yes, this does not change anything about pluto or the solar system. this just corrects the mistake of classifying pluto as a planet initially. 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. this was the right thing to do, believe me.
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 not satisfied that the definition is rigorous enuff. i can accept that the definition is flawed, but i can not accept that "134340 pluto" is a planet.
this same thing happened has happened before. in 1801, 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.
incidentally, "134340 pluto" was never a moon of neptune. neptune did capture triton. this is why triton has a retrograde orbit. many astronomers consider pluto and charon to be a binary system, but two small bodies orbit that system. they are called nix and hydra.
2007-02-25 02:49:55
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answer #1
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answered by warm soapy water 5
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Yes, Pluto will always be part of our Solar System, but is no longer considered a planet. Why?
Well for starters, Pluto is just too small. In the neighborhood where Pluto lives? Planets are supposed to be huge. The Jovian planets, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune are 20 to 300 times the size of the Earth, and Pluto is really small compared to the Earth, smaller than our Moon. Kind of stands out.
And Pluto is not made out the same material as the Jovians. The large planets are mostly gigantic spheres of gas, mostly hydrogen and helium. Likely there are no solid surfaces, only denser and denser gas all the way in. Pluto is a small solid world of methane, water, carbon dioxide and ammonia ices, maybe a little rock and with a just hint of atmosphere (that freezes out and falls as snow in her "winter").
And third, Pluto's orbit is the most eccentric (oval shaped) and the most tilted to the plane that the rest of the planets orbit in. Also, Pluto is locked in a resonance with Neptune's orbit and comes closer to the sun than Neptune sometimes.
There were theories that Pluto was a lost moon of Neptune but that was before we discovered she a has one large moon (Charon) half her size (pretty much, this system is a double planet) and recently two other teeny-tiney moons.
Pluto seems like she cant be an ejected moon-she must have formed on her own and seems to be part of an entire army of small icey-dwarf objects that circle just outside Neptune's orbit in what is known as the Kuiper belt. We have no idea of how many or how large these objects may be. NOT "planets" proper, hence the new term "dwarf planet" where Pluto is king.
BUT I still think Pluto should be called a planet because of historical reasons (discovered by an American, financed by Percival Lowell, Tombaugh's life story, etc).
2007-02-25 01:37:18
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answer #2
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answered by stargazergurl22 4
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Pluto has not been moved out of the solar system by its downgrading to a dwarf planet. It is still in exactly the same orbit round the Sun.
2007-02-25 00:29:42
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answer #3
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answered by tentofield 7
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Pluto is still part of the Solar system. What's been debated recently is whether it should be classified as a planet. The decision was reached that it should be reclassified as a "dwarf planet"
2007-02-25 00:26:53
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answer #4
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answered by davidbgreensmith 4
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Yes, it is a part of the solar system, as all objects revolving the Sun are the constituents of the solar system. However, its planetary status is withdrawn owing to its small size.
2007-02-25 01:06:30
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answer #5
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answered by Anonymous
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It is a part of solar system.
2007-02-25 00:27:31
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answer #6
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answered by J.SWAMY I ఇ జ స్వామి 7
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.It is out by a ruling from astronomers
2007-02-25 00:23:55
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answer #7
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answered by WC 7
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