Posted by rockyhillaaron | Posted in Uncategorized | Posted on February 5, 2016
Should Pluto Be Classified?
By: Aaron Matheny
Have you ever heard of the expression, “My very excellent mother just served us nine pizzas”? Probably not, because in two recent articles I just read, “What is a Planet?” by NASA and “When Is a Planet Not a Planet?” by Daniel Santos, both state that Pluto is not a planet. Many people are arguing about this topic, and the two sides are for Pluto being a planet or Pluto not being a planet. In this essay, I will give my opinion on whether Pluto should or shouldn’t be a planet. I strongly believe that Pluto should not be a planet because Pluto’s reclassification will add numerous other planets to our solar system and Pluto doesn’t meet the 3rd criteria of a planet.
One reason I think Pluto shouldn’t be a planet is if Pluto is reclassified as a planet, many other objects found on the Kuiper Belt, which is a large belt in space with a lot of objects like Pluto, will also have to be classified as planets. Specifically, this means that there will be a total of 52 planets with many more to come. If this happens, it will be next to impossible to memorize the names of all the planets, much less give them names. The article “What is a Planet” states that “Some scientists believe that if Pluto remains classified as a planet, then the dozens of Kuiper Belt Objects (KBOs) orbiting our sun will also be classified as planets.” As a result of this domino effect if Pluto is classified, I still stand with my belief that Pluto shouldn’t be a planet.
Another reason I am opposed to Pluto being a planet is that Pluto doesn’t meet the 3rd criteria in the IAUs, who are the group of people who name and classify planets, definition of a planet, which is “A planet must clear other objects from its orbital path”, which means the planet must have enough gravity to push other objects out of their paths, and Pluto doesn’t do that. It is true that less than half of the IAU actually got a chance to vote on the definition, but the majority of the people who did vote on the definition was for the decision to make an official definition, so it wouldn’t have mattered. “What is a Planet?” states “According to the IAU, Pluto doesn’t meet this third requirement but is now in a new class of objects called “dwarf planets. Since Pluto doesn’t meet the 3rd criteria of the IAU’s definition of a planet, I still feel like Pluto shouldn’t be a planet.
In conclusion, I very strongly believe that Pluto should not be considered a planet because if Pluto is classified, many other KBOs will also have to be classified as planets, and Pluto doesn’t meet the third requirement for the IAU’s definition of a planet. There are also good reasons for Pluto being a planet, like “Not enough members voted”, and “For historical reasons”, but I still believe that Pluto should not be a planet.
