Object Bigger than Pluto Discovered, Called 10th Planet

[darkkazier]

Sorry if I came on a little strong. I know you get it Darkky (mind if I call you Darkky?[/i'])... The rant itself was intended to be directed at Scholtzy, to try and show why classification is so meaningful. Your post just seemed like a good reference point.

 

Its cool heh and sure, you can call me Darkky.

[AzurePhoenix]

Have they even given the planetesimal a name yet? Or at least considering it?

I'd think it'd be better to give planetesimals simple designation codes (or whatever they're called). I'd think it'd be nicer to let the astronomers from a million years in the future wait till they actually form planets before giving them names. Except for really pretty and wierd ones. We should name those .

Meh, I'm eccentric beyond my years. Or senile. Whatever.

[Kermit]

I'd think it'd be better to give planetesimals simple designation codes (or whatever they're called). I'd think it'd be nicer to let the astronomers from a million years in the future wait till they actually form planets before giving them names. Except for really pretty and wierd ones. We should name those .

Meh' date=' I'm eccentric beyond my years. Or senile. Whatever.[/quote']

 

 

Yeah, I guess that works. But how would we know if the astronomers in the distant future haven't already all been blown up? I think humanity is on the verge of a global catastrophe if we're not careful.

 

Besides. It'd be another thing for a new generation of schoolkids to memorize, haha.

[AzurePhoenix]

I doubt they'll ever make kids remember very many specific things that exist outside of our own solar system, except for maybe a few notable stars, galaxies and nebulas, and at most two or three particularly important or curious extrasolar-planets.

 

Well, that is until we start finding indications of life on some. I would certainly hope that students would have to learn all about every single one of those worlds.

[Kermit]

I doubt they'll ever make kids remember very many specific things that exist outside of our own solar system' date=' except for maybe a few notable stars, galaxies and nebulas, and at most two or three particularly important or curious extrasolar-planets.

[/quote']

 

I had a psychotic astronomy teacher named Mr. Calumpit, he was this short Filipino guy with a lot of hair and long arms and he spoke with a lisp. Made us all memorize the seven stages of cosmology (particulate, galactic, stellar, etc..) the names of quite a few random stars and galaxies, the types of stars and galaxies, and for some reason, stuff about UFOs.

[AzurePhoenix]

Damn, I wish I had a teacher like him when I was doing the astronomy section of Earth Sciences. It might sound crazy, but I loved doing similar stuff when I was in school, and even had fun doing the homework. In fact, I always felt we weren't going nearly as indepth as we should have.

 

EDIT: Except for the lisp, some of the concepts are hard enough to learn to pronounce as it is

[Kermit]

Actually, I took astronomy last semester as my elective course, that's when I had Mr. Calumpit. Was quite thorough, but that lisp.. that was the scary part. And yes, nerds like us love doing homework.

[JohnB]

Okay, easy way out here.

 

Spherical (or nearly), Pluto mass or above = Planet.

 

Spherical (or nearly), below Pluto mass = Planetoid.

 

Non Spherical, any mass = Asteroid.

 

I don't know if much professional thought was given to actual classifications for Planets because until recently there was no proof that there actually were any, and the ones we knew we could look at. Hence "Earth like" or "Mars like" would suffice.

 

Science Fiction has given this concept some thought however. Take Star Trek with their "Class M" planets. A simple ploy that allows for 26 differing planetological conditions. E.E. Smith used a different system in his books where planets were classified from AAAAAAAAA to ZZZZZZZZZ. Each letter representing things like mass, temperature, atmosphere, etc. Straight "A"s being Earthlike. Similar ideas came forward during the Golden Age of Sci-Fi. These were all useful as literary devices but rather useless for practical applications.

 

Let's combine the ideas.

 

Using Earth conditions as the median. ( no particular reason other than it's the one we are living on. and the fact that what we really want to know in a classification system is how the world differs from Earth.)

 

We then classify according to Diameter, Mass, Density, Surface Temperature, Atmospheric Primary Gas, etc. If the planet has more than Earth, then the letter used is further down the Alphabet, less and the letter used is nearer the front.

 

So Earth is MMMMM. Venus might be MMMQ?, Jupiter becomes TWKKC Mars around HHI?? (I think there would have to be one for Atmospheric Surface Pressure too.)

 

Hey, this is a rough idea worked out on the fly here. Once you work out the actual cutoff points between letters, then a designation (name) and a classification of however many letters will tell you most of what you want to know pretty quickly.

[AI_Interface]

I like your idea JohnB. Maybe each letter could be preceeded by another letter that would help people to remeber what that letter is indicative of. Or have them organized into a chart. You could also use 0 to represent earth and the rest of the numbers to represent relative properties. That way new classes could be added easily in the case of newly discovered steller phenomena.

[Xyph]

I don't think it's too much to ask that a planet orbits in the same plane as all the other planets, which is mainly why I don't see why Pluto is considered a planet. That said, if something the size of Jupiter had a similar orbit I would probably feel differently - but then again, Kuiper Belt objects generally aren't gas giants.

 

On the subject of planetary classification systems, this one seems extremely plausible, although it's perhaps not as specific as some others have the potential to be.

[AzurePhoenix]

Personally, I really like this one Xyph. It's really thorough, but not nearly so confusing as code-designations, which I also feel detracts from the "personalities" of planets.

[JohnB]

Thanks AI, I don't think that extra letters are needed though. By the system you immediately know that a "G" has more whatever than an "M". If say, the first 4 are for Size, Average Temperature, Atmosphere and Gravity then that's enough for the average man in the street. All he needs to remember is to go to places that have "M" in the first 4 places. The further from "M" you are, then the more conditions vary from those of Earth.

 

So if you see MPMM then you immediately know you're going somewhere with similar conditions to Earth, but you would need to pack the winter woolies. If you saw ZAZT, then it's a stinking small ball with conditions similar to Mercury.

 

Xyph, I like that system too. I think the two would work well together. One tells you about the general type, while the other the specific surface conditions.

 

As to the orbits, I don't think that it's overly important. What if a planet was "captured" by another sun? I think classification really should be based on size and mass.