Pluto 2000

[AV1611VET]

Perhaps I should mimic one of your better posts . . .

1

That's what I thought.

I'll go ahead and take this...

Of course, you can not agree with any of those criticisms since they are science based. You told science to take a hike a long time ago, so you can't agree with them now.

... with a grain of salt.

 

[Loudmouth]

... with a grain of salt.

When evidence contradicts your fantasy you throw out the evidence and cling to your fantasy. That's not a grain of salt. That is a self imposed separation from reality. When you feel like you want to return to reality then you can start talking about science, but not until then.

 

[AV1611VET]

When evidence contradicts your fantasy you throw out the evidence and cling to your fantasy. That's not a grain of salt. That is a self imposed separation from reality. When you feel like you want to return to reality then you can start talking about science, but not until then.

You are the one rejecting reality, Loudmouth.

Either that, or you have, by coincidence, missed the many, many, many times I've clarified my stance on science in general, and my user title specifically.

There are newbies here that probably know more about where I stand on science than you seem to do.

If you want to stick with your assumption that I can't agree with science because I 'told it to take a hike', that's certainly your prerogative; but don't expect me to believe it.

 

[CapColeman]

You tell em AV.

 

[Loudmouth]

If you want to stick with your assumption that I can't agree with science because I 'told it to take a hike', that's certainly your prerogative; but don't expect me to believe it.

So you are saying that the scientific method can be used to determine if humans and chimps share a common ancestor?

 

[AV1611VET]

You tell em AV.

I can't believe he's doing this.

He has to know me better by now.

Probably just in a bad mood right now.

 

[AV1611VET]

So you are saying that the scientific method can be used to determine if humans and chimps share a common ancestor?

Goodbye.

 

[Loudmouth]

Goodbye.

See what I mean?

When evidence contradicts your fantasy you throw out the evidence and cling to your fantasy. That's not a grain of salt. That is a self imposed separation from reality. When you feel like you want to return to reality then you can start talking about science, but not until then.

 

[Delphiki]

Hi.

Again. Pluto did not change. Our understanding of Pluto didn't change, except maybe that we know more about it.

What changed was our classification of Pluto from planet to dwarf planet.

So in your scenario, the kid is wrong according to the way we classified objects in space in the year 2000. He's right according to the way we do it now, though, but he's also right for the wrong reasons. Not knowing why you are declaring something (like "Pluto is not a planet") isn't sufficient or convincing enough reason for anyone to take you seriously.

The simplest way to put this is that we were faced with a choice between classifying numerous additional objects as planets, or just classifying Pluto with the rest of those objects.

Since Pluto is the first solid (not gaseous) object from the sun after Mars, in it's own orbit around the sun, it made sense to do so. Eris, after all, is bigger than Pluto and is a dwarf planet.

Maybe it would be comforting to know that another word for these dwarf planets past Neptune is "plutoid". See? Now you don't have to cry and feel sad for name-calling a round chunk of ice in space. It's like they are all friends!

Other "plutoids": Charon, Haumea, Sedna, Makemake

Feel better now?

 

[Delphiki]

If you told me to paint a Chess set, and I painted the Kings & Queens on the wrong color, and you asked me why I did that, and I said my dad always set it up that way ... would you count that against me?

THAT would be a reason. If you had said "I don't know", that's not a reason.

 

[Freodin]

You are the one rejecting reality, Loudmouth.

Either that, or you have, by coincidence, missed the many, many, many times I've clarified my stance on science in general, and my user title specifically.

There are newbies here that probably know more about where I stand on science than you seem to do.

If you want to stick with your assumption that I can't agree with science because I 'told it to take a hike', that's certainly your prerogative; but don't expect me to believe it.

Let's see: where do you stand on science?

My Boolean standards:

1. Whatever the Bible supports: support.
2. Whatever the Bible trumps: trump.
3. If the Bible is silent and science supports it: support it.
4. If the Bible is silent and science trumps it: trump it.

What does the Bible say about the planetary status of Pluto? Nothing, it is silent about it.
Science supports the non-planet status of Pluto. AV denies the non-planet status of Pluto.

Conclusion: AV's stand on science and his own boolean standards regarding it: they can take a hike if he feels like it!

 

[AV1611VET]

What changed was our classification of Pluto from planet to dwarf planet.

Which was done how?

I'm not going to question your need to change Pluto's status.

I'm sure, if we lived long enough, we'd eventually be reclassified as humans; but I will question you as to if you know how it was done?

And, if so, if you feel the end justified the means?

 

[Delphiki]

Which was done how?

By a lot of people getting together and discussing reasons as to why or why not they should do so. A consensus was reached, and people agreed to reclassify the planet as a dwarf planet.

It wasn't some dark, tin-foil-hat conspiracy theory to cast out Plutonian space aliens from the rest of the solar system like you seem to think it was.

I'm not going to question your need to change Pluto's status.

I'm sure, if we lived long enough, we'd eventually be reclassified as humans; but I will question you as to if you know how it was done?

And, if so, if you feel the end justified the means?

I'm interested as to how you think it was done. Were there deaths involved? Did people wind up homeless or starve? We're people dancing naked in public? Were airplanes carpet-bombing super-AIDS on to third world countries? Please tell me what you thought the means was, because I'm sure it's bound to be entertaining.

 

[AV1611VET]

Please tell me what you thought the means was, because I'm sure it's bound to be entertaining.

Ya ... entertaining ... get your mindset established before you hear the other side.

Like I've said many times here, if I sponsored a team of scientists to find the Loch Ness Monster, and overheard one of you talking like that, I would demand he be removed from the team.

But for the record ... here's your show:

Only four percent of the IAU voted on the controversial demotion of Pluto, and most are not planetary scientists. The vote was conducted in violation of the IAU's own bylaws on the last day of a two-week conference when most attendees already had left. No absentee voting was allowed. Supporters of the demotion resolution violated the IAU's own bylaws by putting this resolution on the General Assembly floor without first vetting it by the proper committee as IAU rules require. Also, many planetary scientists do not belong to the IAU and therefore had no say in this matter. When professional astronomers objecting to the demotion asked for a reopening of the planet debate at the 2009 IAU General Assembly, the IAU leadership adamantly refused. Why would they refuse to reopen a debate unless they were insecure about their stand? Meanwhile, this issue continues to be debated in other venues, such as the 2008 Great Planet Debate, held at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab in August 2008 (which I personally attended), the American Geophysical Union, and the European Geophysical Union.


The IAU decision was immediately opposed in a formal petition by hundreds of professional astronomers led by Dr. Alan Stern, Principal Investigator of NASA’s New Horizons mission to Pluto. One reason the IAU definition makes no sense is it says dwarf planets are not planets at all! That is like saying a grizzly bear is not a bear, and it is inconsistent with the use of the term “dwarf” in astronomy, where dwarf stars are still stars, and dwarf galaxies are still galaxies. Also, the IAU definition classifies objects solely by where they are while ignoring what they are. If Earth were in Pluto’s orbit, according to the IAU definition, it would not be a planet either. A definition that takes the same object and makes it a planet in one location and not a planet in another is essentially useless.


Pluto is a planet because it is spherical, meaning it is large enough to be pulled into a round shape by its own gravity--a state known as hydrostatic equilibrium and characteristic of planets, not of shapeless asteroids held together by chemical bonds. These reasons are why many astronomers, lay people, and educators are either ignoring the demotion entirely or working to get it overturned. You can find out more by Googling "Laurel's Pluto Blog."
A decision should not be blindly accepted as some sort of gospel truth because a small number of people decreed it so. The IAU can decree the sky is green, but that doesn't make it any less blue.

 

[Freodin]

Ya ... entertaining ... get your mindset established before you hear the other side.

Like I've said many times here, if I sponsored a team of scientists to find the Loch Ness Monster, and overheard one of you talking like that, I would demand he be removed from the team.

But for the record ... here's your show:

But you don't understand what laurele wrote either (he's wrong in some regards, right in others and totally beyond YOUR point in everything else).

You tell all kind of nonsense because you don't understand. But you want to have the authority to make the rules. It doesn't work this way.

If you indeed sponsored a team of scientists to find the Loch Ness Monster, you would rant and rave against them for disagreeing with you... and all they did was tell you that Loch Ness wasn't situated in New Jersey.

 

[Naraoia]

It's 2012 and AV is talking about Pluto.

Someone asks him about Eris, Makemake and Haumea.

He doesn't know what they're talking about.

They then ask him about Charon, Nix and Hydra.

He still doesn't know what they're talking about.

Did that actually happen?

 

[thaumaturgy]

Which was done how?

I'm not going to question your need to change Pluto's status.

I'm sure, if we lived long enough, we'd eventually be reclassified as humans; but I will question you as to if you know how it was done?

And, if so, if you feel the end justified the means?

What. Does. It. Matter.

Honestly, you are making such a fuss over this it boggles my mind why you don't seem to understand what is being discussed here.

Has our understanding of Pluto changed? No. The only thing that changed is that we developed the ability to see more Pluto-sized objects (and larger) out in that region since the 1930's to the point that putting Pluto in the same category as Earth meant we would either have to start populating our solar system with many other new planets or we'd have to re-define the classification scheme.

And in the end that's all this is. It's a "handle". If you change your handle on the board, does that mean you are a completely different type of being? If you changed your handle to "AV1611HORSE" would it make you into a literal HORSE?

No! It would just be changing your name.

Honestly watching you go over the whole Pluto thing is literally painful to observe.

Your inerrant bible classified Bats as "fowl". Are bats fowl? Not by any measure we know of today. So who is wrong? The authors of Leviticus or us today?

Or is it just a difference in classification schemes?

See how that works? In the case of bats as "fowl" it really doesn't have to mean that the Bible is an incoherent box of words, it could just be that the ancients decided that anything that flew was a type of bird. As biology developed and grew we learned that bats share almost nothing in common with birds except for the power of flight. So we re-classified bats more in keeping with the type of animal they are.

Pluto was a planet until we realized that there's a whole host of things out in that area as large or larger, so we have to expand out the classification scheme and Pluto falls into the new bucket.

Did Pluto's orbit change? Did we learn that Pluto isn't really a thing but an optical illusion? Did we realize Pluto was actually a magical realm inhabited by unicorns? NO. We just reclassified it but nothing really substantial about Pluto or our understanding of Pluto changed.

 

[AV1611VET]

If you changed your handle to "AV1611HORSE" would it make you into a literal HORSE?

Your analogy is poor.

If I couldn't change my name to AV1611HORSE w/o a consensus of moderators, and if only a handful of moderators rigged a vote to change my name, then your analogy would be ... analogous.

Also ... did you read the post form Laurele?

Specifically this part?

One reason the IAU definition makes no sense is it says dwarf planets are not planets at all!

Pluto is not a planet.

 

[CabVet]

Your analogy is poor.

If I couldn't change my name to AV1611HORSE w/o a consensus of moderators, and if only a handful of moderators rigged a vote to change my name, then your analogy would be ... analogous.

Also ... did you read the post form Laurele?

Specifically this part?

Pluto is not a planet.

What we are trying to tell you, is that whatever Pluto is (planet or not planet), it did not change in 2008, only the classification changed, and it has no impact on anything whatsoever. Want a good analogy? Here, try this:

It's the year 1929.

You are teaching senior level astronomy at a local high school.

You have a student that, for some reason, consistently says there is a ninth celestial body in the solar system and he calls it Pluto.

The reason he gives for doing so is simply, "I don't know."

The final is coming up, and your students are instructed that they have one week to build a three-dimensional model of the solar system.

You warn your one student that he is entitled to believe that Pluto is our ninth celestial body if he wants to, but he must comply with standard models, or you will have to count it wrong.

He does so, and gets and A+ on the final.

Value question: In your opinion, is he wrong about Pluto?

 

[Freodin]

Your analogy is poor.

If I couldn't change my name to AV1611HORSE w/o a consensus of moderators, and if only a handful of moderators rigged a vote to change my name, then your analogy would be ... analogous.

Also ... did you read the post form Laurele?

Specifically this part?


Pluto is not a planet.

And again: Laurele is wrong in several points. But he disagrees with "us internet scientists", and thus - whether you understand him or not - you use him to champion your ignorance.

I think that you, in the place of the student in your OP, would get the A+. You might have a knack at remembering data, or for looking them up.
But I am also certain, when the assignment for your finals was something that required you to research, understand, conclude, explain... you wouldn't pass. You would hand in nothing and tell the teacher: "nobody told me what the results were to be!"