What is it?
2006-10-03 15:08:15 · 9 answers · asked by spurs_rock_321 2 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Astronomy & Space
What I think you have heard is that it now has a number (134340). Some people have misunderstood this to mean that it no longer has a name, but is only to be known by its number in the future. That is simply not the case. It can be referred to both as Pluto or as 134340 Pluto.
If I can explain what the number is and why Pluto has been given one?
The Minor Planet Centre catalogues all minor planets with orbits that are sufficiently well charted that they can be predicted with some certainty. It takes a while to appear in the MPC catalogue after a new object is discovered.
The catalogue was started when the asteroid 1 Ceres was discovered in 1801, followed by 2 Pallas in 1802, 3 Juno in 1804 and 4 Vespa in 1807, We now know of more than 338,000 asteroids but only about a third of these have catalogue numbers and only a tenth of those have names. So like stars in star catalogues, astronomers refer to many of these objects by a number alone,
Planets, however, do not have a number and do not appear in the Minor Planet Centre catalogue. On 24th August 2006 Pluto was demoted from planet status to dwarf planet status.
That is why it did not have a number before now, and why it has now been given a MPC number.
Pluto has NOT had its name taken away from it. This is an emotive twist that has been put on the facts by people who think it was "unfair" to demote Pluto, and this rumour is clearly spreading, like misinformation has a habit of doing!
134340 Pluto, 1 Ceres and 136199 Eris are all now classed as Dwarf Planets.
2006-10-03 15:12:56 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 18⤊ 0⤋
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pluto
no, but the international astronomical union gave pluto a minor planet number. it is now "134340 pluto".
i have been waiting for this since i was about ten when i learned that pluto didn't fit the pattern set by the more major bodies in the solar system so it was an anomaly. it just felt "out of place". now that astronomers have found hundreds of other similar bodies with similar orbits, classifying "134340 pluto" as a planet is even more irrational. this does not change anything about the solar system or pluto. it just corrects the mistake of classifying "134340 pluto" as a planet initially. this is the right thing to do, believe me.
many planetary astronomers and astronomers in general are not satisfied that the iau definitions of the classes "planet" and "dwarf planet" are rigorous enuf so i don't know how long this will drag on. i can accept the definitions are flawed, but i can not accept that pluto is a planet. i felt somewhat satisfied with the reclassification of pluto, but this haggling is disappointing.
2006-10-04 14:45:25 · answer #2 · answered by warm soapy water 5 · 0⤊ 2⤋
Not "good enough to be a planet" pluto
2006-10-03 22:11:42 · answer #3 · answered by jr128128 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
No but it s also referred to as one of the dwarf plaents. but there are a lot so be specific if u re gonna mention pluto somewhere.
2006-10-04 11:27:22 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
it's still Pluto
2006-10-03 22:10:55 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
nah, just ain't a planet no more, just a crappy little rock that we just spent a bunch of money to send a mission on its way too..I actually don't mind the mission, we may even learn something about the Kuiper belt from it
2006-10-03 22:12:28 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
The name is unchanged.
The classification changed from "planet" to "dwarf planet."
Aloha
2006-10-03 22:10:52 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
no
2006-10-03 22:10:16 · answer #8 · answered by mike j 1 · 1⤊ 0⤋
nah....
2006-10-04 05:57:02 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋