Not the newest story in the world, but, hey, things move slowly in astronomical time, right?
I'll be doing a podcast tomorrow on the demotion of Pluto to dwarf-planet status - happened this past summer. Michael Burstein, head of the Pluto Is A Planet organization, will be my guest.
Here's the background, in case you were on vacation this summer:
Pluto was discovered and named as a planet in our solar system in 1930. This past August, the International Astronomical Union voted that it wasn't really a planet. A variety of controversial reasons were brought into play: Pluto's moon is about as big as Pluto (ok - so make it a double planet - why strip it of planetary status?); Pluto's not that big in any case, so if Pluto's a planet, we might have to say a big asteroid or two is also a planet (ok - so what would be the problem in expanding our solar system to 12 planets?); well, you get the picture.
This might seem a bit arcane, but I think it actually gets at the problem of experts I discussed last week in my post about Digg: Who decides what is news? Who decides what is a planet? Who decides if a dog is really the same species as a wolf?
The IAU vote was apparently rife with political infighting. So while we might want to place our faith in experts, a vote by a group of wrangling scientists somehow seems not the way to go with this. I suppose that's an improvement over past procedures, in which new discoveries were named by monarchs, or on their behalves, but maybe in this our age of easy computer access a better way of proceeding would be discuss it for a year or so - that is, everyone discuss it - and then put it to a vote of the world.
Let science explain, people decide. (Hmm... almost sounds like a familiar cable news slogan, there...)
But this isn't a dispute about a medical procedure, or application of a new technology of transportation. It's a debate about definitions. Why not let humanity decide?
Useful links:
Is Pluto a Planet?: A Historical Journey through the Solar System good historical background
http://www.plutoisaplanet.org/ lots of info, including details on Feb 4, Save Pluto Day
listen to the podcast
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