Why are all the planets on the same plain?

Question

It can't just be coincidence that all of the planets we know of are all in a practically straight line. What causes it? Maybe the Sun isn't perfectly spherical or something like that? I can't seem to find any answers on the internet.

This isn't a joke question. I'm really trying to find this answer. The planets are pretty much on the same plain. We don't have any planetary orbits that are perpendicular to each other, why not?

Answer 1

The planets all condensed from the same dust cloud. This cloud was in orbit around the sun and was rotating. As a result of the rotation it was spun out into a disk - this is called an accretion disk and is seen around a lot of stars. So all of the planets condensed out of a disk and hence are in the same plane.

Some objects orbiting the sun did not condense from this disk but were captured. These are typically not in the plane of the ecliptic. Pluto - recently removed from the canon of planets - is in this category.

Answer 2

They are not. Pluto has a very eccentric orbit. For instance, while looking at Pluto's orbit around the sun, you would think that the planet acutally crosses the path of Neptune at some point... but it actually doesn't. While PLuto moves closer to the sun that Neptune during a portion of it's orbit, The angle that Pluto orbits the sun is such that their paths never cross each other.

Neptune itslef is on a different plane than the rest of the solar system too. As a matter of fact, Neptune's axis is on a near 90° angle than the other planets.

Answer 3

The Solar System was formed from a cloud of gas and dust that began its condensation 5 to 10 billion years ago, The central part of the cloud, where it was densest, eventually beacame the Sun where mounting pressure caused temperature rise to the point where atoms of hydrogen (which was the predominant component of the cloud) to fuse, thus igniting the sun we know. The remainder of the cloud, in its rotation around the sun, began to form planets through the random collisions of particles, then small pieces, then larger pieces, then huge chunks.........once a significant mass was attained, these protoplanets began to accrete mass through gravity as well as collision, and the planets themselves grew to their present selves, This was occurring 3 to 5 billion years ago.

The angular momentum of the original cloud had to be conserved. This is one of the fundamental laws of physics. As the sun condensed, it lost angular momentum, which was transferred to the outer parts of the cloud, which became the planets, as described above. This angular momentum caused the proto-system to begin revolving around the sun. Gravitational forces produced the most stable orbits, which, as in any similar system, are in the equatorial plane (roughly, anyway) of the central body.

As a side note, it's the conservation of angular momentum which causes the varying lengths of orbital periods-----the length of the different planetary "years"-------rather than their distance from the sun or the gravitational attraction of the sun.

Answer 4

The picture on your profile tells that you are a teaser...

the fact of that the planets are "almost" on a plane orbit is just ruled by gravity, do not try to learn this in People magazine, look on scientific publications.

Answer 5

1. They aren't
2. Even though most of them are almost on a plane it has to do with the forming of the solar and circular momentum
3. I really don't like this question. I learned this in eighth grade.

Answer 6

gyroscopic effect of the rotation.

Answer 7

They aren`t ....sounds as a medieval statement....