Ahead of this year’s astronomy festival, ‘Astrofest’, Professor Fred Watson gives participants a sneak preview of his evening talk on the bizarre and continuing saga of Pluto’s demotion from planet to dwarf-planet.

At the 2009 Astrofest, held at Curtin Stadium this Saturday 28 November, Prof Watson will explain why the “Pluto debate is a no-brainer”.

“[The debate] has been running for more years than people think but came to a peak in August 2006 when the International Astronomical Union essentially ‘demoted’ Pluto to the status of dwarf-planet,” Prof Watson says.

“And that raised the question of how you define a planet.

“A definition was put in place, it included the idea that to be a planet an object must have cleared its region of the solar system with debris, and since Pluto hasn’t done that it doesn’t qualify.

“This was an incredibly controversial decision, because a lot of people said because Pluto has always been a planet, why should we change it?

“The fact is we’re changing it because we now know that space is a lot more complicated than we thought it was 30 years ago and we’ve learnt new things.

“But it’s still controversial, particularly in the USA.”

In fact, in the US state of Illinois Pluto was re-established as a planet through senate legislation this year, largely because the planet’s discoverer, Clyde Tombaugh, hailed from Illinois.

March 13, 2009 was even declared “Pluto Day” in Illinois, celebrating its date of discovery in 1930.

“It’s the most idiotic thing you’ve ever heard,” Prof Watson says.

“That’s not science, that’s just people being attached to ideas that don’t really represent what we now know.”

Prof Watson says Pluto’s de-classification as a planet shows “science moving forwards”.

“It shows that we are prepared to take on board new information, to accept what that new information is telling us and make the very best decisions regarding what constitutes a planet and things of that nature,” he says.

“So what we’re seeing is a great example of the way science works – based not on tradition or emotional values but what we find by taking measurements and making observations.”

Prof Watson’s talk starts at 6.30pm and for all the details of Astrofest, including maps, schedules and activities, visit the Astrofest page.

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