DailyDirt: My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nine...

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

If you're young enough, you were only taught about the eight planets in our solar system -- and possibly that there was a mysterious 'Planet X' or planet Tyche beyond Neptune. More recently, there's a new ninth planet proposal from the same folks who re-named Pluto as a dwarf planet. Check out these links on Pluto and this new ninth planet that might redefine the outer edge of our solar system. After you've finished checking out those links, take a look at our Daily Deals for cool gadgets and other awesome stuff.
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Filed Under: astronomy, binary planet, charon, dwarf planet, eris, hydra, kerberos, konstantin batygin, michael brown, ninth planet, nix, planet x, pluto, solar system, space, space exploration, styx, tno, trans-neptunian object, tyche


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  • identicon
    Lawrence D’Oliveiro, 22 Jan 2016 @ 6:09pm

    Minor Bodies With Moons

    Lots of minor bodies have moons, though it appears Pluto is the only one with as many as five.

    By the way, anybody else been watching the current planetary alignment? I went out this morning and saw four (I think either I was too early for Mercury, or my view was blocked in that direction). Jupiter is bright as usual, but Venus is amazingly much brighter, and distinctly yellowish. And you can just make out that it is not quite round, since it is currently to one side of the Sun from our viewpoint, and only the side facing the Sun is lit.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 22 Jan 2016 @ 7:09pm

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    pixelpusher220 (profile), 22 Jan 2016 @ 11:12pm

    it's not fair!

    I still want Pizza!

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Coyne Tibbets (profile), 23 Jan 2016 @ 12:41am

    Stop the flood!

    "What does Brown have against Pluto?"

    When I heard about his search, I immediately wondered if the motive isn't personal. I don't know how long Mr. Brown has been looking for this new planet, but if he was expecting the honor of finding the next planet after Pluto, well...then his honors were being stolen by the discoveries of Eris, Haumea, Quaoar, Salacia, Orcus, 2002 MS₄, Sedna, 2007 OR10₁₀, MakeMake, Varuna, Varda, 2002 UX₂₆ and...*whew*! Not to mention the ones discovered long ago, that were under debate for addition to the list, like Ceres 1.

    So it's possible he figured that, if he was going to have the honor of finding the next planet, he had to stop the flood of these new mini-worlds being discovered. That would be petty (and Pluto an innocent bystander) but it wouldn't be the first time something of this type has happened in the astronomical community.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 23 Jan 2016 @ 12:56am

      Re: Stop the flood!

      Considering that Brown also discovered many of the minor bodies that pushed Pluto to be reclassified... Doesn't look like he had any nefarious scheme in mind.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 23 Jan 2016 @ 12:56am

      Re: Stop the flood!

      Considering that Brown also discovered many of the minor bodies that pushed Pluto to be reclassified... Doesn't look like he had any nefarious scheme in mind.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Mark Wing, 23 Jan 2016 @ 7:07pm

    Pluto is a shitty planet. We should melt it down for scrap.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    orbitalinsertion (profile), 25 Jan 2016 @ 12:38pm

    Twisting the knife...

    Someone please send in the ROFLcopters.

    I think my favorite thing about Pluto is the vast majority of people with vocal opinions about it couldn't spare the time of day for anything remotely astronomical (or indeed, vaguely science-related)otherwise. Probably the same people who get pissed off when species are reclassified or anyone comes up with a better model of anything (unless they don't actually know about it and it makes the electronics in their smartphones work). I wonder how many got all upset with Einstein's better and more accurate theory of gravitation.

    Hey, anyone else get all cranky when it was figured out that the solar system isn't as far out at the edge of the galaxy as we once thought it was? Let's have a petition for re-sizing the galaxy to suit our weird personal whims and take back our Good Old Days and Keep Kids Off Our Lawns.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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