Washington Week: Student Voices (O)

COLUMN: Loved Pluto gone for good?
By Scott Greytak
The Lantern (Ohio State U.)
09/22/2006

(U-WIRE) COLUMBUS, Ohio — "My Very Excellent Mother Just Sent Us Nine Pizzas". Simple. Catchy. Occasionally mouth-watering. Yet a month ago today, the world's top astronomers ruled out Pizza as a true planet, ruthlessly demoting Pluto to a new category: a mere "dwarf planet." As the 2,500 member International Astronomical Union determined in Prague after months of semi-interesting debate, Pluto's oblong orbit, one that tends to overlap with Neptune's own rotation around the sun, officially disqualified the rock from "planet" status. All of America watched helplessly as our favorite namesake of the Roman god of the underworld callously fell into a sub-group of celestial bodies. In an attempt to soften the blow, the Union offered that Pluto would remain a case study of focused importance to astronomers, as such "dwarf" or "minor" planets have been recorded for hundreds of years. Yet Pluto nonetheless be henceforth doomed to rank beside Ceres, a massive asteroid between Mars and Jupiter, and UB313, a forgetful icy object recently discovered by a Cal-Tech astronomer as an "almost planet."

Pluto's brief history as a "planet" had been nothing short of an awe-inspiring tale of curiosity and wonder. Since its discovery in 1930, Pluto has been the recognizable outer limits of our galaxy. The shy, dark corner of our universe that never seemed to fit in with all the rings and the moons. Ever read a science fiction book about Pluto? Neither has anyone else. Aliens from Pluto? Perhaps, but the assumed jetlag might come back to haunt the development of the central characters.

Initially titled "Planet X" by its discoverers, Pluto had spent its 76-year-long rookie season as a planet relentlessly fighting off targeted criticism from international critics. "It's just a ball of ice," they said. "Nine is an odd number." Yet Pluto still toured the galaxy for decades, trying simply to prove its galactic legitimacy. And finally, as the uniquely mysterious dot-of-a-planet that we all considered the farthest place from home, Pluto brought its fight 2.67 billion miles here to Earth last month, only to be assured of its insignificance among the wonders of the cosmos. Sure, the rock could easily fit inside the United States, and yes, it is considerably smaller than even our own moon, but it had - for as long as one can remember - been a staple of the classic nine-planet curriculum that helped us all understand space. Are we really expected to try and fit UB313 into the "Excellent Mother" story? I mean, what is the point in the first place without the pizza?

As any Disney fan will tell you, such unified action by the international community is an outrage. After the necessary United Nations secessions have taken place, however, Pluto remains quietly missed by the I-was-barely-able-to-remember-the-first-eight-of-them-anyway community.

These days, however, it seems as though Pluto supporters may have made some ground: the Union has agreed to take into consideration a historically-based argument for Pluto's reacceptance, pending on a collaboration among a slight majority of European scientists in the Astronomical Union. Yet if it took the Union some six months to carry out the execution, who knows how long the appeals process might take.

In truth, Pluto's story may be one left for the aliens. As the only "planet" that we as a human race have yet to visit by spacecraft, its fall from the graceful nine "bodies" to the forgetful three "dwarfs" might send a rippling-effect message to the space exploration community: "Wrong Way (Forever)." We might, in fact, never know what wonders the jagged, frozen methane-ice pebble has to offer humanity. So think twice International Astronomical Union, before you take our nine pizzas away forever.

Scott Greytak is a junior in journalism.

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