if pluto is not a planet then why it is spinning around the sun?

Answer 1

Hi dear friend,

Science is a collection of methodologies and definitions devised out on the basis of a "common sense" approach to the world around us. Defining some thing ( a phenomenon or a group) in nature is a way man has devised to easily categorise and study the universe. We define a bird as an organism with feathers, and hence partly many smaller raptor-dinosaurs were infact birds.Like wise, something with chlorophyll (the green pigment)was classified as a plant years ago, but eversince we discovered new animal-like organisms with chlorophyll we created new classification system and modified our definition of what a plant is. Similarly the International Astronomical Union (IAU) in 2006 August met a redefined "planets". A per this new definition a planet is a celestial body that:

(1) is in orbit around the Sun,
(2) has sufficient mass so that it assumes a round or 'nearly round' shape, and
(3) has "cleared the neighborhood" around its orbit.
A non-satellite body in our solar system fulfilling only the first two of these criteria is classified as a "dwarf planet". Meanwhile, a non-satellite body fulfilling only the first criterion is termed a Small Solar System Body.
Pluto and its largest satellite, Charon, is now considered a "binary system". This is because they are almost of the same size and the "barycentre" of their orbits does not lie within either of these bodies. Hence lets not blame anyone for deleting Pluto from the "True-Planet" list. The IAU has now classified Pluto and Charon under 'Dwarf planet'.
However criticisms are still in the air:
NASA scientist Alan Stern, reminds us that like even planets like Earth, Mars, Jupiter or Neptune have not fully cleared their orbital zones . For example there are about 11987 asteroids still crossing or in Earth's path. Jupiter too is with a similar no. of huge asteroids. Infact, Pluto would have been sucked off into Neptune if Neptune had enough mass to do so..! Lets wait and see.
Cheerio!

Answer 2

Spinning around the sun is not the only criteria for an object to be called a planet.

If this was the case then there are thousands of asteroids and comets revolving around the sun.
But some may argue that pluto is not in the asteroid belt. Yes but recently 4-5 pluto sized objects are discovered near pluto which orbit the sun. This means that we may have more than 14 planets.

The reason why pluto was deleted from the list of planets is as we build more powerful telescopes and as more of the objects around the solar system are discovered the lists of planets would continue to grow. So it was considered wise to redifine planets.

Answer 3

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pluto
http://www.iau.org/fileadmin/content/pdfs/Resolution_GA26-5-6.pdf

on 24 august 2006, the international astronomical union reclassified pluto.

pluto does orbit the sun, is ball-shaped and is not a satellite, but it does not have an isolated orbit (a bunch of other similar bodies have similar orbits.) so it is not a planet. for the time being, the iau classifies it as a "dwarf planet".

i have been waiting for this since i was about ten when i learned that pluto didn't fit the pattern set by the 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 bodies with similar orbits, classifying "134340 pluto" as a planet is even more irrational. i feel somewhat satisfied, but i don't know how long this will drag on tho. many planetary astronomers are satisfied that the definition is rigorous enuf. i can accept that the definition is flawed, but i can not accept that "134340 pluto" is a planet.

this was the right thing to do, believe me. this does not change anything about pluto or the solar system. this just corrects the mistake of classifying pluto as a planet initially.

this same thing happened has happened before. in 1800, an astronomer found a body orbiting the sun between the orbits of mars and jupiter and thought it was a planet. astronomers finally stopped classifying them as planets after they found several other bodies with similar orbits, and no one thinks ceres, pallas, juno, and vesta are planets today.

many astronomers consider pluto and charon to be a binary system, but two small bodies orbit that system. they are called nix and hydra.

incidentally, "134340 pluto" was never a moon of neptune. neptune did capture triton. this is why triton has a retrograde orbit

Answer 4

to keep it magnificent and straightforward: The closer a planet is to the sunlight, the quicker it is going to orbit round it, and the speed of the orbit will continually cancel out the actual shown actuality that a closer planet has a better gravitational pull. So really, because planets orbit so quickly, they couldn't in any respect crash into the sunlight only through gravity. The farther the planet is from the sunlight, the further time it has to take up one complete orbit.

Answer 5

Even things like comets spin around the sun. Are they planets?

Answer 6

All object that spin round the sun may not be planet. Moreover the nomenclature is man made. It was introduced once and it is removed now.

Answer 7

Hm...that's a good question. Satelites orbit planets, but Pluto orbits the Sun. Maybe scientists need to rethink not classifying Pluto as a planet anymore.

I just noticed the answers that talked about asteroids, but I don't know about it being an asteroid. Why would it just be away from other asteroids.

Answer 8

The asteroid belt orbits the sun, and none of the asteroids in the belt are considered planets. It's all in your definition of a planet.

Answer 9

everything is held in by the suns gravity. so everything spins and orbits around the sun.

Answer 10

it is very small for its size
and you can't say that whatever revolves around the sun is a planet, if so you must call all meteorites planets