tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-27321929296476733192024-03-10T23:20:16.626-04:00LaurelsPlutoBlogThis is a blog advocating the overturning and/or ignoring of the controversial IAU planet definition that demoted Pluto, the adoption of a broader planet definition that includes all dwarf planets, and the chronicling of worldwide efforts toward these goals.Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.comBlogger481125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-51298412602542650842024-02-18T16:03:00.002-05:002024-02-18T16:03:49.476-05:00Celebrating the 94th Anniversary of Pluto's Discovery<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7MY6vpldfeN3viKwiSqsK6oY1b0fGYBF2bzunD53aXPvN6Vkk3Dtb3sZFO6K8BLjPaWXrH6xkAMmDAX398-bFPVLou5ky9AXB6R1g4K_ioOz0R9kvDeWwkCPtcTb5S43epiNzM1yGesKKCIDQ4Pgq1ECGag-Tl-W03OUiOqIJM2Lh_ulZmg-md9KxKs8/s358/Pluto%20Discovery%20Announcement.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="358" data-original-width="300" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7MY6vpldfeN3viKwiSqsK6oY1b0fGYBF2bzunD53aXPvN6Vkk3Dtb3sZFO6K8BLjPaWXrH6xkAMmDAX398-bFPVLou5ky9AXB6R1g4K_ioOz0R9kvDeWwkCPtcTb5S43epiNzM1yGesKKCIDQ4Pgq1ECGag-Tl-W03OUiOqIJM2Lh_ulZmg-md9KxKs8/w536-h640/Pluto%20Discovery%20Announcement.jpg" width="536" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">It is time to
celebrate! Today marks the 94<sup>th</sup> anniversary of Pluto’s discovery by
Clyde Tombaugh on February 18, 1930, at the <a href="https://lowell.edu/">Lowell
Observatory</a> in Flagstaff, Arizona.<br />
<br />
The observatory is celebrating with its annual <a href="https://iheartpluto.org/">I Heart Pluto</a> event this weekend, featuring
a Pluto pub crawl, a talk by writer Diana Gabaldon, and various science talks
and demonstrations.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">In honor of this
anniversary, </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">National Geographic</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> has published an article titled, “</span><a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/pluto-planet-dwarf-planetoid-solar-system?fbclid=IwAR1CCNPDCf61eyMCsOLnu22svX0vzkk3PI2STC94R_j3m4MKBCivPxbCb4U" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Did
Pluto Ever Stop Being a Planet: Experts Debate</a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> with citations of Philip Metzger
and Mike Brown.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Phrasing the issue
as a question rather than a statement is progress, as it amounts to not blatantly
portraying the IAU view as objective truth. It is also an acknowledgement that the
debate over planet definition and Pluto’s status continues.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">There are several
errors in this article. First, contrary to the writer’s claim, Brown is not
responsible for the demotion of Pluto, no matter how much he wants to be. That
was done by 4% of the IAU, a group of which he has never been a member.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Also, Brown is
wrong in claiming that the term "planetoid" referred to small
spherical objects. Planetoid has always been a synonym for asteroids/comets,
objects not large enough to be rounded by their own gravity.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Brown is also
wrong when he says that the pro-Pluto faction is dominated by members of the
<a href="https://science.nasa.gov/mission/new-horizons/">New Horizons</a> mission. While most New Horizons scientists do view Pluto as a
planet, largely due to their preference for the geophysical definition as well
as their interpretation of the flyby data, they are by no means the only
scientists who take this view. There are many planetary scientists and even
astronomers, both amateur and professional, who are not affiliated with New
Horizons but reject the IAU planet definition and view Pluto—and all dwarf
planets—as a subclass of planets.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Regarding New
Horizons scientists, Brown states, “When they launched, Pluto was a planet. By
the time they got there, it wasn’t.”</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">This statement should be of concern to anyone who cares about science. Why?
Because it essentially argues for science by decree of “authority.” Pluto was
not hit by a large asteroid between 2006 and 2015. No portion of Pluto was
lobbed off in an impact as was done to ancient Pallas and Vesta, taking the
objects out of hydrostatic equilibrium. Nothing about Pluto changed from the
launch of New Horizons to the 2015 flyby.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">The change to
which Brown is referring is the vote by four percent of the IAU in August 2006,
meaning Brown is championing the idea of science by authority, something that
is very unscientific.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">As Jack Mitch Culberson stated on Twitter and in a presentation, what the media
should have reported of the August 2006 vote is not that Pluto stopped being a
planet but that the IAU stopped considering Pluto to be a planet.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Brown also makes
an ad hominem attack when he says, “The pro-Pluto side tried to change the
definition of a planet to be something it’s not because they were so desperate
to keep Pluto a planet…”</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Here he deliberately
attributes an emotional motivation rather than a scientific one to the
pro-Pluto side. The truth is not that pro-Pluto scientists were desperate to
keep Pluto a planet but that they favored a geophysical planet definition,
which is centered on an object’s intrinsic properties rather than its location.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">So what if the latter results in the solar system having 200 planets? As stated
many times, there is no scientific merit to the argument that the solar system
cannot have “too many planets.” If there were, scientists would have to do
something about Jupiter and Saturn having “too many moons,” the galaxy having “too
many stars,” and the universe having “too many galaxies.”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">This week, in
conjunction with the anniversary of Pluto’s discovery, the </span><a href="https://www.lpi.usra.edu/" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Lunar and Planetary Institute</a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> in Houston,
Texas, is holding a two-day workshop titled, “</span><a href="https://www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/planetcharacterization2024/" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Planet
Characterization in the Solar System and the Galaxy</a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">” on February 21-22.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">The conference
description notes, “The diversity of planets and planetary types has exploded
since the first discoveries of exoplanets and shows no signs of abating as the
total population of known planets in our system and others has grown from 9
planets to over 5,000. We will convene to describe, discuss, and debate the
various planet classification schemes. We consider the needs of both
astrophysics and planetary science, geophysics, ocean worlds studies,
atmospheric studies, magnetospheric studies, and more, with the goal of
informed scientific debate, education, and progress toward consensus
classification schemes.”</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Clearly, the debate
over planet definition and classification is very much ongoing.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">I will be attending
this conference virtually and will give a brief presentation on the harm the 2006
IAU vote has done to public perception of science and scientists worldwide.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Clyde Tombaugh’s discovery of Pluto at age 24 was a triumph for science and
showed the world that there is more to the scientific process than an advanced
degree. It continues to inspire generations of people to look up and try to
make their own discoveries. It is a victory for persistence and perseverance
that merits being celebrated to this day and beyond.</span></p>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-33159718854728155522023-12-21T16:09:00.000-05:002023-12-21T16:09:14.969-05:00Celebrate Victory at the Winter Solstice<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSxHKWFtk_VDVieexT18pLNzy6RRRqqzHn6JyhggQSRL_nNc6-uUHpnKo3uASY_ZZTrCn1qlViJVYVlgt-wuzAZQYfaRbmUz6madvaH58nbRMndc2ykcg5759vO51pJ3iTpKS08JmBx6gCTke7q2ZRAvW1l6bb8fgXo1X2eBS36HHll0N0bmPKFJn11_c/s1111/Winter-solstice-2020-hert-niks-.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="738" data-original-width="1111" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSxHKWFtk_VDVieexT18pLNzy6RRRqqzHn6JyhggQSRL_nNc6-uUHpnKo3uASY_ZZTrCn1qlViJVYVlgt-wuzAZQYfaRbmUz6madvaH58nbRMndc2ykcg5759vO51pJ3iTpKS08JmBx6gCTke7q2ZRAvW1l6bb8fgXo1X2eBS36HHll0N0bmPKFJn11_c/s16000/Winter-solstice-2020-hert-niks-.jpg" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I apologize for
being late with this good news though most who follow the New Horizons mission
have already heard it—specifically, we won! New Horizons will continue to be a
planetary mission while also doing heliophysics in the distant Kuiper Belt. Its
team will also continue to search for a third Kuiper Belt Object (KBO) for a
close flyby.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">This victory
belongs to the New Horizons team and to more than 7,000 people who signed the
online petition to keep New Horizons a planetary mission with the crew it has
had since before its 2006 launch.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">According to
petition organizer Hoyt Davidson, “The New Horizons team believes our petition
and the cover letter to NASA’s leaders really was the straw that broke this
loose.”</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">For more on where
the mission goes from here, visit </span><a href="https://www.nasa.gov/missions/new-horizons/nasas-new-horizons-to-continue-exploring-outer-solar-system/" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">https://www.nasa.gov/missions/new-horizons/nasas-new-horizons-to-continue-exploring-outer-solar-system/</a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">
.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">When so many of us were fighting to keep the planetary mission, I suspected
things would end this way but was afraid to be too hopeful.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">While this win
happened at the end of September, today, when we commemorate the Winter
Solstice and look back at the past year, is an opportune time to celebrate this
accomplishment.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">For the latest on
New Horizons, check out this blog post by principal investigator Alan Stern: </span><a href="https://pluto.jhuapl.edu/News-Center/PI-Perspectives.php?page=piPerspective_12_19_2023&fbclid=IwAR1d2x8GTgzxBoNG_XSS_GkMcgDd-_8QCGuq9PttzPx-4G5-4KVBToZNUrE" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">https://pluto.jhuapl.edu/News-Center/PI-Perspectives.php?page=piPerspective_12_19_2023&fbclid=IwAR1d2x8GTgzxBoNG_XSS_GkMcgDd-_8QCGuq9PttzPx-4G5-4KVBToZNUrE</a></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">At its core, the
Winter Solstice is about hope, about the promise of new light and new life on
the longest, darkest night of the year. In ancient times, people would come
together to light bonfires they kept burning all night to “strengthen” the Sun
and help it return.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">How different is
that from people all over the world coming together to fight for New Horizons?
This, after all, is how the mission was created and launched after multiple
cancellations and numerous obstacles. People came together for a project in
which they believed and refused to give up on it.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">We have always had the power to create change, to make the world a better place,
to bring light to the darkness.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">In these days of
extreme weather and climate disasters, we need to find that power within and
come together to save the habitability of our world and to explore beyond it. May
we embrace and express that power in 2024 and beyond.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">
<br /><i>“Darkness does wane though winter’s chill<o:p></o:p></i></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">The season reigns
so bitter still<o:p></o:p></span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Fire’s bright seed
is born anew<o:p></o:p></span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Small spark of
light we sing to you!<br />
<br />
Birthday of light we hail and cheer<o:p></o:p></span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Though short the
days still cold and drear<o:p></o:p></span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Solstice has come,
and with this morn<o:p></o:p></span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Our brother Sun
has been reborn!”<br />
</span></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><br />
~Rich Mertes, fourth grade teacher, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LazGbmTcJHw">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LazGbmTcJHw</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></p>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-84842614778885754792023-09-21T17:03:00.002-04:002023-12-20T21:43:32.483-05:00End of the Chase for New Horizons?<a href="https://interouts.com/articles-Interouts(II)/End-of-The-Chase-For-New-Horizons.html">End of the Chase for New Horizons?</a>: How the journey taken from start to implementation of the incredible New Horizons mission is facing derailment, something that has echoes from the past.Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-45618161831544715412023-08-24T17:39:00.002-04:002023-08-24T18:17:17.461-04:00The Pluto Resistance Continues<p></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDI-o7iJlKE73OC1tETzbZvfMtlklL9LxgWj-peqtzNFPwi18qgIDbeTja10kUNkcR5Gsas993nA-INwgAAAmNS5-zw99pntKrK96zjQdS4m99UJXZxxCr09cwjhc_V3baJNmzOTTQ24l0f0Iq_GGmcp6_itznGWCB2p3pYRpl0JkDWvNJ4YrqMYvpfr0/s612/Pluto%20Starry%20Background.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="612" data-original-width="612" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDI-o7iJlKE73OC1tETzbZvfMtlklL9LxgWj-peqtzNFPwi18qgIDbeTja10kUNkcR5Gsas993nA-INwgAAAmNS5-zw99pntKrK96zjQdS4m99UJXZxxCr09cwjhc_V3baJNmzOTTQ24l0f0Iq_GGmcp6_itznGWCB2p3pYRpl0JkDWvNJ4YrqMYvpfr0/s16000/Pluto%20Starry%20Background.jpg" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><p style="font-size: 12pt; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></p></span><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">Here we are. It’s that day again—the day that will live in infamy, when 424 IAU members engaged in a throwback to the 16th century and attempted to impose a very flawed planet definition on all of humanity. At that time, there were six billion plus people on Earth. Today, there are over 8 billion.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">Yet the bigger mistake and public disservice was not by the IAU but by most of the media and educational establishment. By giving the IAU definition the force of law instead of recognizing it as just one view among several in use, they too engaged in medieval behavior.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">In an upcoming entry, I will share a comprehensive Power Point presentation by writer Jack Mitch Culberson. Some of the images come from this blog, but most are from other sources. He accurately described the IAU vote of 2006 the way the media should have done.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">Culberson stated, “<b>The IAU no longer considers Pluto a planet.</b>” THAT is what should have been and should be reported—not “Pluto stopped being a planet.” Not only is the latter statement equal to science by decree of authority; it also completely glosses over the fact that an equal number of planetary scientists rejected that definition and to this day, prefer the geophysical definition, according to which all dwarf planets are a subclass of planets.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">When Galileo looked through his telescope in 1610 and saw mountains on the Moon, the phases of Venus, and the moons of Jupiter, scientist Cesar Cremonini declared him wrong and refused to even look through his telescope. After all, Aristotle had already determined the Moon is a perfect sphere. If one already knows the “truth,” why look at additional evidence?</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">In 2015, 105 years later, the IAU did essentially the same thing Cremonini did, with the same inaction. Having made up their minds that a planet has to “clear its orbit,” they refused to look with new eyes at data about Pluto sent back by New Horizons, which clearly showed it to have complex planetary processes. The 2005 discovery of Eris was viewed as new data that merited a redefinition of the term planet, but the first ever images and data that revealed Pluto to be a planet, did not merit that same consideration to them.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">And the media mostly enabled their denial.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">The news isn’t all bad. While this should never have gone on so long, today, 17 years later, most planetary scientists ignore the IAU definition in favor of the geophysical one. Now, we need to get the media, educational establishment, and other venues to recognize that this issue remains unsettled and that the IAU position should not be treated as objective truth but as one side of an ongoing debate.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">Just today, </span><a href="https://www.celestron.com/" rel="nofollow" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">Celestron</a><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;"> sent an email describing today as “Pluto Demoted Day,” with a link to an </span><a href="https://www.celestron.com/blogs/knowledgebase/the-ultimate-guide-to-observing-uranus-neptune-and-pluto" rel="nofollow" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">article</a><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;"> that states only the IAU position without even acknowledging the geophysical definition.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">For many of us, today is not “Pluto Demoted Day.” It’s “Pluto Resistance Day.” And we need to get the word out there that there is another view, that there is science behind classifying Pluto as a planet, and that no individual or group should be given the right to impose its view on all humanity.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">We will never give up, and we will never stop fighting this wrong. Galileo was eventually vindicated, and so will adherents of the geophysical planet definition.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">The resistance continues.</span><p></p>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-33645308031570781222023-08-23T17:33:00.003-04:002023-08-23T17:33:48.518-04:00Please sign this petition to save New Horizons as a planetary/Kuiper Belt mission<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCzQwGv3bfkyXpSAlZWLlTGfmPoWpWifmI_0A2PqukKqP7psprIZsal6uOPuK-gHQnsW7Ve5hfuHBBaAAcdD3BBnpHqwkGHtSTNXrikBvV2pSMgIu6VPQFKABg2qx4wLqJHOIfpRQ5WNdycGWcj79d9vvADzTBdrnkhzhjnWkVGGEezFW7NHNu3vwh8F0/s945/NH%20Extended%20Mission%20Badge.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="945" data-original-width="945" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCzQwGv3bfkyXpSAlZWLlTGfmPoWpWifmI_0A2PqukKqP7psprIZsal6uOPuK-gHQnsW7Ve5hfuHBBaAAcdD3BBnpHqwkGHtSTNXrikBvV2pSMgIu6VPQFKABg2qx4wLqJHOIfpRQ5WNdycGWcj79d9vvADzTBdrnkhzhjnWkVGGEezFW7NHNu3vwh8F0/s16000/NH%20Extended%20Mission%20Badge.jpg" /></a></div><br /><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;"><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;">On April 12 of this year, I</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;"> </span><a href="https://laurele.livejournal.com/124261.html" rel="nofollow" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">wrote</a><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;">about a NASA proposal to prematurely defund New Horizons as a planetary mission and to transfer control of the spacecraft to the agency’s heliophysics division, a move that would replace the current mission team, which have given decades of service to it.</span></p><div style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 13.3333px;">Now, you can help advocate for New Horizons remaining a planetary mission through the years it traverses the Kuiper Belt by signing this Change.org</span><span style="font-size: 13.3333px;"> </span><a href="https://www.change.org/p/save-new-horizons-the-pluto-flyby-and-kuiper-belt-exploration-mission-23183a16-ea8e-4663-a614-2383fc23bef8/u/31847975?cs_tk=At3mUe4Tq94vKvuh72QAAXicyyvNyQEABF8BvFVDLup6Cgwv0r1J0RBnZro%3D&utm_campaign=7c379990591d4446a5892c69567d2cf7&utm_content=initial_v0_6_0&utm_medium=email&utm_source=petition_update&utm_term=cs" rel="nofollow" style="text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: large;">petition</span></a><span style="font-size: 13.3333px;"> </span><span style="font-size: 13.3333px;">organized by the</span><span style="font-size: 13.3333px;"> </span><a href="https://space.nss.org/" rel="nofollow" style="font-size: 13.3333px; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">National Space Society</a><span style="font-size: 13.3333px;">.</span></div><div style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;"><br /></div><div style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;">For no clear budgetary or scientific reason, NASA’s Science Mission Directorate is considering ending it as a planetary mission and transferring control of it from the agency’s planetary science division to its heliophysics division.<br /><br /></div><div style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;">Eventually, when it leaves the Kuiper Belt, New Horizons will concentrate solely on the heliophysics of the outer solar system. But for now, it still has sufficient fuel to continue studying the Kuiper Belt for another five years. It is the only vehicle in place to conduct in situ study of this region. Arbitrarily ending the planetary mission half a decade early wastes a unique opportunity that neither NASA nor any other space agency is likely to have for decades.<br /><br /></div><div style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;"><b>The petition closes on Monday, September 4</b>, which is Labor Day, and the National Space Society hopes to get up to 10,000 signatures by then to stand up for New Horizons remaining a planetary mission until it leaves the Kuiper Belt. <b>So we need to act quickly.</b><br /><br /></div><div style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;">If you are American, these are our tax dollars at work, and we deserve a say in how they are used. This is the only chance in decades to explore the Kuiper Belt and possibly find a third close flyby target. We should not waste it!<br /><br /></div><div style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;">And if you’re of a different nationality and a supporter of planetary exploration, you can still sign this petition and are urged to do so. New Horizons made headlines around the world when it flew by Pluto and then by Kuiper Belt Arrokoth. Its exploration of the Kuiper Belt is not just an American project; it is a human one.<br /><br /></div><div style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;">Please take this action to save New Horizons as a planetary mission and share this petition with as many people as possible by September 4. Thank you in advance.</div>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-64931934419737300212023-08-13T14:38:00.003-04:002023-08-13T14:38:53.909-04:00John Vester Followup Article on "Pluto: Planet or Not"<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUkRj2LktEXT6eaj031-Nsj-hFobY2oPZuzC6tegVLJhYUFFig4emBkTslHXGQ7ez2QCda63HOwNa4OtjBxNhZ82KyhX-qG3kX1HitUxKPHPEnobusEPD2j-0J2_gRpuX4-sjZzZmwRdma7zW0a9aglrFSzTW-XPBtzKABs_clQR7fCP7ayiCDqctSoYI/s800/Pluto%20Discovery%20Image.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="800" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgUkRj2LktEXT6eaj031-Nsj-hFobY2oPZuzC6tegVLJhYUFFig4emBkTslHXGQ7ez2QCda63HOwNa4OtjBxNhZ82KyhX-qG3kX1HitUxKPHPEnobusEPD2j-0J2_gRpuX4-sjZzZmwRdma7zW0a9aglrFSzTW-XPBtzKABs_clQR7fCP7ayiCDqctSoYI/s16000/Pluto%20Discovery%20Image.jpg" /></a></div><br /><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;"><br /></span><p></p><p><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;">The following is a followup by John Vester addressing responses to his original article published in </span><i style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;">Analog</i><span style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;">, titled "Pluto: Planet or Not."</span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">Since the time the essay was published in Analog magazine, other than a few friends telling me they thought it made sense, I have received some pointed critiques of the science.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">I also received some links to relevant scientific papers:</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">1) A Geophysical Planet Definition</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="https://www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2017/pdf/1448.pdf" rel="nofollow" style="text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">https://www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2017/pdf/1448.pdf</a></u></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">2) Reductionist vs. Folk Taxonomies in Planetary Science</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="http://www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2021/pdf/1083.pdf" rel="nofollow" style="text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2021/pdf/1<wbr></wbr>083.pdf</a></u></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">3) An Organically Grown Planet Definition</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"><a href="https://astronomy.com/magazine/2018/05/an-organically-grown-planet-definition" rel="nofollow" style="text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">https://astronomy.com/magazine/2018/05/an-organically-grown-planet-definition</a></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Calibri, serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">4) Ignore the IAU!</span></span> <span style="font-family: Calibri, serif;"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Dwarf Planets are Planets Too</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-WsYl_wWNo" rel="nofollow" style="text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m-WsYl_wWNo</a></u></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">Five main objections to my Linguistic Planetary Definition have come to my attention.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"></p><ol style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;"><br /><li><p style="line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">The proposed linguistic definition lacks simplicity because some objects that would be considered planets by this scheme can become captured into orbit around another object, making it now a moon by my scheme.</p></li><br /></ol><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;"><u>ANSWER</u> – This objection is a defense of the misguided attempt, on both sides, to infuse the definition of the word “planet” with too much baggage in support of the astronomer’s or the planetary scientist’s preferences.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;">The essence of the linguistic definition is simplicity. A planet is simply anything that orbits a star. If some object changes from one category to another, it should not be a problem. When a tadpole changes to a frog, or a caterpillar into a butterfly, there is no confusion. So if a rock changes from being an asteroid to being a moon, it should not be upsetting. It happens at the subcategory level without complaint. An asteroid sometimes comes back to life, as it were, and is treated as and called a comet.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;"></p><ol start="2" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;"><br /><li><p style="line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">My “Power to the people!” line drew some ire. It’s up to science, I am told, to raise the public’s understanding of nature. The public did not accept the notion of Earth as a planet, but Copernicus and science prevailed, even though the public was wrong. We shouldn’t be dumbing down scientific terminology to satisfy the views of the public.</p></li><br /></ol><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;"><u>ANSWER</u> – Setting aside the fact that the Copernican revolution was a revolution in understanding, not a revolution in nomenclature, the linguistic approach does reclaim some words for the language, allowing science full rein over all the subcategories.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;">The overarching categories, like planet, moon, and star, ought to be based on simple, discriminating principles, such as what it orbits, or whether it has achieved nuclear fusion in its core. To burden the word “Planet” with questions of shape, geologic activity, clearing of orbits, etc. serves no purpose in helping educate the public. These confusing stipulations may please the scientists on those teams, but will only result in the division and the gnashing of teeth, as we see now regarding Pluto.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;"></p><ol start="3" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;"><br /><li><p style="line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">I have been accused of including hearsay by relating the story of “snow” and the languages of the Eskimos/Inuits.</p></li><br /></ol><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;"><u>ANSWER </u>– While I included the words “It is said” in an attempt to make it clear that I make no claim as to the truth of the story, it does illustrate an important point. As one becomes more intimately involved with something, clarity of communication demands more precise language about it.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;">As we enter a golden age of astronomy, thanks to incredible probes, like New Horizons, and fantastic telescopes, like JWST, and which we will continue to launch, and as findings, news, and discussions of mission discoveries continue to proliferate, we need to clarify out terminology.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;">The scientific community is in a similar position to what Zoology was like in the 1700s. What we need is a modern day Carl Linaeus to develop a taxonomy for space objects. But the overarching category names should not be discarded. In spite of Linaeus, we still talk about horses and dogs. And we still observe that there are plant, animal and mineral kingdoms. How is star, planet and moon different?</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"></p><ol start="4" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;"><br /><li><p style="line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">Fault has been found with my statement that originally all planets were mere specs of light in the night sky. On the contrary, the sun and moon are held up as proof.</p></li><br /></ol><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.5in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;"><u>ANSWER </u>– This proves nothing. Back then, as now, the sun and moon are <i>not</i>, neither of them, planets. The GPD folks are eager to start calling large moons planets, which seems to me a step in the wrong direction.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;"></p><ol start="5" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;"><br /><li><p style="line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">I have been taken to task for ignoring or missing “one of the greatest insights in scientific history,” which is that space objects large enough to be complex and, as Galileo put it, to be homes for life and civilizations, are planets. During the 1700s and 1800s, science dropped the “homes for life and civilizations” part, but they kept the size and complexity part. This important central insight is a central part of the GPD argument.</p></li><br /></ol><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.5in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;">ANSWER – Let’s notice that science gets it wrong too. Galileo’s speculations about life and civilizations were dropped so as to keep lifeless planets in the planet club. Note too that the GPD would have us referring to our moon, and others, as planets because they show evidence of geologic activity. How confusing compared to simply referring to what something orbits, or compared to what we have seen and heard in hundreds of years of literature and song.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;">Let things like size and shape and complexity be handled in research and at the subcategory level. If the GPD wants Luna (or Titan, or Enceladus, etc.)to be planets, what happens if the supposed geologic activity completely ceases? And what if it starts up again? The chance exists that this will happen at some point and require new GPD designations. But that’s the crux of Objection #1!</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: 0.25in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">With all that said, it occurred to me that there is a sort of grey area that should be appreciated.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">My proposal is from a spoken language stand point. Objections to these ideas comes from a science stand point. While science may feel an obligation to reach down and educate the public on what science has learned about how the world works, I resist the notion that science always knows best.</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">We, the people, should lay claim to some basic words, like star, planet and moon. If we do not, science can make a mess of things, as they did with the word “metal.” In common parlance we know what metals are. Hard, shiny, bendy. Good enough for everyday use. Chemistry has expanded on the definition to mean any element or alloy that handles electrons in certain ways. Useful and interesting. But the Astrophysicists use the word to man any element in the periodic table heavier that hydrogen or helium. How is this helpful in educating the public?</p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">In conclusion, the overarching categories, “star,” “planet,” and “moon,” should be the province of the man on the street, with simple, easy to understand criteria. All the many subcategories should be the province of science.</p>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-60237251504930858132023-08-12T14:49:00.001-04:002023-08-12T14:49:44.504-04:00Adrift in the Kuiper Belt? - Alan Stern of the New Horizons Mission<iframe width="480" height="270" src="https://youtube.com/embed/0uMwPtU5nRA" frameborder="0"></iframe>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-24177857088945786112023-07-14T23:07:00.002-04:002023-07-15T01:40:55.510-04:00 "Planet or Not" Guest Blog by John Vester<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8ycnjLWwPn4RWtzMDb-syMG59NO5SR3oZWZzhcHKz2J27kVsd73H9L2PlWrVyaOIr6NA_JE0DplGkuGge4HQ6jUEGELdwkmlvDFhpFHGbzic0HQe1FaEZRNCegBwf5AS1Hm5iS8FX5vxY-XOyQjgxbNcY4k56NvelwkDYbFDPcS_W7x5xywCgTPSDRqk/s720/Pluto%20Explored%20Stamp.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="720" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8ycnjLWwPn4RWtzMDb-syMG59NO5SR3oZWZzhcHKz2J27kVsd73H9L2PlWrVyaOIr6NA_JE0DplGkuGge4HQ6jUEGELdwkmlvDFhpFHGbzic0HQe1FaEZRNCegBwf5AS1Hm5iS8FX5vxY-XOyQjgxbNcY4k56NvelwkDYbFDPcS_W7x5xywCgTPSDRqk/s16000/Pluto%20Explored%20Stamp.jpg" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;">Today, July 14, 2023, is the eighth anniversary of New Horizons' successful Pluto flyby in 2015. In celebration of this occasion, I am sharing a guest blog by John Vester, which was initially published in the March/April 2021 issue of <i>Analog</i> magazine. <br /><br /><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Planet or Not?</span><br /><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">by John J. Vester</span></p><p align="center" style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"> <span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">In 2015, after 16 years of planning and herculean effort, Alan Stern and his team took us all to Pluto aboard the New Horizons planetary probe</span></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif; text-indent: 0.5in;">. </span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">But something else that happened in 2006 (the year of the New Horizons launch) cast a slight shadow over the mission, and has since tasked Stern almost as much as the mission itself did…the loss of Pluto’s status as a planet, and the struggle to regain it.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">When The International Astronomical Union (IAU) voted to demote Pluto to “dwarf” status, they embarked, Stern argues, on a course for which their membership was unqualified to make pronouncements. The arguments pro and con are many, rage still, and have crystallized into two opposing camps, all of which is brought into clear focus by the April 28, 2019 debate, hosted by the Philosophical Society of Washington DC.</span></span><sup><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">1</span></span></sup></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">The IAU Planetary Definition (IPD) has three main parts. 1) A planet orbits the sun, 2) it is large enough to achieve a spherical shape, and 3) a planet clears its orbit of other objects. Against criticism, the adherents of the IPD mainly defend the vote on procedural grounds (although they admit it probably should not have been planned behind closed doors). Naming and science, they say, are two different things and naming is important. It helps science function by creating a common language. (It should be pointed out, though, that the IAU did not name anything, but merely attempted to change the definition of an existing word.)</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Stern maintains that expertise is also important, and promotes his Geophysical Planetary Definition (GPD). He points out that planetary scientists, who were significantly absent from the vote in Prague, and who are more qualified than astronomers to decide on planetary nomenclature, do not use or recognize the IPD. The GPD considers a planet 1) to be a sub-stellar object that never underwent fusion, and 2) has enough mass to assume a spherical shape</span></span><span style="font-family: Courier New, monospace;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">The IPD is more concerned with the dynamics of an object…where it is and what its orbit is and does. The GPD is more about the object itself…what it is regardless of where it is. The IPD confines itself to objects in our solar system, while the GPD applies to exoplanets equally. The IPD’s clearing of orbits requirement has the odd consequence that the same object can be considered a planet at one distance from the sun, but not if farther away. GPD proponents are quick to point out that under the IPD’s clearing of orbits stipulation, even the Earth would not qualify as a planet.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Both definitions set up complex requirements for entry into the planet club. One of the reasons given in support of the IPD is the seemingly absurd notion that we need to limit the number of planets so school children won’t have so many to memorize. Yet there are still 50 states and the periodic table still lists north of a hundred elements.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Both definitions are a little vague about moons, rogue planets and brown dwarfs. Each side snipes at the other, basing some of their arguments on outlier cases such as these. This is no way to establish overarching categories.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">There has to be a simple way out of this morass, and maybe there is. Here’s an immodest proposal that does not offer either side a conclusive victory, but does not condemn either to final defeat. All combatants agree that this Pluto/planet dustup is a categorization problem. But more than that, I think it is a language problem.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">So my proposal, a linguistic solution, is this: Anything orbiting any star is a planet, and anything orbiting a planet is a moon. That simple.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Stern defends the GPD by pointing out that neutron stars, pulsars, and red giants are all still considered stars. (This points up a conundrum in the IPD—calling something it does not consider to be a planet a “dwarf planet.”) To illustrate his point, Stern shows a picture of a Chihuahua and a Great Dane next to each other. Although quite different in size and appearance, we still call them both dogs. There would be no value (not to mention the tidal wave of push back) if scientists demanded we all start calling these animals, instead, </span></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><i>canis lupus familiaris</i></span></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Imagine the uproar if the IAU began to tinker with the definition of sun, or star. For many things, the common name in the language is best.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">So it is with the word “planet,” which originally was a language thing. It meant “wanderer.” It had nothing to do with size. Back then, the planets were mere pin pricks of light that moved (wandered) relative to the background stars (and also exhibited weird apparent retrograde motions at times). But we know that planets don’t wander. They have circumscribed perambulations…they pace. So “planet” has been decoupled somewhat from its original, literal meaning.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">To understand the proposed linguistic rationale being offered here, consider the word “snow”. Since we do not live constantly with snow, the English language (along with many/most others) has only one word to encompass the entirety of this seemingly homogenous phenomenon (though extremely varied in the details of its many manifestations). But expertise does matter. Therefore Eskimos/Inuits, who live their whole lives in an intimate relationship with snow, have, it is said, a great many words, one for each of its important forms, all subsumed under the general category that we label “snow.”</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">With our quickly expanding knowledge of the bodies in our solar system, planets are no longer mere specks of light wandering the sky, but real worlds. This has resulted, during the last forty years, in a huge increase in the number of scientists who consider themselves planetary scientists, not astronomers, and very few of them are members of the IAU, and this is telling.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">But the expertise of scientists, whether astronomers or planetary scientists, is not entirely relevant here. They commandeered the word planet from the language of the common people. It is the language (therefore people, not scientists) that has jurisdiction. The Chihuahua/Great Dane example is absolutely relevant. Great Dane is a subcategory of dog. As for heavenly bodies, we know enough about them now, thanks to all those planetary scientists, that we should be more concerned with subcategories. We already speak of the “rocky planets,” the “gas giants,” and the “ice giants.” We understand all these to belong under the heading of “planet.” Why not bring asteroids, comets, Trojans, KBOs, TNOs, and Oort Cloud objects into the same grouping? They should all take their places as subcategories of planets.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">This is certainly simpler than the tortuous redefining attempted by the IAU. Clearing an orbit is irrelevant by this linguistic definition. Objects in uncleared orbits would themselves be different flavors of planets.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;">“<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Spherical” is a matter of degree, not kind. Even if it mattered, Ceres and Pallas, once considered planets, are today in limbo as spherical asteroids. They are all planets again by the proposed new scheme, and maybe we’ll call them “rocky dwarfs.” As for Pluto, Eris, Sedna, etc., how about “icy dwarfs?”</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Size is also irrelevant by this proposed revision to the definition of the larger category, planet. But this shouldn’t create difficulties in discussing these objects. Asteroids would be planets we call “asteroids” (its subcategory). A rock or even a grain of sand orbiting the sun is a planet that we would call a grain of sand or a “meteor.” Once it burns up in a planetary atmosphere or hits the ground and stops orbiting the sun, it is no longer a planet and we might call it part of a “meteor shower” or a “meteorite.”</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Even the outlier cases can be easily dealt with by this suggested protocol. The GPD allows that some moons can be considered “worlds” or “planets.” The only way a moon could be proclaimed a planet would be if the center of mass, around which both objects revolve, falls, not inside the larger body, but in the space that separates them. Then it is a double planet, or a binary.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Rogue planets, called in the GPD “unbound planets” become “unbound bodies.”</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">A brown dwarf is simply a planet if it never initiated fusion in its core. If it doesn’t orbit a star, it is an unbound body.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">There will, of course, be scientific hairsplitting on whether an object belongs in one subcategory or another. For the rest of us, though, it will be much simpler to know that they are all planets, simply by virtue of the fact that they orbit a star. One of the criteria Stern offers for recognizing a good naming solution is that it is simple, logical, and intuitive. What could be easier for the general public to understand and embrace than this language-based solution?</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">The IAU is probably the best place to do the subcategory hairsplitting (provided the planetary scientists are represented and have their say). For my money, the IAU should pass a resolution adopting this idea, and also abdicating their jurisdiction over the overarching category, planet.</span></span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in; text-indent: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Words matter. So, by this proposal, planet would become the people’s word again. Power to the people!</span></span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-indent: 0.5in;">Endnote:</span></p><p style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; line-height: 13.3333px; margin-bottom: 0in;"><sup><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">1 </span></span></sup><span style="color: blue;"><u><a href="https://www.theverge.com/2019/4/28/18518014/pluto-debate-planet-definition-alan-stern-international-astronomical-union" rel="nofollow" style="text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">https://www.theverge.com/2019/4/28/18518014/pluto-debate-planet-definition-alan-stern-international-astronomical-union</span></a></u></span></p>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-77340203051523447012023-04-12T17:15:00.004-04:002023-04-12T18:23:21.422-04:00New Horizons Should Remain a Planetary Mission<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhizYUdwgTiNJ_JOdou4MPVng4Y8Ws5Rkt1q-gzvNy3AjNB-BlrDKihdPaXTIsYoQb6XolAYwaIDR7B4Fi6nQXpVOvK5hwoHyfEOpNppShmaG490W-omaFkxDBJ8YauwoQT9sWsPRfCstMNugFFKt9RgdZE4u1ymOj_Ywmf19BUxSuIWZEeaulHIMMX/s2406/New%20Horizons.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1354" data-original-width="2406" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhizYUdwgTiNJ_JOdou4MPVng4Y8Ws5Rkt1q-gzvNy3AjNB-BlrDKihdPaXTIsYoQb6XolAYwaIDR7B4Fi6nQXpVOvK5hwoHyfEOpNppShmaG490W-omaFkxDBJ8YauwoQT9sWsPRfCstMNugFFKt9RgdZE4u1ymOj_Ywmf19BUxSuIWZEeaulHIMMX/w640-h360/New%20Horizons.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">A little-known proposal is</span><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;"> threatening the future of NASA’s <a href="http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/" rel="nofollow" style="text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank"><i>New Horizons</i></a> mission</b><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">, and for reasons unknown, the space press has not reported on this development whatsoever.</span></p><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">This needs to change, as the public has the right to know that one of this country’s most successful planetary missions is in danger of being shut down before its time.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">Launched in 2006, New Horizons has captured breathtaking images of Pluto and its large moon Charon, as well as a Kuiper Belt Object (KBO) one billion miles beyond it.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">From the beginning, New Horizons has been a planetary mission. Its exploration of not just Pluto but primitive KBOs that have remained unchanged since the solar system’s earliest days continues to reveal new insights into the solar system’s formation and evolution.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><b style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;">Now, New Horizons as a planetary mission is facing premature cancellation. For no clear budgetary or scientific reason, NASA’s Science Mission Directorate is considering ending it as a planetary mission and transferring control of it from the agency’s planetary science division to its heliophysics division.</b><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">Incredibly, this would remove the current New Horizons team, many of whom have dedicated decades to seeing it through from an idea to launch to Pluto and beyond. Instead, it would put the spacecraft under the control of a new heliophysics team.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">When a similar move was done with the Voyagers once they ran out of planets to visit, the mission’s leadership and most of its team was allowed to remain in control. It makes little sense to remove New Horizons from the loyal, dedicated group who fought for it every step of the way and are now guiding it through the uncharted territory of the Kuiper Belt.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">Such a move is nothing less than a slap in the face to a team that has poured their minds and hearts into one of NASA’s most successful planetary missions and still have so much more to give.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">Eventually, when it leaves the Kuiper Belt, New Horizons will concentrate solely on the heliophysics of the outer solar system. But for now, it still has sufficient fuel to continue studying the Kuiper Belt for another five years. It is the only vehicle in place to conduct in situ study of this region. Arbitrarily ending the planetary mission half a decade early wastes a unique opportunity that neither NASA nor any other space agency is likely to have for decades.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">Small KBOs like Arrokoth, which New Horizons flew by in 2019, contain the building blocks of the solar system. The New Horizons team has spent the last few years using very large ground-based telescopes to search for a third flyby target, for which the spacecraft has roughly as much fuel as for the Arrokoth flyby.</span><div><br style="font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">What sense does it make to throw away the chance to observe yet another KBO up close as well as many others from a distance?</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">Currently, no other missions to the Kuiper Belt, and none are even being planned. New Horizons is literally our only chance to explore this region of the solar system in situ for decades.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">This proposal is not about money. The move would not save any money, replacing one team with another. Neither does it make scientific sense. It is a senseless step that wastes precious resources for no benefit.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">New Horizons has had multiple scientific successes because of the hard work, dedication, and passion of its team. We should be rewarding these scientists and engineers, not throwing them away and forfeiting the chance to study this remote, fascinating region of the solar system for another five years.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">Why hasn’t the space press reported on this senseless proposal? The public, who fund NASA, deserve to know that the agency is on the verge of making a wasteful, unnecessary move.</span><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">New Horizons thrilled children and adults around the world when it revealed the beauty and complexity of Pluto. Today, the public deserves to know that this mission faces premature termination for literally no reason. Space journalists around the world need to tell this story while there is still a chance of preventing this destructive move.</span></div>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-74616773380282386432023-03-02T19:27:00.005-05:002024-02-18T16:21:35.749-05:00Hear Ye, Hear Ye! Carolyn Porco and Scott Tremaine are Wrong about Pluto!<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiIl3LLdxVv8UzxJq8AeeN5im0PZJQE8zH7FcTnhZ-0Hy5dbNCuDg9I9ICEdcgnejpQfOvx3afpWJ1wVeCm9q2jPASxphp20pJEcspq-5sWRHdggawVkFEZWR1cKqpVjOgfaz-9B8p5Bt-4KMA-YduxCTuDwEe6evQZvytTn1ZDRh4Zw3Fv6j9mwMI/s960/Pluto%20with%20Background%20Stars.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="540" data-original-width="960" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiIl3LLdxVv8UzxJq8AeeN5im0PZJQE8zH7FcTnhZ-0Hy5dbNCuDg9I9ICEdcgnejpQfOvx3afpWJ1wVeCm9q2jPASxphp20pJEcspq-5sWRHdggawVkFEZWR1cKqpVjOgfaz-9B8p5Bt-4KMA-YduxCTuDwEe6evQZvytTn1ZDRh4Zw3Fv6j9mwMI/s16000/Pluto%20with%20Background%20Stars.jpg" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><p style="font-size: 12pt;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif; font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></p><span style="font-size: medium;">In
a Facebook announcement dated February 14, 2023, planetary scientist
Carolyn Porco takes on the role of planetary town crier, stating,
“Hear Ye, Hear Ye! </span></span><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">Scott
Tremaine, renowned celestial dynamicist & a founder (along w/ my
thesis advisor Peter Goldreich) of the field of planetary rings, has
written a textbook on <i>The Dynamics of Planetary Systems</i>.
</span></span></span><span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><i><b>At
my request of some time ago, he included in his book a discussion of
the definition of a planet...And what did he find? Pluto is NOT a
planet !! Reason has prevailed. Rejoice!</b></i></span></span></span></span><p></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #050505; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Porco
is admittedly an accomplished scientist best known for her work on
NASA’s Cassini mission to Saturn. But in this case, she is
wrong.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif; font-size: medium;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Reason does NOT prevail when a person with an
agenda specifically requests that a fellow scientist push that agenda
in his book while refusing to acknowledge the ongoing debate and both
sides in that debate.</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">Porco’s
position on the planet definition issue is actually more extreme than
that of the IAU. She opposes the use of the term dwarf planet because
she claims Pluto and Ceres are both asteroids! She states in the
comments, “</span></span></span><span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">Actually,
I don't ever use, and won't, the name 'dwarf planet'. It's
inconsistent. How can something be a dwarf member of a category it
doesn't belong to?”</span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #050505; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Regardless
of their own position on this issue, most scientists acknowledge the
ongoing debate between dynamicists and geophysicists over the
question of defining a planet. Most show respect for the opposing
position even if they don’t agree with it.</span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #050505; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">In
my writings and public presentations, I always make the effort to
present both views. While I am clear on the view I hold, I believe it
would be a disservice to readers and/or audience members to pretend
my view is the only one and that all others have been discredited
when this is not the case. I would rather members of the public hear
both sides of this issue and then make up their own minds than feed
them my viewpoint alone.</span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">Porco
goes on in subsequent comments to denigrate the geophysical planet
definition by claiming roundness means nothing, adding, that the term
dwarf planet “</span></span></span><span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">actually
has no information in it besides 'sort of roundish'. On the other
hand, ‘Pluto is a large Kuiper Belt Object’ tells you
composition, location, relative size, approximate level of solar
illumination, etc. Far more useful.”</span></span></span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #050505; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">To
her, there is apparently no difference between tiny, shapeless
asteroids and KBOs and objects large enough and massive enough to be
rounded by their own gravity, in spite of the fact that the latter
have complex processes not seen on asteroids and in some cases, seen
elsewhere in the solar system only on Earth and Mars.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif; font-size: medium;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Just
calling Pluto a large Kuiper Belt Object tells us nothing about its
structure, its geology, its atmosphere, the interaction between its
atmosphere and surface, its many varied terrains, its cryovolcanoes,
its likely subsurface ocean, and its interactions with companion
Charon as the solar system’s only binary planet system.<br />
<br />
Pluto
actually has far more in common with some of the larger, spherical
moons in the solar system, considered by many planetary scientists to
be secondary or satellite planets, than it does with tiny, shapeless
Kuiper Belt Objects like Arrokoth. Today, planets such as Ceres;
Jupiter’s moons Europa, Callisto, and Ganymede; Saturn’s moons
Enceladus and Titan; Neptune’s moon Triton, and Pluto are the solar
system’s top contenders for hosting microbial life due to the
growing evidence that they harbor subsurface oceans.</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #050505; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Porco
insists that gravitational dominance alone determines what is a
planet without ever addressing the fact that this dominance depends
on location and can lead to the same object being considered a planet
in one location and not a planet in another one. If Earth were in
Pluto’s location, it would not gravitationally dominate or clear
that orbit.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Furthermore, she states, “</span></span></span></span></span></span><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">But
Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars dominate their orbital corridors. </span></span></span></span></span></span><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">If
they hadn't, you wouldn't see them, you'd see a cloud of debris.
<br />
<br />
Does Mercury actually dominate its orbit, or does the Sun
clear out debris there? The answer is unclear. Furthermore, there is
no cloud of debris around Pluto. If there were, New Horizons would
have had no trouble finding a second and even a third flyby target.
The reality is the Kuiper Belt is vast, and most KBOs are nowhere
near Pluto but much further out and very scattered.<br />
<br />
She
goes on to say, “</span></span></span></span></span></span><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span face="Segoe UI Historic, Segoe UI, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="letter-spacing: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">'</span></span></span></span></span></span><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Round'
is a perfectly useless criterion. It doesn't work for those distant
bodies for which we don't, and won't for a very long time to come, if
at all, have shape information for. So it fails as a metric for
categorization...</span></span></span></span></span></span><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><b>I
mention ‘spherical’ but merely because it’s a side effect of
(or proxy for) planetary properties and processes I am interested in
with categorization in mind. E.g: a degree of planetary
differentiation.”</b></span></span></span></span></span><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><br />
<br />
But
another commenter points out that gravitational dominance is much
more difficult to detect at great distances than is roundness, and
that time and the technological advancements that go with it will
eventually answer these questions for distant objects, both in our
solar system and others.<br />
<br />
Additionally, planetary
differentiation is very much related to roundness, as she admits in
the sentence I bolded above. Active geology begins happening when
objects reach the threshold of being rounded by their own gravity.
Categorizing Ceres and Pluto as asteroids is bad science because it
blurs the distinction between complex objects shaped by their own
gravity and tiny ones that are often little more than rubble piles,
held together only by their chemical bonds. </span></span></span></span></span></span>
</span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #050505; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">One
commenter even repeats the false claim that Mike Brown discovered
dwarf planets larger than Pluto despite the fact that no such dwarf
planets have been found. Eris was initially thought to be larger than
Pluto, but in November 2010, a team of astronomers led by Bruno
Sicardy observed it occult a star and found it to be marginally
smaller than Pluto though slightly more massive.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif; font-size: medium;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">The
persistence of this misconception after more than a decade is an
example of why the IAU definition has harmed science by widely
spreading confusion and incorrect information.</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #050505; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Unfortunately,
the tone of the discussion in the comments takes a turn for the worse
when Porco resorts to personal attacks against New Horizons Principal
Investigator Alan Stern and other supporters of the geophysical
planet definition, demeaning them by calling them “Pluto
fanatics.”</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif; font-size: medium;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Here are some examples of her inappropriate
personal attacks:<br />
<br />
“The Pluto fanatics were desperate to
get a Pluto mission, and it was deemed of vital importance to
maintain Pluto as a planet, so they would have more justification.
They were practicing politics, not science.”</span></span></span></span></span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">This
is blatantly false. New Horizons was already approved and had already
launched when the IAU vote took place. Most New Horizons scientists
view Pluto as a planet because they favor the geophysical definition
over the dynamical one. It is a purely scientific disagreement.</span></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-size: medium;"><span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span>As
New Horizons planetary scientist Cathy Olkin noted, </span></span></span></span><span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span>"I
naturally refer to Pluto as a planet because that seems like the
right moniker. It has an atmosphere; it has interesting geology; it
orbits the sun; it has moons. 'Planet' just seems right to me."</span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #050505; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Porco
went on to comment, “Stern has admitted he wanted Pluto to be a
planet because he was afraid New Horizons wouldn’t be chosen if it
wasn’t. He DOES appeal to emotions. You want to compare our
respective domains of expertise? Stern did a mission to Pluto. I ran
an experiment and published papers that required knowledge on my part
in atmospheric meteorology, the kinematics and dynamics of planetary
rings including faint rings of tiny micron-sized particles, the
geology, geophysics and geodesy of planetary satellites, the tidal
interactions between planetary bodies, the geysering eruptions of
Enceladus, and a lot more. So, a body like Pluto is NOT outside my
field.”</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif; font-size: medium;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">Again, her first statement is false. And while
Porco did accomplish everything she states, Stern has also published
numerous papers on many of these same subjects and is the world’s
leading Pluto scholar. And his advocacy and leadership of the New
Horizons mission essentially unveiled Pluto to the entire world.</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #050505; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Porco
should feel secure enough in her own accomplishments to not belittle
another scientist who clearly made extensive contributions to
planetary science just because he disagrees with her on planet
definition.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif; font-size: medium;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;">In one remark, she responded to a commenter by
saying, “You are clearly an ignoramus and should keep your mouth
closed.”<br />
<br />
She even goes as far as comparing opponents of
the IAU definition to climate deniers!<br />
<br />
Ad hominem, or
personal attacks, are a sign that someone is losing the debate.</span></span></span></span></span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="color: #050505; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Significantly,
Porco blocks me on Twitter, and I could not comment on her Facebook
page because it only allows those she permits to comment.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-variant: normal;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: normal;"><span style="font-style: normal;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-size: medium;">But
I will not keep my mouth closed. I will not be silenced, and neither
will advocates of the geophysical planet definition.<br />
<br />
If
someone has to resort to censorship to force their view on the world
and disallow any comments that disagree with their view, they are NOT
causing reason to prevail. They are enforcing tyranny. And that is
anything but a reason to “rejoice.”</span><br />
<br />
</span></span></span></span></span></span><br />
</p>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-68781353709042641712023-02-20T23:30:00.002-05:002023-02-20T23:30:59.181-05:00New Horizons: NASA’s Mission to Pluto and the Kuiper Belt, by Alice Bowman: I Heart Pluto Festival 2023<iframe width="480" height="270" src="https://youtube.com/embed/LyhwnT77RQs" frameborder="0"></iframe>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-57347269636696531972023-02-20T15:14:00.003-05:002023-02-20T15:14:49.290-05:00The Future of New Horizons: An Interview with Dr. Alan Stern | I Heart Pluto Festival 2023<iframe width="480" height="270" src="https://youtube.com/embed/ZwZd2kV5LX8" frameborder="0"></iframe>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-40009838512135260822023-02-18T16:07:00.000-05:002023-02-18T16:07:03.542-05:00Planet Pluto Discovered 93 Years Ago Today, February 18, 1930<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEht5AEA4rG_8eNjcwXoD0C-en4uScGxjroduLxVlGDmEF3y5lIAfRIXEBvCKhvrgc1PoPVvlMw0kFLHTGvnnA1RnB6GVeWo2h3kBobsMGPjRYpxdZSVJrXYdcbGLj4ecDm_A0slf7zw2vqjxWhMNxc3GIsZYkQvFwp2O9kbN1tGEywMfuyFFUGoTzrH/s736/Pluto%20Discovery%20Cartoon.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="692" data-original-width="736" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEht5AEA4rG_8eNjcwXoD0C-en4uScGxjroduLxVlGDmEF3y5lIAfRIXEBvCKhvrgc1PoPVvlMw0kFLHTGvnnA1RnB6GVeWo2h3kBobsMGPjRYpxdZSVJrXYdcbGLj4ecDm_A0slf7zw2vqjxWhMNxc3GIsZYkQvFwp2O9kbN1tGEywMfuyFFUGoTzrH/s16000/Pluto%20Discovery%20Cartoon.jpg" /></a></div><br /><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiL2mhhau66WuCnId28s20wPUu2lJWN4f0mv-gUfWVDv2otV30XqgeJupI8nkrI2k2TldJZruef9ibbpUOuEns9-Ll5iG2PQrIs24m9ew6711A7BdbQBxfTXAUbN6e6xykJdlHTDhDFE9QiO5m6hAsD9eqqeFKKCL9wSY0gMq6xRRSUDMyhplf4Rvp9/s720/Pluto%20Explored%20Stamp.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="720" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiL2mhhau66WuCnId28s20wPUu2lJWN4f0mv-gUfWVDv2otV30XqgeJupI8nkrI2k2TldJZruef9ibbpUOuEns9-Ll5iG2PQrIs24m9ew6711A7BdbQBxfTXAUbN6e6xykJdlHTDhDFE9QiO5m6hAsD9eqqeFKKCL9wSY0gMq6xRRSUDMyhplf4Rvp9/s16000/Pluto%20Explored%20Stamp.jpg" /></a></div><br /><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">On
February 18, 1930, exactly 93 years ago today, 24-year-old Clyde
Tombaugh discovered Planet Pluto while blinking between two
photographic plates of the same part of the sky taken six days apart
at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona.</span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">He
found a tiny dot that moved against the background stars from one
plate to the next and thus succeeded just over a year after arriving
at Lowell Observatory to take up the search for a new outer solar
system planet, begun many years earlier by observatory founder
Percival Lowell.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Now close to 130 years old, the Lowell
Observatory is today holding its annual “I Heart Pluto”
celebration to commemorate the discovery. The 13-inch Lawrence Lowell
telescope Tombaugh used to take the photographic plates, recently
restored, still sits within its original dome and is viewed by
visitors every day.</span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Discoveries
are not always well understood at the time they are made. In Pluto’s
case, the new planet was too small to be resolved into a disk,
leading some scientists to speculate that it might be a moon of a
not-yet discovered larger parent planet.</span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Eventually,
telescopes became powerful enough to resolve Pluto into a disk, but
even Hubble images taken during the 1990s were fuzzy. The real
revelation of Pluto in all its glory happened in 2015, when the New
Horizons spacecraft flew by that world, imaged its varied terrains,
and returned data that is still being studied and analyzed
today.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Tombaugh and his fellow astronomers in 1930 had no
way of knowing that they had found the first of many small planets in
what is now known as the solar system’s third zone. They certainly
had no inkling that the newly discovered world was one of many solar
system objects that has a subsurface ocean possibly capable of
hosting microbial life.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">With the recent renewed interest
in UFOs, it is important to remember that as of today, we have not
even determined whether any other place in our own solar system
harbors life. What we have discovered is that small planets Pluto and
Ceres, as well as various moons of the gas and ice giants, likely
have oceans beneath their surfaces that could potentially host
microbes. Among that growing list of worlds are Jupiter’s moons
Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto; Saturn’s moons Enceladus, Titan,
and possibly even Mimas; Neptune’s moon Triton, and possibly
Pluto’s binary companion Charon.<br />
<br />
Distant planets like
Eris and Sedna could also potentially host such oceans, but we won’t
know until we send probes to study them up close.<br />
<br />
On
February 18, 1930, Clyde Tombaugh had no way of knowing that he had
not only unlocked a third zone of the solar system, but also
discovered a new class of ocean worlds that could be the prime
locations for life taking hold beyond the Earth.<br />
<br />
While it
is clear that any extraterrestrial life in our solar system is
limited to microbes, finding evidence of such life on any world would
be one of the most significant scientific discoveries in history, as
it would confirm life got started on worlds other than Earth.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Tombaugh
also could not have known that the world he discovered was not a dead
rock, but a geologically active planet that appears to have an
internal heat source. No one expected something like this so far from
the Sun. Today, the discovery of Pluto’s complexity and activity
raises the possibility that other, even more distant worlds, could
also be active planets.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Our
technology is not yet at the level of being able to discover
Pluto-sized planets in other solar systems, but the ability to do so
is likely just a matter of time. While his search was for a gas giant
planet, Tombaugh discovered the first in a new subclass of planets,
the dwarf or small planets, largely but not solely present in the
outer solar system. It is reasonable to hypothesize that other solar
systems could also have regions like this, with scattered small
planets that might be hiding subsurface oceans.</span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Some
in the astronomy community did not give Tombaugh sufficient credit
for his discovery back in 1930. His name was not even mentioned in
Lowell Observatory’s press release announcing the discovery. Some
astronomers of the day even looked down on him because he was a
24-year-old with just a high school education, not an astronomy PhD.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">Yet even here, Tombaugh set a new trend though it would
not become a “thing” until many decades later. This trend is that
of astronomical and planetary discoveries being made by ordinary
citizens, amateur astronomers, and even kids, who don’t have PhDs,
but are passionate about the universe. Internet and telescope
technology have opened the discovery process to interested citizens
around the world, who have discovered exoplanets, brown dwarfs,
supernovae, etc.</span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">In
so many ways, Tombaugh was far ahead of his time. This is also true
of his staunch support of Pluto’s planethood. Doubts about that
began not in 2005 but in 1930, soon after its discovery. Yet Tombaugh
never wavered in his position even though he did not live to see the
New Horizons flyby. Today, we know that Pluto is actually part of a
binary system with Charon, meaning it is not one but two planets! The
system’s four smaller moons orbit not Pluto itself but the center
of gravity between Pluto and Charon.</span></span></p><p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: medium;">This is a day to
celebrate Planet Pluto and its opening of new frontiers in solar
system and planetary studies. I personally wish I could be at Lowell
Observatory’s I Heart Pluto celebration and hope to to be there for
the centennial in 2030.<br />
<br />
This year’s celebration will
conclude with two talks that will be livestreamed online. The first,
“<a href="https://www.youtube.com/live/ZwZd2kV5LX8?feature=share">The
Future of New Horizons</a>,” will be presented by Alan Stern on
Sunday, February 19, at 7 PM Mountain Standard Time, which is 9 PM
Eastern time. The second, “<a href="https://www.youtube.com/live/LyhwnT77RQs?feature=share">New
Horizons: NASA’s Mission to Pluto and the Kuiper Belt</a>,” by
New Horizons engineer and mission operations manager Alice Bowman,
will be presented on Monday, February 20, at 7 PM Mountain time/9 pm
Eastern time.<br />
<br />
Happy Discovery Day, Planet Pluto!</span></span></p>
<p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br />
</p>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-73679025080181023182023-02-15T13:24:00.003-05:002023-02-15T13:25:16.292-05:00I Heart Pluto Festival Returns to Lowell Observatory<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOxQkxRmnRdXyRGVB2Z---g2aVbo68DbORhghk9S7G87jZiVH9T1wHOyJi6zIFJ17sZVyzDVdjZnUQmA0LW2Y_bhR8ZaPAJMswmx9KQXvoSLXTiAE_U0S75ih1EfyynCm0HAfgDMXSFvhu8aEgt41IfWAXSl7DJlMG3uOjIVlbptSb-1rRHP-Sb_TP/s2519/PlutoFest2023final_web.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2519" data-original-width="1654" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOxQkxRmnRdXyRGVB2Z---g2aVbo68DbORhghk9S7G87jZiVH9T1wHOyJi6zIFJ17sZVyzDVdjZnUQmA0LW2Y_bhR8ZaPAJMswmx9KQXvoSLXTiAE_U0S75ih1EfyynCm0HAfgDMXSFvhu8aEgt41IfWAXSl7DJlMG3uOjIVlbptSb-1rRHP-Sb_TP/w420-h640/PlutoFest2023final_web.png" width="420" /></a></div><br /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;"><br /></span><p></p><p><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">It is almost the 93rd anniversary of Pluto's discovery on February 18, 1930, and that can mean only one thing--Lowell Observatory's annual I Heart Pluto celebration is back! Find out more </span><a href="https://iheartpluto.org/" rel="nofollow" style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px; text-decoration-line: none;" target="_blank">here</a><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">! While celebrations on February 18 will be in person at Lowell Observatory, there will be two talks livestreamed online on YouTube, one on February 19 and the other on February 20, as follows:</span></p><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">Sunday, Feb. 19, 7 pm: The Future of New Horizons: An Interview with Dr. Alan Stern</span><br style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><br style="background-color: white; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13.3333px;" /><span face="Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: 13.3333px;">Monday, Feb. 20, 7 pm: The Latest News from Pluto and Arrokoth, with Alice Bowman, Engineer/New Horizons Mission Operations Manager, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory</span>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-81611059908761990912022-12-21T22:47:00.000-05:002022-12-21T22:47:13.875-05:00Winter Solstice 2022<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjewceSFciqW-QSluVra8SJsFg-pMsw5eJ_mlG7PTrDwiv-JeK_rNJ0sQxlpS6FGtcHw3chmowIPvjrfd6a9Dk1mhW2u_F59Jy3hphW8pU4ZEP_OVfpRcgIfEB2KxS_lxfTVSBZOJ20PPaRabOsaYIzXBcffn5H2xM0u1IIio2FjNikT30u_BixBPHl/s1484/Winter%20Solstice%20Sunset.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1113" data-original-width="1484" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjewceSFciqW-QSluVra8SJsFg-pMsw5eJ_mlG7PTrDwiv-JeK_rNJ0sQxlpS6FGtcHw3chmowIPvjrfd6a9Dk1mhW2u_F59Jy3hphW8pU4ZEP_OVfpRcgIfEB2KxS_lxfTVSBZOJ20PPaRabOsaYIzXBcffn5H2xM0u1IIio2FjNikT30u_BixBPHl/s16000/Winter%20Solstice%20Sunset.jpg" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">We
have once again reached that noteworthy milestone—in the Northern Hemisphere,
it is the Winter Solstice, the shortest day and longest night, the turning
point of the year when darkness stops advancing, and the Sun appears to stand
still in the sky before reversing course.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">It’s
been quite a year for space exploration. The James Webb Space Telescope
successfully launched just about a year ago in spite of endless delays and
repeatedly going over budget. It performed flawlessly in unfurling its
sunshield and mirror, reaching its Lagrange Point position, and returning
stunning images that open a new era of exploration for astrophysics, planetary
science, and cosmology.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Another
long delayed project, our return to the Moon, also finally launched this year.
Artemis I sent back beautiful close up photos of both Earth and Moon,
reminiscent of the famous Apollo 8 image captured at this time of year back in
1968—a picture that had a profound impact on many and played a key role in
launching the environmental movement.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">While
2022 has certainly had its share of challenges, it brought to fruition projects
some doubted would ever launch, revealing that late does not mean never and
reminding us that if something really matters, giving up should never be an
option.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">People
who have had the good fortune to travel to space note it brings a life-changing
perspective. From there, no borders are visible, just one fragile planet, now
home to 8 billion people and numerous other life forms.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">We
all, not just world leaders, need that change in perspective because the
problems our home planet faces cannot be addressed by just one group of people
or one country. The only way we have any hope to stabilize our climate,
mitigate the worst effects of climate change, and clean up our air, land, and
water, is to come together as one people on one planet.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Too
often, people look at the year-end holidays in ways that divide us, at a time
when, more than ever, we need to unite to preserve our planet’s habitability
for future generations—so we can one day explore the solar system and
eventually the stars.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">This day, at its core, is about hope. It is about light and life, known by the
Romans as the Birthday of the Unconquerable Sun. This makes it an ideal time to
treasure the gift of our planet and affirm the amazing things we can accomplish
when we come together for a common goal—like launching JWST and sending
astronauts to the Moon.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">If
we can do those things, we can save our planet for future generations. May the
year that starts with the return of the light inspire us all to come together
and choose a future of light and life.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">“We are the power in everyone</span></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">We are the dance of the Moon and Sun</span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">We are the hope that cannot hide<o:p></o:p></span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">We are the turning of the tide!”<o:p></o:p></span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><br /></p><p></p>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-7408273223202816282022-10-14T13:41:00.001-04:002022-10-14T13:41:45.630-04:00Why Space.com Article is Wrong about Pluto's Planet Status<p><i></i></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUs8lddxLwcbdPxoBu9CLESfwlV0KLp8lLmIlDujRa_jx7LQhwVVB8--UHsVIJM5j-pM_nn7XamtrgcXhl_5Um20p9in55zQ3gV83kRGVNgpP5P_Ih_rRWL6_asTHf2j1uecxz5eTMlWozKlUThZePvq8_WiESTT3YgWqVOa8IVPir6h420bMNGmQV/s1200/Pluto%204.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUs8lddxLwcbdPxoBu9CLESfwlV0KLp8lLmIlDujRa_jx7LQhwVVB8--UHsVIJM5j-pM_nn7XamtrgcXhl_5Um20p9in55zQ3gV83kRGVNgpP5P_Ih_rRWL6_asTHf2j1uecxz5eTMlWozKlUThZePvq8_WiESTT3YgWqVOa8IVPir6h420bMNGmQV/s16000/Pluto%204.jpg" /></a></i></div><i><br /><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></i><p></p><p><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Space.com</span></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> is usually a very
credible information site about all matters space and astronomy, which is why
its October 23, 2022 article, “<a href="https://www.space.com/why-pluto-is-not-a-planet.html?fbclid=IwAR1eDBADbM4KDax482FNo3nmYbasvDN8bqeeaA8KADmI1Wv2c5J5WfRLnhk">Why
is Pluto Not a Planet</a>?” is so disappointing in its blatant one-sidedness.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">More
than 16 years after the controversial IAU vote on a highly flawed planet
definition, it is difficult to understand why this site would publish an
article that is extremely selective in every one of the sources it uses as
references. From the IAU web page to Mike Brown to Ethan Siegel, formerly of </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Forbes</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">, to a Neil Tyson video, the
article refers almost solely to supporters of the IAU definition and completely
excludes the many essays and articles written from the opposing point of view.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">The
article is problematic starting with its title, which, instead of acknowledging
the ongoing debate over planet definition and Pluto’s status, simply states the
IAU view as fact. This misleading title essentially presents the IAU view as “the
truth” rather than as one view in an ongoing debate, and this notion is
repeatedly assumed in the article, in spite of very sparse references to
dissenting views.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Yet,
there is absolutely NO reason to give the IAU position privilege as somehow being
the “official” one in use. It is simply one of several definitions currently
used by planetary scientists.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">We need
to address the factual errors in this article. Like many writings on this
subject over the last 16 years, the writers cite Ceres’s discovery as a planet
and subsequent demotion to asteroid in the mid-19</span><sup style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;">th</sup><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> century as an
earlier example of what happened to Pluto. However, they fail to acknowledge
the other, crucial part of Ceres’s history.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Because
it is very small, Ceres could not be resolved into a disk by 19</span><sup style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;">th</sup><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> century
telescopes. At the time, it therefore made sense to demote it to one of many
asteroids in the belt between Mars and Jupiter. However, since then, Ceres has
been found to be spherical, meaning unlike nearly every asteroid in that belt,
it is squeezed into a round or nearly round shape by its own gravity. Most
asteroids are simply rubble piles shaped by chemical bonds. The threshold for
an object being spherical, in a state known as hydrostatic equilibrium, is crucial
because this is when objects begin to experience geology and the complex
processes seen on rocky planets.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">In 2015, NASA’s </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Dawn</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> mission revealed
Ceres to have these complex features, including cryo-volcanoes and a possible
subsurface ocean that could potentially host microbial life. These findings
indicate the 19</span><sup style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;">th</sup><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> century demotion was in error and that Ceres is
more like the larger rocky planets than almost all objects in the asteroid
belt, with the exception of Vesta and Pallas, which appear to have once been
spherical only to have had a large portion knocked off during impacts with
other objects.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Many
scientists argue this makes Vesta and Pallas deserve an intermediate category
between asteroid and small or dwarf planet, such as protoplanet. In fact, some
scientists on the </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Dawn</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> mission refer
to Vesta as the solar system’s “smallest terrestrial planet.”</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">While
some, including the writers of this article, invoke Pluto’s eccentric orbit and
17-degree tilt to the ecliptic as reasons for demoting it from planethood, the
fact is several exoplanet systems contain multiple giant planets all orbiting
in different planes. At least two systems have giant planets that cross one
another’s orbits. And the ecliptic, often wrongly depicted as the path of the
Sun, is actually the plane of the Earth in its solar orbit. Requiring objects
to orbit in the same plane as Earth is a violation of the Copernican principle,
which essentially states that Earth is just another planet, not the center of
anything. And if giant objects that cross the orbits of other giant planets in
their systems are not planets, what then are they?</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">The
next inaccuracy in the </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Space.com</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">
article is its attribution of Eris’s discovery solely to Mike Brown. While
Brown often presents himself as Eris’s sole discoverer, the fact is, Eris was
discovered by a team of three scientists, the other two being Chad Trujillo and
David Rabinowitz. Significantly, both Trujillo and Rabinowitz reject the IAU
planet definition. Rabinowitz even signed a petition with hundreds of planetary
scientists back in 2006 in response to the IAU definition, saying they would
not use it.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">The
reference to the late Brian Marsden is also problematic, as Marsden, who apparently
had a long feud with the late Pluto discoverer Clyde Tombaugh, was obsessed for
decades with demoting Pluto so it could be put under his auspices at the IAU
Minor Planet Center. Like Brown, he is a scientist who appears to have had his
own agenda from the start.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">While
the article does acknowledge that only 424 IAU members voted on the controversial
planet definition in 2006, it fails to note that this vote was held in
violation of IAU bylaws, which prohibit putting a resolution to the floor of a
General Assembly without first vetting it by the proper IAU committee. It also
fails to mention that these 424 people were largely not planetary scientists
but other types of astronomers, that they represented only four percent of the
IAU’s membership, that no electronic or absentee voting was permitted, that 91
of the 424 voted for dwarf planets to be classed as a subclass of planets, and
that an equal number of professional planetary scientists signed the afore-mentioned
petition rejecting the IAU definition within days of its adoption.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Additionally,
the writers fail to mention that when initially coined by Alan Stern in 1991,
the term “dwarf planet” was intended to designate an additional class of small
planets, not to designate a class of non-planets. In its unauthorized vote, the
IAU essentially misused the term “dwarf planet” based on the fiction that dwarf
planets are fundamentally different compositionally than their larger
counterparts, a position proved false by the findings of the </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Dawn</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> and </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">New Horizons</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> missions.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Even Neil Tyson is on record saying he has no problem with dwarf planets being
considered a subclass of full planets!</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">As
the article writers note, New Horizons found Pluto to have active geology;
diverse features including windswept dunes, varied terrains, a layered
atmosphere, cryo-volcanism, interaction between atmosphere and surface, and a
likely subsurface ocean. Some complex features discovered on Pluto exist
elsewhere in the solar system only on Earth and Mars!</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" class="BLOG_video_class" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/8-2HxrgqUnM" width="320" youtube-src-id="8-2HxrgqUnM"></iframe></div><br /><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">To
make matters worse, the article never acknowledges the alternative geophysical
planet definition, which is preferred by most planetary scientists, beyond a
vague mention of a 2017 proposal that “defined a planet as a round object in
space that’s smaller than a star.” This is a major disservice to the proposal,
presented to the </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Lunar and Planetary
Science Conference</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> that year, which centers planet definition on an object’s
intrinsic properties rather than on its location, which the IAU definition does.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Most
problematic is the article’s inherent assumption that only the IAU has the
ability or power to determine what a planet is. Conveyed throughout this
article, that sentiment can be seen in the statement noting Alan Stern and
David Grinspoon’s 2018 </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2018/05/07/yes-pluto-is-a-planet/?commentId=9d9f6b96-e408-4be7-894a-409ae4821e8c">Washington
Post</a></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> article urging reconsideration of planet definition “have fallen
on deaf ears so far, and it seems unlikely the</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">IAU
will revisit the controversy any time soon.”</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">If such pleas to the IAU fall on deaf ears, and the organization refuses to
address new data returned by the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Dawn</i>
and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">New Horizons</i> missions, then it is
time to consider other venues for this discussion. The notion of science being
decided by any type of “authority” went out with Galileo’s discovery of Jupiter’s
moons over 400 years ago. A science publication like <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Space.com</i> should know better than to appeal to any “authority”
regarding scientific matters.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Finally,
the article falls back on attributing opposition to the IAU decision to
emotion, as seen in its Mike Brown quote, “Nostalgia for Pluto is not a very
good argument, but that’s basically all there is. Now, let’s get on with
reality.”</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">This comment is not only demeaning; it is also blatantly false. Scientists,
amateur astronomers, and members of the public oppose the IAU definition not
because of nostalgia or emotion but because the geophysical definition, which
classifies objects first and foremost by their intrinsic properties, simply
makes more sense based on what we have discovered about these objects. Brown
does not get to unilaterally end the debate and get the last word simply
because he wants to do so.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">There are so many scientists and publications that articulately present the
other side of this debate. I urge </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Space.com</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">
to do a better job in presenting this fascinating controversy to give readers a
comprehensive understanding of both positions, allowing them to decide for
themselves where they stand.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">The
authors of this article are right on one thing: This debate </span><b style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">will</b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> continue for the foreseeable
future.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><u>Sources in response to those presented
in the Space.com article:</u><br />
<br />
Note: I wrote the response to the IAU statement and to Siegel’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Forbes</i> article and embrace my role in
this debate on Twitter with the handle <a href="https://twitter.com/plutosavior">@plutosavior</a>
.<o:p></o:p></b></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I have covered the <i>New Horizons</i> mission for the website <i><a href="https://www.spaceflightinsider.com/">Spaceflight Insider</a></i>
since 2014 though the opinion expressed here is solely my own and not
necessarily that of the site or its editors.</span></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">“Responding
to the IAU: Pluto and the Developing Landscape of the Solar System,” a
point-by-point rebuttal to the IAU statement:</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><a href="http://laurelsplutoblog.blogspot.com/2013/02/responding-to-iau-pluto-and-developing.html" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">http://laurelsplutoblog.blogspot.com/2013/02/responding-to-iau-pluto-and-developing.html</a></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">“A
Geophysical Planet Definition” presented to the 2017 Lunar and Planetary
Sciences Conference:</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><a href="https://www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2017/eposter/1448.pdf">https://www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2017/eposter/1448.pdf</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">“Guest
Blog: Revisiting the Definition of a Planet,” Response to Ethan Siegel’s 2018 </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Forbes</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> article:</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><a href="https://cs.astronomy.com/asy/b/astronomy/archive/2018/05/18/guest-blog-revisiting-the-definition-of-a-planet.aspx#.Wv8Nwq7VyxY.blogger">https://cs.astronomy.com/asy/b/astronomy/archive/2018/05/18/guest-blog-revisiting-the-definition-of-a-planet.aspx#.Wv8Nwq7VyxY.blogger</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">“An Organically Grown Planet Definition,” by Alan Stern and Kirby Runyon, <a href="https://astronomy.com/magazine/2018/05/an-organically-grown-planet-definition#.Wv3x0d97CCI.blogger">https://astronomy.com/magazine/2018/05/an-organically-grown-planet-definition#.Wv3x0d97CCI.blogger</a>
<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">“Pluto
A Planet? New Research from UCF Suggests Yes,” by Robert H. Wells: </span><a href="https://www.ucf.edu/news/pluto-planet-research/" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">https://www.ucf.edu/news/pluto-planet-research/</a></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">The Case for Pluto: How A Little Planet
Made a Big Difference</span></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">,
by Alan Boyle: <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Case-Pluto-Little-Planet-Difference/dp/0470505443">https://www.amazon.com/Case-Pluto-Little-Planet-Difference/dp/0470505443</a></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">
<br />
<br style="mso-special-character: line-break;" />
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<!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></p>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-31929207145490703992022-08-27T14:45:00.002-04:002022-08-27T14:45:20.207-04:00Universe Today: New Horizons Could Still Have More Adventures Ahead<p><a href="https://www.universetoday.com/157298/new-horizons-could-still-have-more-adventures-ahead/?fbclid=IwAR0RZ-jUrn4pcE1jWFWvS31I4dyCyKpojIeMr3nj8jnvy_Y-vMt_6-I0gWQ"> https://www.universetoday.com/157298/new-horizons-could-still-have-more-adventures-ahead/?fbclid=IwAR0RZ-jUrn4pcE1jWFWvS31I4dyCyKpojIeMr3nj8jnvy_Y-vMt_6-I0gWQ</a></p>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-76795575325961355472022-08-24T15:16:00.003-04:002022-08-24T15:18:49.254-04:00Pluto Resistance Day<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR7CRiyENnOMHZ1XVt3yKoO661o-OVrXFSxpS1hDw5mTDJYuy3jo6enF4-cPRt-WEgVb0QsuZjsVH1GL9hdk0FADTSiulD5NXn-s925f1RPsL33weK3yG4WnGjOGiRIec4sBbRKEdPvt4B6wWHYVfeGDtUqdcdgd0UMmGXwv3qc6N1JC4P0V00rdu4/s1727/PlanetClassificationColor.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="922" data-original-width="1727" height="342" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR7CRiyENnOMHZ1XVt3yKoO661o-OVrXFSxpS1hDw5mTDJYuy3jo6enF4-cPRt-WEgVb0QsuZjsVH1GL9hdk0FADTSiulD5NXn-s925f1RPsL33weK3yG4WnGjOGiRIec4sBbRKEdPvt4B6wWHYVfeGDtUqdcdgd0UMmGXwv3qc6N1JC4P0V00rdu4/w640-h342/PlanetClassificationColor.png" width="640" /></a></div><br />Sixteen
years. As of today, that is how long it has been since the <i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><a href="https://iau.org/">IAU</a></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> attempted to end the planet definition
debate once and for all but instead created more chaos and confusion on this
topic for the media, educators, and the general population.</span><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">The
spread of misinformation their decision caused unfortunately continues to this
day.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">In
the last few years, some people have taken to designating August 24, the day of
the IAU vote, as a “holiday” titled “Pluto Demoted Day.” Writer Aryan Sahu, in
a very one-sided article published on the website </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><a href="https://www.merazone.com/2022/08/pluto-demoted-day-2022-history.html">Merazone</a></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">,
actually described this day as “fun” and listed ways to “celebrate” it without
even acknowledging the ongoing controversy. Unfortunately, the usually
informative astronomy site </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><a href="https://www.timeanddate.com/">TimeandDate.com</a></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> also lists this day
as a “fun holiday.”</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">But
it is not in any way a holiday or something to celebrate.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">I instead choose to call it </span><b style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Pluto
Resistance Day</b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">. It’s the day when all who recognize the flaws of the IAU
definition come together and affirm our commitment to advocate for a better
planet definition in the long term and educate the public about the ongoing
debate in the meantime.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Although
there are good children’s books on the solar system that present both sides of
the controversy, others that ignore the pro-Pluto view continue to be published.
I cringed when I saw one new children’s book titled </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Eight Little Planets</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> and another called </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">How to Teach Grownups about Pluto </i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">that humorously teaches children
to use the five stages of grief to get the adults in their lives to accept that
Pluto is “gone.”</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Yet there is no need for any type of grief because Planet Pluto is alive and
well!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">But
the misinformation continues. Just today, an article in </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><a href="https://www.abbynews.com/trending-now/plutos-demotion-day-a-chance-to-salute-the-disinherited-dwarf-planet/">The
Abbotsford News</a></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> erroneously describes Pluto as an “icy stone plodding
around the Kuiper Belt,” then states that “Thousands of objects have been
catalogued so far in that outer belt, the Kuiper Belt, and </span><b style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">at least 200 of them are bigger than Pluto.</b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">”</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Far
from an “icy stone,” Pluto is approximately 70 percent rock. And not a single
object larger than Pluto has been discovered in the Kuiper Belt to date. Eris
was initially thought to be larger but was found to be marginally smaller than
Pluto when a team of astronomers observed it occult a star in 2010.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Yesterday,
an article published in </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Science News</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">
titled "</span><a href="https://www.sciencenews.org/article/kuiper-belt-discovery-solar-system-planets-space?fbclid=IwAR26m6WkHDKR53YGNdeXKoGFK7O2tpPUZMxg47RHe6BOEv1E9ut5jDFa8Z8" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">The
Discovery of the Kuiper Belt revamped our view of the solar system</a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">"
failed to even acknowledge the ongoing planet debate, quoting Mike Brown, David
Jewitt, and Jane Luu, all of whom argued that Pluto “does not belong with the
planets” without interviewing or mentioning a single planetary scientist who
disagrees with this statement and favors the geophysical definition. The
geophysical definition was not even mentioned once in the article.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">It then goes on to say, "Pluto probably wouldn't be a member of the planet
club much longer, the two (Jewitt and Luu) predicted. Indeed, by 2006, it was
out” with no acknowledgement of the fact that most of the four percent of the
IAU who voted on this were not planetary scientists but other types of
astronomers, that an equal number of planetary scientists signed a petition
rejecting the IAU decision, and that most planetary scientists today ignore
that definition in favor of the geophysical one.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">As noted before in this blog, the IAU definition requires a planet to orbit the
Sun, not a star. This means that none of the 5,000 plus exoplanets discovered
to date count as planets under their definition. Neither do rogue planets,
which don’t orbit any star and therefore have no orbit to clear. In 2006, the
IAU leadership promised to address the issue of defining exoplanets, but in 16
years, no such effort has been made.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Meanwhile,
seven years have passed since </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><a href="https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/missions/dawn/overview/">Dawn</a></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">’s
flyby of Ceres and </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><a href="http://pluto.jhuapl.edu/">New Horizons</a></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">’ flyby of Pluto, and the IAU
has not shown any interest in using the data from these missions to reconsider
the status of Ceres, Pluto, and other dwarf planets that could potentially have
subsurface oceans capable of harboring microbial life.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Just
two weeks ago, the IAU held yet another </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><a href="https://www.iauga2022.org/">General Assembly</a></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> that didn’t consider
any of these issues.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">While
the stalemate continues over planet definition and the IAU continues to do
nothing to correct the confusion their definition has caused, there has been
one major positive development in the last year. Over budget and more than a
decade late, the </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><a href="https://webb.nasa.gov/">James Webb Space Telescope</a></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> (</span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">JWST</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">) finally and successfully launched
in the last week of 2021.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">On
several occasions, </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">JWST</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> was almost
canceled and/or defunded. Some astronomers even argued the project was not
worth the trouble and expense. And even after launch, so many parts had to work
correctly that many scientists felt genuine trepidation, afraid something would
go wrong.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">But
nothing did, and today, </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">JWST</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> is
orbiting the Sun one million miles from Earth and taking unprecedented,
breathtaking photos of galaxies, stars, and planets. It just sent back a
gorgeous image of Jupiter, and I know I’m not alone in hoping it one day images
Pluto as well.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Whether with</span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> JWST </i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">or another
observatory, it is only a matter of time before we discover dwarf exoplanets the
size of Pluto. Will that discovery have any impact on the IAU?</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">JWST</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> took much longer to launch than
expected and faced numerous obstacles, including hurricanes and earthquakes,
yet it is now giving us a whole new view of the universe. And one of its
lessons is that good things sometimes take much longer than anyone desired or
anticipated. But late does not mean never.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">No
matter how long it takes, we will not give up on a better, more inclusive
planet definition that recognizes dwarf planets as a subclass of planets. We
will NEVER go away. One way or another, the travesty of August 24, 2006, will
be undone. In the meantime, we will continue to inform the media, textbook
publishers, educators, and the general public that the debate continues, that
the geophysical definition is the one preferred by most planetary scientists,
and that the IAU definition is just one of many, not in any way more “official”
or legitimate than any others in use.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">For those
interested in reading a very fair and balanced account of the history and
current state of the planet definition debate, writer Matt Williams has published
an excellent article on the website </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"><a href="https://interestingengineering.com/science/the-great-planet-debate-is-it-over-will-it-ever-be">Interesting
Engineering</a></i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">, which includes quotes by Alan Stern, Phil Metzger, and
yours truly. I am very grateful to him for giving me a voice in his
comprehensive article and encourage all Pluto fans and those interested in this
issue to give the article a read.</span></p>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-27475353500708230172022-07-21T00:02:00.000-04:002022-07-21T00:02:04.486-04:00View Pluto at its best during opposition this week | Astronomy.com<a href="https://astronomy.com/magazine/news/2022/07/pluto-opposition-2022?fbclid=IwAR0-PW9ROtJdxO3rgCk1RhhCPtHXHa3MPn-pjG9bdpxfd9ZpnVAHPsibYEU#.YtjPqbygvw4.blogger">View Pluto at its best during opposition this week | Astronomy.com</a>: The dwarf planet reaches opposition the night of July 19/20. Here's what you need to know to spot it.Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-40869457754161904392022-06-17T21:56:00.001-04:002022-06-17T21:56:24.885-04:00Pluto's giant Ice volcanoes Hint at the Possibility of Life | Pluto Planet<iframe width="480" height="270" src="https://youtube.com/embed/gSouvy2k5mA" frameborder="0"></iframe>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-27710379229700857232022-06-09T00:24:00.000-04:002022-06-09T00:24:11.391-04:00The Final Images We Will Ever See of Pluto and Arrokoth<iframe width="480" height="270" src="https://youtube.com/embed/D5XPuS-Y0fg" frameborder="0"></iframe>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-62603514629676612112022-05-25T23:43:00.001-04:002022-05-25T23:43:40.850-04:00LIVE Telescope view of Jupiter, Venus, Mars, & Saturn<iframe width="480" height="270" src="https://youtube.com/embed/5jdSnREyPRM" frameborder="0"></iframe>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-53785239120653422542022-05-20T13:08:00.001-04:002022-05-20T13:08:43.780-04:00SETI Live: Geologically Recent Ice Volcanoes on Pluto<iframe style="background-image:url(https://i.ytimg.com/vi/47FysRv69eI/hqdefault.jpg)" width="480" height="270" src="https://youtube.com/embed/47FysRv69eI" frameborder="0"></iframe>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-41073328351098957382022-05-16T12:27:00.000-04:002022-05-16T12:27:03.420-04:00Live Stream Full Lunar Eclipse [8K] 5/16/2022<iframe width="480" height="270" src="https://youtube.com/embed/Afm-ZzSRFvU" frameborder="0"></iframe>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2732192929647673319.post-10467228701993582402022-04-25T18:43:00.002-04:002022-04-25T18:50:10.512-04:00Response to Tom Hartsfield's Big Think Article, "Searching for Planet 9"<p><span face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: small;"><br /></span></p><p><span face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: small;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwwcQY0i1LGkggYVVTW13Q_xFCbdNjtN8rxusTg3CDKAtTN6qo_WHAH6cHG9MhXCVKvyk_DyDjsV2zzdinbyXpYA9oZgVTKHriWBSlRWMbitgumsGdNUkXpRGRkPlCiAmLRLt-_vS94u88x5C6cFZZv-OuWXmbMchlC6VCX6MEjNdyem3Hn__5omwq/s1024/Pluto%20Closest%20Flyby%20Image.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="437" data-original-width="1024" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwwcQY0i1LGkggYVVTW13Q_xFCbdNjtN8rxusTg3CDKAtTN6qo_WHAH6cHG9MhXCVKvyk_DyDjsV2zzdinbyXpYA9oZgVTKHriWBSlRWMbitgumsGdNUkXpRGRkPlCiAmLRLt-_vS94u88x5C6cFZZv-OuWXmbMchlC6VCX6MEjNdyem3Hn__5omwq/s16000/Pluto%20Closest%20Flyby%20Image.jpg" /></a></div><br />This is a response I sent to the one-sided article <span face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" style="background-color: white;">"</span><span face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" style="color: #1155cc;"><span style="background-color: white;">Searching for Planet 9</span></span><span face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" style="background-color: white;">"</span><span face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: small;"> published April 19, 2022, in</span><i style="background-color: white; font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"> Big Think</i><span face="Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; font-size: small;"> by writer Tom Hartsfield along with a request that I or another writer be given the chance to write a response presenting the other side of this ongoing debate.</span><p></p><div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">As you are likely well aware, the debate over planet definition and over Pluto's status remains ongoing. Just four percent of the IAU voted on the controversial demotion of Pluto and related planet definition, and most were not planetary scientists but other types of astronomers. Their decision was immediately opposed by an equal number of planetary scientists in a formal petition led by New Horizons principal investigator Alan Stern.<br /><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Notably, the four percent of the IAU who voted on this misused the term "dwarf planet," which Stern coined back in 1991 to refer to a new subclass of planets by stating in their resolution that dwarf planets are not planets at all but another type of object entirely. Nine years later, this statement was not borne out by the findings of the Dawn mission at Ceres and the New Horizons mission at Pluto.<br /><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">Since the 2015 New Horizons mission revealed Pluto to be a geologically active world with complex processes seen elsewhere in the solar system only on Earth and Mars, an increasing number of planetary scientists have come to view it as a full-fledged planet<br /><br />At the Lunar and Planetary Sciences Conference in 2017, planetary scientist Kirby Runyon introduced the geophysical planet definition, which rejects the notion that an object has to clear its orbit to be a planet. Unlike the IAU definition, the geophysical definition focuses on objects' intrinsic properties rather than their location and deems any object that is not a star but is large enough and massive enough to be rounded by its own gravity a planet.<br /><br />Because so many planetary scientists prefer the geophysical definition, they object to the term "Planet 9" for the hypothetical but as yet undiscovered planet in the outer solar system. Advocates of the geophysical definition count dwarf planets as full planets, so they view the solar system as already having a minimum of 13 planets and counting. In the August 5, 2018, edition of Planetary Exploration Newsletter, a publication of the Planetary Science Institute, a group of planetary scientists objected to the insensitive, one-sided use of the term "Planet 9," noting <span face=""Trebuchet MS", Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: #f6f6f6; font-size: 13px;">the IAU planet definition is "far from universally accepted."</span></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span face=""Trebuchet MS", Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: #f6f6f6; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span face=""Trebuchet MS", Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: #f6f6f6; font-size: 13px;">Instead, they requested this hypothetical world be referred to by the standard term for a hypothetical but as yet undiscovered planet, which is "Planet X," with "X" referring to the unknown rather than to the number 10.</span><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span face=""Trebuchet MS", Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: #f6f6f6; font-size: 13px;">Hartsfield's article unfortunately begins with an extremely one-sided statement, "The former planet 9, Pluto, was knocked out of the club because it failed to meet the definition of a planet" without noting that that definition is just one of several currently in use and remains controversial to this day.</span></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span face=""Trebuchet MS", Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: #f6f6f6; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span face=""Trebuchet MS", Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: #f6f6f6; font-size: 13px;">It then continues with the article's first sentences reading, "Our solar system once possessed nine planets. Then we kicked Pluto out of the club because it was just one of several little things beyond Neptune. Pluto happened to be the largest of them, putting it right on the line between planet and Kuiper Belt speck. The hunt is on for the real planet 9--if it exists."<br /><br />This sentence contains multiple problems. There is no "we" that kicked Pluto out of the club. The sentence assumes a level of consent that never existed, especially among planetary scientists. It does not even acknowledge the fact that most planetary scientists reject the IAU definition and have done so for over 15 years.<br /><br />Furthermore, Pluto is far from a "Kuiper Belt speck" or even an object between a planet and a speck. Such a statement totally ignores the New Horizons findings, which found Pluto to have planetary processes such as geology and weather, likely geological layering, floating glaciers, a layered atmosphere, interaction between its surface and atmosphere, varied terrains, windswept dunes, cryovolcanism, and a likely subsurface ocean. No Kuiper Belt "speck" has these features; such specks, like asteroids, are simply loosely held together by their chemical bonds.</span><br /></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><span face=""Trebuchet MS", Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif" style="background-color: #f6f6f6; font-size: 13px;"><br /></span></div><div style="background-color: white; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;"><i>Big Think</i>'s readers deserve a far more fair and balanced reporting of this issue, which acknowledges the ongoing debate and both positions instead of portraying one side as fact. There are many planetary scientists who would be happy to write about this for you, and I would be happy to get you in touch with them.</div>Laurel Kornfeldhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02387883186244337619noreply@blogger.com0