If you go to the ScienceBlogs front page you will see that The Buzz word of the day is Pluto. And when there is a new Buzz Word, a lot of us tend to post about it – see how many already chimed in on the topic.
I am actually quite happy to see the revisions of the definition of a planet. The old 9-planet system was just too neat and clear-cut, too iconic, to fixed and unmovable.
Let’s jolt the masses out of the lull and show them the way science moves and changes and shatters our most valued beliefs!
Twelve planets today, twelve thousand planets tomorrow, twelve million planets in OUR OWN Solar system in a century? Why not? That would redefine what a “solar system” is and replace simplicity with complexity which, IMHO, is a good thing for everyone to learn to deal with.
For more information, John McKay provides the history and Phil Plait gives the scientific details.

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