Pluto

[fajrdrako]

Weird week, for many reasons. I am feeling impatient with certain rampant egos that seem to be out of control on the periphery of my life just now. (No, no one here.) Absurd irrationality in several quarters.

Then I am surprised by the reaction of various people regarding the decision to call Pluto a dwarf planet rather than a planet. First I read a piece of fanfic protesting it. Then in the space of a day I've encounted half a dozen people - no, more - who are in various ways incensed by the resolution. (Sometimes with a good dollop of humour, admittedly.) Sandi said that she was 'disgusted' by the decision and I was afraid to ask why - she obviously thought the reason was self-evident. I hadn't even known that there have been petitions regarding the matter over the past year or so, political movements, a whole slew of people dedicated to keeping Pluto a planet rather than having it designated something else. It's as if the ex-planet Pluto had a whole fan club I never even knew about.

I think I must be missing a point. Why does it matter what we call it? A dwarf planet, a planetoid, 'that funny chunck of rock with a weird orbit' - what's the difference? Or talk Esperanto and call it a planedeto. Personally, I think 'dwarf planet' is a fine name but even if it was something ugly, I can't think of any reason I might care, or why it makes any difference. Do planets get more funding than 'dwarf planets'?

Comments

[littledrop.livejournal.com]

That's... amazing. Changing the official name doesn't change what it is. *boggles*

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Yes. It's just a word. I can't see how it changes anything.

[mlleelizabeth.livejournal.com]

I only care in a humorous way, and mainly because I'm a scorpio which means my ruling planet is now no longer a full-fledged planet.

If I were a publisher of Astronomy textbooks, though, I'd be downright gleeful right now. Think of all the correcting and reprinting and new-book-selling they'll get to do!

[(Anonymous)]

People are so oddly reactionary! They hate change even when it doesn't really affect them in the least, like whether or not TPTB in astronomy consider Pluto a planet or not.

I suppose the Astrology people must be ticked off?

[teenygozer.livejournal.com]

Argh! I didn't realize I'd been logged out. That "anonymous" person, above, is me.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Hee. teenygozer is in stealth mode.

Teenygozer

[idiotgrrl.livejournal.com]

All right. I can't resist cat pictures and finding out more about the pretty thing in the icon.

Re: Teenygozer

[teenygozer.livejournal.com]

Oh, you want the story of Gozer the Gozarian!

That picture was taken before we officially owned him. He used to visit during the summer many years ago, watch TV with me for a bit, eat a bit of my cats' food, then leave. He was so clean and well mannered, we assumed he was owned. My mother took that picture on one of his visits. Then he disappeared for the month of October, reappearing in November with a badly-healed broken leg. I figured if he was owned, they were creeps who weren't looking after him, so after he limped into the house, I insisted he stay inside, dammit. He refused and attempted to escape, destroying my apartment with his temper tantrum at being locked in: as adorable as a button, but very aggressive! We named him after Gozer, the Destroyer of Worlds from Ghostbusters. It was a long haul, but with diligence, we tamed him and he became a truly wonderful housecat. Never got very big, was only about 9 lbs. at his largest, but he was solid muscle and a no-nonsense mouser. He died of a congenital heart problem at a fairly young age, living fast, dying young and leaving a kittenish corpse, just as I predicted the day I ushered him into the house intending to keep him. (BTW, the broken leg was probably caused by falling from a roof, as he loved to climb. Many times I'd come into a room to find him delicately perched on the top of an open door.) His fanzine, Forever Cat Tales, was a popular Forever Knight zine that made a bunch of money for a local cat rescue agency, PawSafe. It was published by "Teeny Gozer Productions", which is where I got my LJ name.

Re: Teenygozer

[idiotgrrl.livejournal.com]

That's beautiful.

Re: Teenygozer

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Oooh, now I know why your name is what it is. What a terrific cat!

...I assume you know the poem "Curiosity" (http://www.math.uiuc.edu/~dzaharo2/curiosity.html)? It's a favourite of mine.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

I sometimes hate change for the sake of change, but when it is about something so remote and so far away - I can't see that it matters!

It seems to me that astrology is (or should be) fairly adaptable - but I'm not sure about its practicioners.

[maaseru.livejournal.com]

An amazing number of media have front-paged the story, and it's occurred to me that this is because it's a news story that is pure escapism. This story can't really hurt anyone and we don't have to see human beings on this planet killing, mutilating, raping, and screaming at other human beings.

My 2 cents, anyway.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Well, yes, that's a good point. Pure escapism, and on a fairly abstract level. Goodness knows the rest of the news we're getting isn't so benign.

[acampbell.livejournal.com]

What's in a name, anyway?

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

A Pluto by any other name would seem as sweet.

[monsieureden.livejournal.com]

haha. bravo

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

I can steal lines with the best of them! (And from the best of them too....)

[countrycousin.livejournal.com]

You are much too reasonable.

:<)

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Dear me. I thought I was quite opinionated. My opinions, however, are ... reasonable.

[silverwhistle.livejournal.com]

They probably grew up on Disney cartoons and think it means the dog will have to be taken out and shot...

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

LOL. Or erased from the stories?

[silverwhistle.livejournal.com]

Something of the sort!

[monsieureden.livejournal.com]

I always liked Pluto the most. If it's a dwarf planet, doesn't that still make it a planet anyway? It's not like it got kicked out of the solar system.

I think people just like to talk and react to things. I don't imagine this is a particularly serious issue to any joe smoe. I think it's funny that there were actual protests; that's a little too much.

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

I always liked Pluto the most.

My favourite planet is Saturn, I think. All those pretty rings, and connotations of Saturn Girl (Imra Ardeen Ranzz) from the Legion of Super-Heroes. No offense to Pluto and all those other planets.

If it's a dwarf planet, doesn't that still make it a planet anyway?

Yes, just a different type of planet.


It's not like it got kicked out of the solar system.

"Go away and never come back!"

Changed my mind

[idiotgrrl.livejournal.com]

I was upset at first by the talk of demoting Pluto because I had a sentimental attachment to it. (See my lj post). And I was willing to accept Xena as the 10th planet. But if Ceres and Charon are planets under a definition that includes Pluto, that's plainly silly, and finally I came to accept it.

Really, it's just sentimentality and a dislike of change unless it's "Progress." I think this feels like Regress to some people, that's all.

Re: Changed my mind

[silverwhistle.livejournal.com]

It reminds me of the way some people can react when they discover that new historical research means that a lot of stuff they learned at school or years ago at university has been overturned.

I went through something similar this last year, catching up on about 18 years of work in the space of one year. I loved it - it was a rollercoaster - but I know some people feel threatened when things they have taken for granted as 'true' turn out not to be. I've been on the receiving end of it in the past, when I've given lectures!

Re: Changed my mind

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

I love it when information changes - when known truth is proved false and vice versa - bring it on!

Okay, maybe I wouldn't like it so much if one of my heroes turned out to be a villain. (In my heart of hearts, I don't believe that could happen. Using my brain, I know it could.)

Re: Changed my mind

[silverwhistle.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's great fun - but a lot of people are very resistant to it. On IMDb a while ago, mechafatnick and I had a series of run-ins with someone who was a 'Runciman fundamentalist', and was reluctant about acknowledging the last 50 years of research post-Runciman, which have changed assessments of why people crusaded, and about various characters.

In my 18C work, I've seen it more often, especially with Americans who feel threatened by the idea that their national foundation myth is just that, and that their stereotypes about other people are not supported by evidence. They accuse people who have done primary source research of being "revisionists" (as if it's a dirty word), and prefer to cling to what in many cases is actually 19C nationalistic propaganda.

Okay, maybe I wouldn't like it so much if one of my heroes turned out to be a villain. (In my heart of hearts, I don't believe that could happen. Using my brain, I know it could.)

My experience has generally been the reverse: people I've first encountered presented as villains in popular material turn out to be delightful. My first introduction to Pattie was in a friend's book on weaponry. It was a reprint of a 1950s US book - McCarthy-era flag-waving - and implied he was some kind of monster. He's about as monstrous as Squeaker, and as charming and cuddle-able. And you know my experiences with Conrad, whom I first discovered as a Walter Scott villain, and turned out to be the most dashing and glamorous creature in my pantheon.

Re: Changed my mind

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

'Runciman fundamentalist'

But that's... bizarre. Insane. No historian is the last word on anything, least of all 50 years after publication.

Americans who feel threatened by the idea that their national foundation myth is just that

Now, there you do get a lot of emotional baggage attached to the untruths. Tricky situation, that. Brainwashing? Conditioning? It's hard to fight.

They accuse people who have done primary source research of being "revisionists"

Well, yes. That's the whole point. You find errors, you fix them. You find half-truths, you look for the full truth. That's what history is all about. Any historian who perpetuates the untruths is no historian.

people I've first encountered presented as villains in popular material turn out to be delightful.

Me too. I can't think of counter-examples. Humanity is fallible, so to a large extent it's a matter of using my own moral judgement about the flaws of others. My personal heroes have stacked up just fine.

Re: Changed my mind

[silverwhistle.livejournal.com]

But that's... bizarre. Insane. No historian is the last word on anything, least of all 50 years after publication.

Yes, it was a very odd experience. mechafatnick said it was something he'd never heard of before, too.

That's the whole point. You find errors, you fix them. You find half-truths, you look for the full truth. That's what history is all about. Any historian who perpetuates the untruths is no historian.

Unfortunately, the popular history market is filled with people who continue to repeat comforting myths (generally copied from out-of-date books) - and they sell. Here in Scotland, there's marvellous work being done by people like Tom Devine, overturning the Walter Scott-derived, tartan-wrapped victim-complex history... But it's barely filtered through to the popular market, the books aimed at the general, non-academic public and tourists. When historic sites try to present a more accurate picture, there are often disgruntled letters to the press in protest. As far as a lot of people are concerned, history is what they did at school, and is immutable. It takes decades for new research to sink in, and by then, things have moved on still further in academia.

people I've first encountered presented as villains in popular material turn out to be delightful.
Me too. I can't think of counter-examples. Humanity is fallible, so to a large extent it's a matter of using my own moral judgement about the flaws of others. My personal heroes have stacked up just fine.

Indeed - I've never had to throw anyone out of my collection; I've just added to it over the years!

Re: Changed my mind

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

People should learn at an early age that historical understanding is fluid - it's a series of badly-remembered events. It isn't static at all. Sort of like quantum physics that way....

And they should learn to be careful about the moral judgements they attach to history. I blame the notion of patriotism for a lot of the nonsense.

I have every respect for Sir Walter Scott for building national myths. But there should be new, updated myths all the time - it shouldn't be allowed to be static, where it gets closer and closer to being a big propagandistic lie.

Re: Changed my mind

[silverwhistle.livejournal.com]

I have every respect for Sir Walter Scott for building national myths. But there should be new, updated myths all the time - it shouldn't be allowed to be static, where it gets closer and closer to being a big propagandistic lie.

I don't think we need national myths at all, and would be better off without them. (And I despise those Scott devised for Scotland.) It's like the tooth-fairy and Father Christmas and religion: a sign of cultural immaturity.

Re: Changed my mind

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

I don't think we need national myths at all, and would be better off without them.

Oh, I agree. I think we do need myths, but not national myths.

Re: Changed my mind

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

Yes, your LJ entry was very interesting. And my friend Sandi - remember I said she called the change 'disgusting'? - it was because she also knew and liked Dr. Tombaugh. (By the end of the evening she was admitting that Pluto being a dwarf planet maybe wasn't so bad.)

For myself, I can't really imagine feeling sentimental over a planet. But I also think it's kind of neat.

[monsieureden.livejournal.com]

http://quirkybird.livejournal.com/388966.html

[fajrdrako.livejournal.com]

LOL - a panegyric to a planet! I still don't pretend to understand, but I find it delightful.

[monsieureden.livejournal.com]

I knew you'd appreciate it. :)