mercury wasn't really "discovered" and the same dicothomy occurred for Venus (Greek astronomers believed the planet to be two separate objects, one visible only at sunrise, the other only at sunset).

[ngunn]

Nice diagram, but what is the object that appears further out than Sedna with an aphelion beyond 1000 AU?