planet

NPR's All things Considered interview about the battle over Pluto and its planethood.

Kenneth Chang asks New York Times readers how many planets they want in the Solar System.

In the previous post about Neil deGrasse Tyson's new book, The Pluto Files and the turmoil I had inflicted on his life, I wrote, Now, a year and a half after the International Astronomical Union decision, it seems to me that most people have reached the acceptance stage that there are eight planets in the solar system.

One commenter, Laurel Kornfeld, makes it clear that most people is a synonym for certainly not everyone: Acceptance stage of eight planets in our solar system? You have got to be kidding. She adds another 593 words arguing for Pluto’s planethood. . . .

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The Forum is a BBC program that invites three prominent international figures to debate their big ideas with each other. Joining Dr. Tyson are Israeli novelist A.B. Yehoshua and Farzana Shaikh, associate fellow on the Asian Program at Chatham House.

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The American Freethought interviews Dr. Tyson and looks at the cosmic dust-up that resulted from the demotion of the planet Pluto to dwarf planet by the International Astronomical Union.

Neil deGrasse Tyson didn't mean to get Pluto demoted from planet status; he just wanted people to think about the solar system differently. But changing the number of planets from nine to eight is just what happened when a debate sparked by the astrophysicist's Hayden Planetarium exhibit—sans Pluto—ended with the re-categorization of the icy rock to dwarf planet status. Dr. Tyson tells his story—and the story of Pluto—in his new book The Pluto Files: The Rise and Fall of America's Favorite Planet. He talks with host Steve Curwood.

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Time magazine interview on Pluto and what determines planethood.

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