{"id":499,"date":"2006-08-24T10:25:00","date_gmt":"2006-08-24T16:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/2006\/08\/planetary-politics-local-favorite-pluto-demoted\/"},"modified":"2006-08-24T10:25:00","modified_gmt":"2006-08-24T16:25:00","slug":"planetary-politics-local-favorite-pluto-demoted","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2006\/08\/planetary-politics-local-favorite-pluto-demoted\/","title":{"rendered":"Planetary politics: Local favorite Pluto demoted"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here\u2019s a word for all elected officials around New Mexico<\/st1:state><\/st1:place>: Politics aren\u2019t always about you.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Astronomers from across the world declared today at a conference in the Czech Republic that Pluto<\/a>, discovered in 1930 by former New Mexico State University professor Clyde Tombaugh<\/a>, is no longer classified as the ninth planet in the solar system. You can read about it from the Associated Press<\/a>.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

This has been a long, hard battle, but the International Astronomical Union\u2019s declaration is official. Textbooks will have to be rewritten, and locals who hold a special place in their heart for Pluto will be disappointed.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Essentially, astronomers decided for the first time what defines a planet. It has to orbit the sun, have sufficient mass to overcome other gravitational forces so that its orbit is nearly round, and has to have \u201ccleared the neighborhood around its orbit.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Pluto was on a very elliptical orbit that crossed paths with the orbit of Neptune<\/st1:place>. It\u2019s now considered a \u201cdwarf planet\u201d like many other asteroids and comets.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The decision comes a week after the group\u2019s leaders proposed reaffirming Pluto\u2019s planetary status and adding Pluto\u2019s moon and two other objects as planets 10-12, according to the Associated Press. But the group of 2,500 astronomers from 75 countries made the tough, but correct, decision.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

When Tombaugh found Pluto, we didn\u2019t know that so many other large bodies existed in a belt of ice and rock on the edge of our solar system. As technology has advanced and we\u2019ve probed deeper into that area, we have found that Pluto isn\u2019t unique in that respect.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

And if it\u2019s a planet, so are many other bodies that are really asteroids and comets.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

The conclusion: Pluto isn\u2019t a planet.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

Such a proposal wasn\u2019t popular. Politics almost kept the reality of science from winning the day on this one. Imagine the lobbying that was going on behind the scenes as astronomers debated whether to rewrite the textbooks.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

But the proposal to add Pluto\u2019s moon and some asteroids to the list of planets revealed the silliness of keeping Pluto\u2019s planetary status, and made clear that Pluto\u2019s classification had to change.<\/p>\n

<\/o:p><\/p>\n

In this case, science won the day and the decision was the right one. Such is not always the case in politics. Maybe our politicos could learn something from the astronomers. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here\u2019s a word for all elected officials around New Mexico: Politics aren\u2019t always about you. Astronomers from across the world declared today at a conference in the Czech Republic that Pluto, discovered in 1930 by former New Mexico State University professor Clyde Tombaugh, is no longer classified as the ninth planet in the solar system. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-499","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=499"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=499"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=499"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=499"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}