Astroblog: The Pain of Pluto's Passed On Planethood.

Sunday, August 27, 2006

The Pain of Pluto's Passed On Planethood.

The IAU decision to demote Pluto to "Dwarf Planet" has been resounding though the blogosphere and the ordinary news media. As the ABC has reported, kids are upset that Pluto is no-longer a planet. A typical kid-parent exchange goes like this. Meanwhile planetariums are scrabbling to update their presentations. The family of Clyde Tombaugh, the discoverer of Pluto, has been variously reported as being "saddened" by the change, and saying that "he would understand".

For people that are confused about the change, Stuart has a good explanation of what happened and why. Cosmos magazine has an online editorial about why Pluto had to go. The Planetary Society has some good Pluto resources on their front page, and a great list of the top 10 reasons why Pluto is/isn't a planet. Over at The Pain-When will it end, is a great cartoon on Pluto's demotion.

Meanwhile, over at Cosmic Variance, Sean reminds us that some rather momentous things have happened in astronomy this week, so we should put Pluto's demotion into perspective.

UPDATE: Wow! Has Pluto ever hit the worlds conciousness. Over at Jimmy and the Keyz, you can download the catchy song "They Demoted Pluto"(with the chorus "I hate the IAU"). You can buy "Honk if you think Pluto is a Planet" bumper stickers and other Pluto related Mercandise. However, Davep sees the bright side, his equipment can see all the planets in the solar system now. (Hat tips to Bad Astronomy blog and Dynamics of Cats)

# posted by Ian Musgrave @ 12:58 pm

Comments:

I have tried hard to listen to Pluto's Demotion without success. Please can you tell me how you listened to it? Is it possible to download the mp3 file?

—Nick Urbanik

# posted by

Anonymous : 3:31 am

Nick wrote: "Is it possible to download the mp3 file?"

Yes, off to the right hand side of the file list is a download button. Click the download button netx to "pluto" and get the mp3.

I can also get it to play from the "play" button on the site (I'm listening to it now), but I have to crank the volume up on both my speakers AND the volume slider on the site, or you can't hear a thing. I thought it was just my setup though.

# posted by

Ian Musgrave : 7:33 am

Aha! So there is a download button that should be shown, but is not. this is what the screen looks like to me.

# posted by

Anonymous : 11:47 am

On the site, Jimmy and the Keys have said, "Send this to anyone who cares about pluto! :-)". Well, I care, so I think I qualify.

Unfortunately, it seems that "purevolume.com" does not work with Linux, and I am not prepared to install Windows just to see the download button!

Could someone please send it to me?

# posted by

Anonymous : 12:07 pm

Sorry, I messed up the mailto URL. It is nicku@nicku.org.

# posted by

Anonymous : 12:11 pm