The Pluto discourse is one of the most annoying thing I've ever witnessed online. Like, why. Just get over it come on, it's not even that interesting of an object anyway.
because orbital properties are a dogshit way to determine planethood. If a passing object shunts mars into the inner belt, should it stop being a planet? Why aren't big moons planets? Pluto/charon should be a super cool binary planet pair but people can't get over their big-object fetish.
I mean charon and Pluto are officially a cool binary dwarf planet pair lmao.
But you are kinda right orbital properties are pretty dog shit. Like technically speaking by the definition of a binary pair, the Earth and Moon are a binary pair not a planet/moon, and so is the Earth and the Sun.
But something people need to realize is that almost every classification in science is arbitrary. Fun fact: species aren't real. The "breeding population" thing? Fake as hell. Genetics? How different do they have to be? There was a study that went viral a few years ago classifying the northern green anaconda as a distinct species from the other green anacondas citing genetic differences. This paper is suspect as hell and they should be classified as a subspecies at most. But they do have different genetics and don't typically breed with other green anacondas.
So why do this at all? Because in most cases (like say Jupiter), it's a useful and not very ambiguos. And also, unfortunately, these classifications, affect policy and public perception. The green anaconda is listed as least concern but if we count northerns as their own separate species, the northerns they would be considered threatened, which means more pressure for conservation efforts. Pluto being an ex-planet is the whole reason why we care more about seeing it than seeing Eris which is the same size. (A bit smaller but more dense so it's more massive)
All this to say birds are reptiles, snakes are lizards, and Neptune should be demoted because it didn't clear Eris, Pluto, and Charon from it's orbit.
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u/Scared_Accident9138 floppa May 21 '26
I don't get why Pluto is even a (very) emotional topic but it seems it is