1847AD: Reclassify Ceres, Vesta, Juno, and Pallas as Asteroids
Kevin Heider
too many oversized ice balls declared as planets even though they are
not single handedly the gravitionally dominant object in their local
population.
In 1828, the book "First Steps to Astronomy and Geography" listed the
eleven (11) planets as: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Vesta, Juno,
Ceres, Pallas, Jupiter, Saturn, and Herschel. (Herschel was an
alternate name for Uranus.)
From about 1801 until about 1847, “Ceres, Vesta, Juno, and Pallas”
were considered planets. But after astronomers kept discovering more
and more asteroids, they removed all 4 of them from the list of
planets. Pluto’s situation is historically sad, but scientifically no
different.
Planet Ceres 1801-1847
Planet Pluto 1930-2006
-- Kevin Heider
-- Kevin Heider
West Coast Swing Photos at:
http://www.pbase.com/kheider
Chris L Peterson
<usenet1.z...@xoxy.net> wrote:
>From about 1801 until about 1847, “Ceres, Vesta, Juno, and Pallas”
>were considered planets. But after astronomers kept discovering more
>and more asteroids, they removed all 4 of them from the list of
>planets. Pluto’s situation is historically sad, but scientifically no
>different.
"Scientifically" there is no basis for including one body or a thousand
in the definition of "planet". This has nothing at all to do with
science; it is a linguistic matter. The best thing the IAU can do is
leave "planet" undefined, since it already has a common definition and
adding another will just confuse things.
Then they can sit down and actually do something scientific by
classifying the many types of bodies found in this and other solar
systems- preferably with words that aren't already in use by other
fields!
_________________________________________________
Chris L Peterson
Cloudbait Observatory
http://www.cloudbait.com
Kevin Heider
<c...@alumni.caltech.edu> wrote:
>On Wed, 23 Aug 2006 10:11:37 -0700, Kevin Heider
><usenet1.z...@xoxy.net> wrote:
>
>>From about 1801 until about 1847, “Ceres, Vesta, Juno, and Pallas”
>>were considered planets. But after astronomers kept discovering more
>>and more asteroids, they removed all 4 of them from the list of
>>planets. Pluto’s situation is historically sad, but scientifically no
>>different.
>
>"Scientifically" there is no basis for including one body or a thousand
>in the definition of "planet". This has nothing at all to do with
>science; it is a linguistic matter. The best thing the IAU can do is
>leave "planet" undefined, since it already has a common definition and
>adding another will just confuse things.
Hi Chris;
You are a professional and I am just a backyard amateur, so I respect
your opinion.
But do we want a Solar System with 12 planets today, 53 planets after
they approve the 42 KBOs being considered as planets, and a list that
will just keep growing?
Do we want future diagrams of the solar system to place more
significance on the smaller KBOs and less significance on the 8 Major
(classical) Planets?
There are already 783 KBOs. None of these KBOs (including Pluto &
Xena) are the gravitionally dominate body (exceeding 50% of the total
mass) of other such objects in their region of space.
I assume in the late 1800's Ceres was not considered a planet because
it is only 25% of the mass of the Asteroid belt, and fairly large
Vesta & Pallas share a similar region of space, and thus Ceres is not
truly dominate. Feel free to correct me if you think I am mistaken.
>Then they can sit down and actually do something scientific by
>classifying the many types of bodies found in this and other solar
>systems- preferably with words that aren't already in use by other
>fields!
Asteroids for rocks primarly between Mars & Jupiter.
Comets for small non-spherical ice balls that repeatedly violate the
inner solar system placing our lives at risk.
KBOs / TNOs for spherical ice balls beyond Neptune, but not in the
Oort Cloud.
>Chris L Peterson
>Cloudbait Observatory
>http://www.cloudbait.com
-- Kevin Heider
Brian Tung
> But do we want a Solar System with 12 planets today, 53 planets after
> they approve the 42 KBOs being considered as planets, and a list that
> will just keep growing?
I see it as being similar to studying economics; you don't have to
define precisely what an industry is in order to be able to characterize
how economics works within one. In particular, studying economics does
not require one to have an enumerated list of all industries.
At one time, such a list probably could have been drawn. There were
that few. But as time has gone on, that list is less and less well
defined. Clearly, auto manufacture is an industry. So is candy
production. But what about wooden blinds manufacturing? Is that an
industry, a niche, a segment, what? Clearly, we can discuss the issues
relating to the ups and downs of wooden blinds manufacturing without
knowing precisely how to classify it.
The property that both industries and bodies revolving around the Sun
have in common is that neither set admits of a simple and obvious break.
There is instead a gradual continuum from big to small. If one works
hard at it, you probably can identify a break that has some basis in
fact (and I believe that has been done in both cases), but in neither
case is that break simple or obvious to non-specialists, *or* clearly
relevant to how scholars study the individual entities.
> I assume in the late 1800's Ceres was not considered a planet because
> it is only 25% of the mass of the Asteroid belt, and fairly large
> Vesta & Pallas share a similar region of space, and thus Ceres is not
> truly dominate. Feel free to correct me if you think I am mistaken.
Only correcting your spelling of the word "dominant." :) ("Dominate"
is, generally speaking, only a verb.)
--
Brian Tung <br...@isi.edu>
The Astronomy Corner at http://astro.isi.edu/
Unofficial C5+ Home Page at http://astro.isi.edu/c5plus/
The PleiadAtlas Home Page at http://astro.isi.edu/pleiadatlas/
My Own Personal FAQ (SAA) at http://astro.isi.edu/reference/faq.html
Chris L Peterson
<usenet1.z...@xoxy.net> wrote:
>Hi Chris;
>
>You are a professional and I am just a backyard amateur, so I respect
>your opinion.
>
>But do we want a Solar System with 12 planets today, 53 planets after
>they approve the 42 KBOs being considered as planets, and a list that
>will just keep growing?
We have a Solar System with millions or billions of components, which
probably fall into dozens of rational categories. That's just the
reality. As far as I'm concerned when we talk about the "planets" we
mean Mercury through Pluto (nine of them), and that is unlikely to
change. Those nine comfortably fall into at least three formal
classifications, but that is only relevant for technical discussions. It
is those classifications that the IAU should be worrying about, not the
word "planet".
>Do we want future diagrams of the solar system to place more
>significance on the smaller KBOs and less significance on the 8 Major
>(classical) Planets?
I would say the nine classical planets. And I would say that the
significance of objects is hard to define, and subject to change. But I
don't think its all that difficult to make a basic diagram of the Solar
System that most people would be comfortable with: nine classical
planets, an asteroid belt, and a broad region beyond Pluto that contains
large bodies similar to Pluto, and which is the source of comets.
The fact that there are bodies similar to Pluto that we don't call
planets, and bodies similar to Ceres that we do, doesn't bother me.
"Planet" is a historical word, not a technical one. If it evolves over
time (in common usage), that's fine, too.
_________________________________________________
William Hamblen
> Then they can sit down and actually do something scientific by
> classifying the many types of bodies found in this and other solar
> systems- preferably with words that aren't already in use by other
> fields!
You've got to call them something.
"Kibo" for Kuiper Belt Object comes to mind. It would make
James "Kibo" Perry happy, too.
Bud
Bless You
Kevin Heider wrote:
Yea an in Aristotle's time it was fire, air, earth, water, and the
cyrstaline aether!
Shall we go back to that too?
Bless You
Chris L Peterson wrote:
> On Wed, 23 Aug 2006 10:11:37 -0700, Kevin Heider
> <usenet1.z...@xoxy.net> wrote:
>
> >From about 1801 until about 1847, “Ceres, Vesta, Juno, and Pallas”
> >were considered planets. But after astronomers kept discovering more
> >and more asteroids, they removed all 4 of them from the list of
> >planets. Pluto’s situation is historically sad, but scientifically no
> >different.
>
> "Scientifically" there is no basis for including one body or a thousand
> in the definition of "planet". This has nothing at all to do with
> science; it is a linguistic matter. The best thing the IAU can do is
> leave "planet" undefined, since it already has a common definition and
> adding another will just confuse things.
>
> Then they can sit down and actually do something scientific by
> classifying the many types of bodies found in this and other solar
> systems- preferably with words that aren't already in use by other
> fields!
>
>
Absolutely right! Moreover, each specialty within scientific areas can
establish
its own specialised (technical) terminology to make the distinctions it
feels
appropriate and./or crucial to its studies - as happens inter-disiplinarily
anyway.
This IAU nonsense smacks of one set of clothes for all Chinese - and all
one size!
Black. Size 3 ? If your arms and legs stick out two feet, well too bad.
Praise the
Chairman !
Bless You
Kevin Heider wrote:
well as a mattrer of fact Ceres was considered a planet during most of the
1800's,
even though it is unquestionably an "asteroid" and part of the "asteroid
belt".
Bless You
Chris L Peterson wrote:
> On Wed, 23 Aug 2006 15:24:38 -0700, Kevin Heider
> <usenet1.z...@xoxy.net> wrote:
>
> >Hi Chris;
> >
> >You are a professional and I am just a backyard amateur, so I respect
> >your opinion.
> >
> >But do we want a Solar System with 12 planets today, 53 planets after
> >they approve the 42 KBOs being considered as planets, and a list that
> >will just keep growing?
>
> We have a Solar System with millions or billions of components, which
> probably fall into dozens of rational categories.
And that is precisely why you cant start lumping all of these various bodies
up
into brand new 'artificial' catagories which destroy some previously (just
as important) criterion. Eg, to say Ceres is a planet is to destroy is
previous
classification as an asteroid and a part of the "asteroid belt" - an
important distinction not only in position/location but also in process.
Pluto may have
been an independent object eons ago and knocked out of it orbit to assume
a new lower orbit (and location) around the Sun, but by the time it was
discovered
it was in its present orbit as distinct from everything else beyond it. Now,
if we
find another Pluto or something even larger beyond Pluto and clearly not
associated
with nearby objects (as astreroids in the asteroid belt) then that single
object would
warrant the status of planet, in my book. We might wind up with 22 planets,
but,
they would be planets according to the original scheme .... as opposed to
everything else circling the star.
> That's just the
> reality. As far as I'm concerned when we talk about the "planets" we
> mean Mercury through Pluto (nine of them), and that is unlikely to
> change. Those nine comfortably fall into at least three formal
> classifications, but that is only relevant for technical discussions. It
> is those classifications that the IAU should be worrying about, not the
> word "planet".
>
> >Do we want future diagrams of the solar system to place more
> >significance on the smaller KBOs and less significance on the 8 Major
> >(classical) Planets?
>
> I would say the nine classical planets. And I would say that the
> significance of objects is hard to define, and subject to change. But I
> don't think its all that difficult to make a basic diagram of the Solar
> System that most people would be comfortable with: nine classical
> planets, an asteroid belt, and a broad region beyond Pluto that contains
> large bodies similar to Pluto, and which is the source of comets.
>
> The fact that there are bodies similar to Pluto that we don't call
> planets, and bodies similar to Ceres that we do, doesn't bother me.
> "Planet" is a historical word, not a technical one. If it evolves over
> time (in common usage), that's fine, too.
>
> _________________________________________________
>
> Chris L Peterson
> Cloudbait Observatory
> http://www.cloudbait.com
Chris, I think you are 1000% correct here, not just historically but
technically-historically.
Davoud
> well as a mattrer of fact Ceres was considered a planet during most of the
> 1800's, even though it is unquestionably an "asteroid" and part of the "asteroid
> belt".
It is unquestionably an asteroid at the moment. What it will be later
today remains to be seen!
Davoud
--
usenet *at* davidillig dawt com
Kevin Heider
>hen...@ai5.net wrote:
>> well as a mattrer of fact Ceres was considered a planet during most of the
>> 1800's, even though it is unquestionably an "asteroid" and part of the "asteroid
>> belt".
>
>It is unquestionably an asteroid at the moment. What it will be later
>today remains to be seen!
>
>Davoud
According to one article it might be called a PLANT. :-)
http://www.cleveland.com/news/plaindealer/index.ssf?/base/news/1155727892203290.xml&coll=2
The number of dwarf planets will eventually grow so large that people
will stop calling them real planets. What's better, Pluto is among
them.
Kevin Heider
<usenet1.z...@xoxy.net> wrote:
>On Wed, 23 Aug 2006 21:24:04 GMT, Chris L Peterson
><c...@alumni.caltech.edu> wrote:
>
>>On Wed, 23 Aug 2006 10:11:37 -0700, Kevin Heider
>><usenet1.z...@xoxy.net> wrote:
>>
>>>From about 1801 until about 1847, “Ceres, Vesta, Juno, and Pallas”
>>>were considered planets. But after astronomers kept discovering more
>>>and more asteroids, they removed all 4 of them from the list of
>>>planets. Pluto’s situation is historically sad, but scientifically no
>>>different.
Pluto was demoted to a Dwarf Planet. Ceres and Xena were
promoted to Dwarf Planets with many more "Dwarf Planets" soon to come!
This is an excellent outcome from the IAU gathering. History has
properly corrected itself.
I am very glad that Charon did not become a planet or dwarf planet.
We currently have 8 Major Planets and 3 Dwarf Planets.
chris evans
--chris
http://www.aotksc.com/astro/
chris evans
it is nearer to sol. So I think Pluto still needs to be considered the
ninth planet, or reclassify as a mplanet to describe these oddies in
the kuiper belt.
--chris
http://www.aotksc.com/astro/