How do you feel about dropping Pluto from our solar system?

Question

I watched a show last night that had scientests debating the fact on weather or not Pluto was a real planet in our solar system. Some of them think that it's just a huge mass because of it's somewhat close location to the debris in the Kuiper (pronounced Kyper) Belt. Others stressed that it is a planet just because it is round. The scientists who want to have it removed went on to say that just because it's round, doesn't make it a planet. Our own Moon is round, as well as all the other satalites in the Solar System, and althogh they have been known from time to time to be labeled lesser planets, they are still considered stalites.

What are your thoughts? I'm in no way a scientest, but I am intregued . Especially when it comes to outer space and the planets. My thoughts? What does it hurt to leave Pluto umong the other 8 in the Solar System?

Respectfully,
Daisymaye28

Answer 1

One has to ask the question "Who makes the rules about what constitutes a planet?" I know that I do not have a vote. It does not matter what we call it anyway because there are no consequences either way. There are no consequences because we can change our minds any time we want. It's kind of like the boxing world(s). There are several worlds according to boxing and their championships. Same deal. Some will always say Pluto is a planet and some will say it is not. I think it is a planet for no other reason than it looks to me like one.

Answer 2

You are right about that, and to answer this and other questions about this icy planet, NASA launched the New Horizons spacecraft in Jan 2006. It is scheduled to travel the 3 billion miles to Pluto and arrive in the year 2015.
Interestingly, the Hubble Space Telescope recently discovered two new moons around Pluto, Hydra and Hyx. Along with Charon it makes now 3 moons circling Pluto. The astronomers that made the discovery hypothesized that this 3 moons originated in a collision between Pluto and another object of the kuiper Belt, similar to the Earth-Moon System.
Pluto is the largest object in the Kuiper Belt, which is also a source of comets. There are thousands of small planets in that Belt, Pluto is the largest.
Pluto's dance around the sun takes 248 years, and the temperature there is minus 387 degrees Farenheit. That has got to be a cold winter!!

Answer 3

There's talk of a new class of planets to add to the Rocky Inner Bodies and Gas Giants: The Ice Dwarfs. It is a proposed compromise to dethroning the King of the Underworld by letting Sedna and Xena as well as Pluto be included in a new group classified to reside between KBO's and the outer planets.

But what makes an Ice Dwarf an Ice Dwarf and not a KBO? Location? Size? Composition? If it is massive enough to be round?
An atmosphere was once a planetary prerequisite, but there are half a dozen moons with an atmosphere in our system. So Got no clue what is takes to be a planet.

I'm 35 and quite used to the status quo, so I like the idea. But pluto...ahem, Pluto should be a planet.

Answer 4

General question. What makes a planet a planet? Is it the mass? Diameter? Orbit? Distance from the sun?

I would say that the following are minimum characteristics of planets.

1 & 2 below are arbitrary, you may prefer other variables.

1. Minimum Mass. 10^20 Kg. (about 1/100th the mass of Pluto).
2. Minimum Diameter. 1,500 Km (about 900 miles)
3. Orbit. Must be in orbit around a sun, and not a planet (therefore, Luna is not a planet, even though it's larger than Pluto).
4. Distance from sun. Not relevant, as long as it is clearly in orbit around the sun. Therefore, a massive sun may have planets dozen's of light-years away.
5. Is not itself a sun. That would be a binary or higher system.
6. Must not be in interstellar space, not associated with a sun or suns.
7. Not in a field of other bodies with the same approximate orbit. That would leave out anything in the Asteroid Belt and Oort Cloud.

Under the above criteria, Pluto qualifies as a planet.

Now, how about "Xena" (aka, 2003 UB313)? To Hades (Greek God of the underworld) with conventions for naming planets. Xena is perfect. And Gabrielle for the moon.

Answer 5

well it does orbit the sun but then its orbit is elliptical unlike the other planets. It's small, but does a planet really have to have a particular size? They've already defined it as a planet. If they stop defining it as a planet, that'll ruin the definition of what a planet really is and they will have to change the whole of history. It won't be dropped because then there would be outrage at every textbook/article about the planets containing pluto. Lots of money would be spent on new textbooks and oh, think about the children having to learn about the nine planets one day and they eight planets the next. This would really mess things up.
Plus, the pnemonics would all stop working and no one would remember any of the planets! Argh! They wouldn't do it...!

Answer 6

If Pluto was droped from our Solar System. It would be like removing the last element form the Periodic Table of Elements. It is a part of our Solar System. It's mass contributes to evolution of our Solar System. Venus is completely inhospitable to life. Yet, it's still considered a planet. How are they going to enforce their decision if they say it's not a planet ? Are they planning on taking this to the US Senate. If I visit America in the future and say;" I'd like to look through a telescope at the planet Pluto " Will I get arrested ?

Answer 7

I totally agree with you. There is no use to take Pluto out of our solar system, it has been a planet for a long time, and we shouldn't destroy it now! I really like space and I want to get involved with NASA. Whoever these scientists are they need to think a little bit harder on what they would be doing. All the text book that the schools have would have to be changed so they would be effecting more then they think.

I highly doubt that they will destroy it, but it is ridiculous that they even had the idea.

Answer 8

I would feel very comfortable with excluding Pluto from our Solar System's list of planets. It may rotate around our Sun, it may be round, it may have a 'moon', but so do other objects in our Solar System. I would rather refer to Pluto as a Kuiper Belt object (is that what it's called?) than the 9th planet. I am in doubt, with the existence of any other planet rather than the first eight which we know of.

Answer 9

There is currently a debate in the scientific community to drop the word "planet" from our vocabulary altogether. MErcury, Venus Earth and Mars are "Terrestrials" because they are composed of rock. Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune are "Jovians" or gas giants.... Pluto is indeed a KBO (Kuiper Belt Object.)

On the other hand, there those that say that it's so culturally ingrained, that we should just arbitrarily say that anything Pluto's size or larger is a planet and anything smaller is an asteroid/comet.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/sciencenow/3302/01-video-01.html

Answer 10

I guess it doesn't really matter from everyday society's standpoint. It's not as if we're gonna have to start paying extra fees for long distance calling to Pluto.

I always liked Pluto though it was such an odd little planet so far out there beyond the gas giants. Just sitting there so meek and humble.

Even if they do drop it I will always consider Pluto one of my own.

Poor little guy.