May 19, 2009--Little Pluto
I was saddened to learn that Venetia Phair died. (See linked New York Times obituary for her life story.) Though not a household name, she was well known in one very small circle—those eight or nine or ten individuals who gave names to our eight or nine or ten planets.
In her case, she named our then ninth planet, Pluto.
And not after Mickey Mouse’s dog. That came later. He was named after the planet; and because he, the dog, became so popular when Pluto a few years ago was downgraded from planet to dwarf planet status, those few fans of Disneyana who know anything at all about astronomy, weakly protested. The Disney Company made not a peep and let the whole matter rest. They had, after all, invested millions in developing and marketing cute Pluto products. Though how anyone could figure out how to make Pluto cute is beyond me. It is after all, was until demoted, our most distant planet, furthest from the sun in our solar system, and thus would not be a nice place to visit in the winter even if, as my mother would always urge, you were sure to bring along a sweater.
Mrs. Phair came to her one public distinction because in 1930 when she was only 11 years old she learned about the new planet’s discovery over breakfast from her well connected grandfather, Falconer Madden, the retired librarian of Oxford University’s Bodleian Library, who had just heard that scientists at Arizona’s Lowell Observatory had photographed it. Dr. Madden wondered out loud what it might be called; and little Venetia, without much thought she confessed later in life, blurted out something like, “Why not Pluto?”
Madden liked the suggestion, passed it along to an astronomer colleague at Oxford who in turn offered it for consideration to those attending a meeting in London at the Royal Astronomical Society. It then made it way back to Arizona where the discoverers were struggling with what to call this orbiting chunk of ice.
The only other name under serious consideration was Kronos, but there were problems with it—Kronos is the Greek equivalent of the Roman Saturn and there already by then was a majestic ringed planet bearing this god’s name. So Pluto it became.
By comparison, Mrs. Phair’s life passed uneventfully. She did get a good education, studying mathematics at Newnham College at Cambridge and did teach economics and math at two girl’s schools in London, and she did marry well—to Maxwell Phair, a classicist who became headmaster at Epsom College, and she did have a son, but she will always be remembered by history for that historic breakfast.
Thinking of remembering, as an 11 year-old I struggled to memorize the names and order of the planets—these sorts of things were required back then—and was introduced to the world of mnemonic devices, which later in life, when I became a premed, came in very handy when I and my striving classmates attempted to remember the cranial nerves and other such scientific trivia. I won’t share any of these in mixed company—suffice it to say that at the time pretty much all premeds were of the male gender.
But when there were nine planets, the mnemonic I used for them was, “My Very Eager Mother Just Served Us Nine Pizzas.” This in spite of the fact that if we were lucky maybe twice a year my actual mother would allow us to have a slice. It was not considered by her to be food.
When Pluto was relegated to dwarf status a few years ago a new mnemonic was needed and, keeping with the tradition of mothers serving food, a retro concept, the most extensively used device became, “My Very Enthusiastic Mother Just Served Us Noodles.” This not only was a helpful device, but it was also closer to the culinary truth in my boyhood household.
But with the 2003 discovery of yet another planet, actually another dwarf out beyond Pluto, Eris (aptly named to represent our own strife-filled era, for she is the Greek goddess of warfare who is known in myth to stir up jealousy and greed) a new mnemonic was quickly crafted—this time leaving mothers out of the picture, “My Very Exciting Magic Carpet Just Sailed Under Nine Palace Elephants.”
Not exactly poetic but it does get the job done.
Rest in peace Venetia.
In her case, she named our then ninth planet, Pluto.
And not after Mickey Mouse’s dog. That came later. He was named after the planet; and because he, the dog, became so popular when Pluto a few years ago was downgraded from planet to dwarf planet status, those few fans of Disneyana who know anything at all about astronomy, weakly protested. The Disney Company made not a peep and let the whole matter rest. They had, after all, invested millions in developing and marketing cute Pluto products. Though how anyone could figure out how to make Pluto cute is beyond me. It is after all, was until demoted, our most distant planet, furthest from the sun in our solar system, and thus would not be a nice place to visit in the winter even if, as my mother would always urge, you were sure to bring along a sweater.
Mrs. Phair came to her one public distinction because in 1930 when she was only 11 years old she learned about the new planet’s discovery over breakfast from her well connected grandfather, Falconer Madden, the retired librarian of Oxford University’s Bodleian Library, who had just heard that scientists at Arizona’s Lowell Observatory had photographed it. Dr. Madden wondered out loud what it might be called; and little Venetia, without much thought she confessed later in life, blurted out something like, “Why not Pluto?”
Madden liked the suggestion, passed it along to an astronomer colleague at Oxford who in turn offered it for consideration to those attending a meeting in London at the Royal Astronomical Society. It then made it way back to Arizona where the discoverers were struggling with what to call this orbiting chunk of ice.
The only other name under serious consideration was Kronos, but there were problems with it—Kronos is the Greek equivalent of the Roman Saturn and there already by then was a majestic ringed planet bearing this god’s name. So Pluto it became.
By comparison, Mrs. Phair’s life passed uneventfully. She did get a good education, studying mathematics at Newnham College at Cambridge and did teach economics and math at two girl’s schools in London, and she did marry well—to Maxwell Phair, a classicist who became headmaster at Epsom College, and she did have a son, but she will always be remembered by history for that historic breakfast.
Thinking of remembering, as an 11 year-old I struggled to memorize the names and order of the planets—these sorts of things were required back then—and was introduced to the world of mnemonic devices, which later in life, when I became a premed, came in very handy when I and my striving classmates attempted to remember the cranial nerves and other such scientific trivia. I won’t share any of these in mixed company—suffice it to say that at the time pretty much all premeds were of the male gender.
But when there were nine planets, the mnemonic I used for them was, “My Very Eager Mother Just Served Us Nine Pizzas.” This in spite of the fact that if we were lucky maybe twice a year my actual mother would allow us to have a slice. It was not considered by her to be food.
When Pluto was relegated to dwarf status a few years ago a new mnemonic was needed and, keeping with the tradition of mothers serving food, a retro concept, the most extensively used device became, “My Very Enthusiastic Mother Just Served Us Noodles.” This not only was a helpful device, but it was also closer to the culinary truth in my boyhood household.
But with the 2003 discovery of yet another planet, actually another dwarf out beyond Pluto, Eris (aptly named to represent our own strife-filled era, for she is the Greek goddess of warfare who is known in myth to stir up jealousy and greed) a new mnemonic was quickly crafted—this time leaving mothers out of the picture, “My Very Exciting Magic Carpet Just Sailed Under Nine Palace Elephants.”
Not exactly poetic but it does get the job done.
Rest in peace Venetia.
posted by Steven Zwerling at
7:10 AM
1 Comments:
It should be noted that the IAU’s controversial demotion of Pluto is very likely not the last word on the subject and in fact represents only one interpretation in an ongoing debate. Only four percent of the IAU voted on this, and most are not planetary scientists. Their decision was immediately opposed in a formal petition by hundreds of professional astronomers led by Dr. Alan Stern, Principal Investigator of NASA’s New Horizons mission to Pluto. Stern and like-minded scientists favor a broader planet definition that includes any non-self-luminous spheroidal body in orbit around a star. The spherical part is important because objects become spherical when they attain a state known as hydrostatic equilibrium, meaning they are large enough for their own gravity to pull them into a round shape. This is a characteristic of planets and not of shapeless asteroids and Kuiper Belt Objects. Pluto meets this criterion and is therefore a planet.
Those of us who are protesting the demotion of Pluto are not doing it because of the Disney dog. We are doing it because the IAU definition makes no sense and was adopted through a process that violated the group's own bylaws. We are doing it, and not weakly, because we believe there can be many different types of planets, that the term planet should be kept broad to include any non-self-luminous spheroidal body orbiting a star and that types of planets should be distinguished through the use of subcategories such as terrestrial planets, gas giants, ice giants, dwarf planets, hot Jupiters, super Earths, etc.
Efforts to either overturn or ignore the demotion are still very much underway by both scientists and lay people. You can find out more about them on my Pluto Blog at http://laurele.livejournal.com
Post a Comment
Subscribe to Post Comments [Atom]
<< Home