Definition of Planet to be Announced in September.

Mercury and Jupiter are planets.
They are very different,to put it mildly.
Putting hard and fast definitions on the new objects is a bit silly as the range is already so broad.

This is not new. A very old Greek problem in Logic is the "heap" paradox,
2,500 YEARS OLD in fact !!
"When does a heap become a heap?" is uncannily like the present planets debate.


Example: "Some pets are cardinals, but all cardinals are finches, while every finch is a bird, and only warm-blooded animals are birds. Hence, some pets are birds."

Applied to vague predicates, such chains of reasoning may result in paradox: if one grain of sand does not make a heap, and the addition of a second grain of sand does not make a heap, and the addition of a third grain of sand does not make a heap, etc., etc., then it would seem to follow (contrary to fact) that a collection of ten billion grains of sand must not be a heap.

A great argument, in theory.
However, it is human nature to try and quantify everything as it helps in communicating to others what we speak of.
If we were to live in a world in which we were not to catogarise anything, it would become extremely difficult to visualise what a person was communicating to us.
Example, compare the two fictional newspaper headlines relating to the same discovery:
"Scientists discover a planet orbiting a nearby star"
or
"Things discover a thing orbiting a nearby thing"


OK, having a bit of fun perhaps. And yes, I do see the point you're making both from a general idea and from the point more specific to planets. However, we live in a world of ever increasing information and it does help to quantify everything in so far as possible, even if some of these classifications are sometimes arbitrary (e.g. heap).

Very funny,just like the meaningless "whats a planet" debate.

You wouldn't think it was meaningless if it was you who discovered Pluto or Sedna. :lol:

they're probably organizing against this rezoning as we speak on those planets .
stephen.

Planet = "Wanderer" in Greek.

I'd call all the new discoveries "Kuiper Belt Planets" and then sub-categorise them. "Gas Giants", "Terrestrial", "Minor", (just like we do already).

I agree that Kuiper belt "OBJECTS" is too vague.(The Voyagers are now Kuiper Belt "Objects".).

Clyde Tombaugh said: "Common sense tells us that there are thousands of more planets beyond Pluto reaching all the way out to the Oort Comet Cloud one tenth of the way to the next star, it's just that our telescopes can't yet see them."

Now the telescopes can see them, the very very near ones anyway.

Very funny,just like the meaningless "whats a planet" debate.

You wouldn't think it was meaningless if it was you who discovered Pluto or Sedna. :lol:

they're probably organizing against this rezoning as we speak on those planets .
stephen.

Rezoning! I wonder if any Clyde Tombaugh fans are passing on brown envelopes. :lol: If Dublin county council were involved, they'd probabily end up as commercial parks.

This much is for sure,when I read the "definition" I will fall about laughing.

Why?

Because ever afterwards people will always ask:
"What's that word mean ?"

And I will always HAVE to reply:
"That's what they call them new yokes or thingamajigs beyond Pluto."

Guaranteed.