Two weeks ago, while on my amazingly cool Astronomy course, my teacher decided the class to debate about wether or not Pluto should be a planet. before we started arguing though, she gave us the three definitions of a planet, according to the IAU:
1. It orbits the Sun 2. has enough mass and gravity to become almost spherical (hydrostatic equilibrium) 3. Has cleared the neighborhood around it
Now, if you look closely you may realize that number 3 is highly debatable (Number 2 in a sense as well): What is the definition of cleared up? You'd think it were 'the planet has absorbed, or thrown out of orbit all nearby objects. If that were true, then Jupiter wouldn't be a planet, because it has two asteroid groups orbiting with it.
I don't want to get into a lengthy tale about what happened in our classroom (It was mostly one group saying 'You're racists against little planets' and 'If we took out number three, we'd have 500,000 planets in the Solar System). Now I ask you:
Is Pluto a planet?
P.S: I don't want to hear a simple 'yes' or 'no', I want to hear why. This is a very debatable topic (So is everything else in Astronomy, but...), and I just want to hear what everyone thinks. I might debate a bit myself if this gets interesting.
I heard Pluto was a moon of Neptune, just like Charon. It was throwed out from the orbit by something big. Maybe planet X. If it was a moon, Im not really sure if it should be a real planet. Maybe, maybe not. I dont care about it too much, but I will think about it.
We should call pluto a planet, and to make up for past slights, give it handicapped parking (orbiting?) closer to the sun as well. It's really not fair that it has to orbit way out in the boondocks of the solar system.
