"Te-hee-hehe" <--that would be my line if I could do just one-liners/one-word(-ers) XD.

Though didn't we just have a research a few months back about a object that they thought was out there? (Again conducted by those in Japan). It makes me wonder, what are the Japanese doing that is far more radical than what any other nation is doing right now? If this is supposidly something "Big" then why not share it and let the whole science community in on it to find it out? Either way, this all just keeps bringing further questions to my mind.

Well, that will make 9 planets again ?

I'm going to stamp my feet now

If Pluto can't be a planet this one shouldn't be a planet because we're not sure its there
so.. until Pluto is a planet again I think all future wanna be planets should wait in line behind Pluto.

Hasn't there always been something beyond Pluto seems like every year or two we get more data that turns out to be nothing

So let me get this straight..

We can see explosions in space that happened billions of years ago millions of light years away and we can map out entire galaxies thousands of light years away from us....but we can't see a "massive" planet in our own Solar System for another 5-10 years?

i am highly skeptical

and note todays date , my mates morning paper has an article about flying penguins

however - i would love to see the article in question - and examine the evidence they present

the main library 15 miles from me carries the journal in question - or at least it did - do i should have a chance to read it in a couple of weeks

like others my first thought is why has an object so large not been detected by ANY means previously

we have been very thoroughly surveying the univers for over 100 years

specific questions include :

would it not have occulted a visible star

why have IR surveys not detected it

why have ` blink ` comparisons of archive images and survey data not shown it up

my specific " rebuttal " to the claim that its too small and too far away - and too dim is :

we found eris which is < 1 fith the claimed size of PX and > 1 quater the orbital distance claimed

and how have they calculated the size estimate ?????????

very strange - the 2 authours are both listed in google searches - and have published before

i am considering EMAILing them to see if they have time to answer the questions i pose

but i had better read the article first - in case they have been addressed in print

Do the Japanese make jokes on April 1st too? Because this sure looks like a prank. We'll see in the near future if it does turn out to be one or not.

April Fool's day notwithstanding; Gravitational observations have always indicated that our outer planets are being affected by an as of yet undetected object. It was this very study that is said to have led us to 'discover' the outermost planets themselves.

(Of course, much to the chagrin of modern day astronomers these were not technically discoveries as archaeological evidence demonstrated some cultures had a prior knowledge of these outer bodies - how? don't ask me? I wasn't there.)

Editorializing of the scientific reports has commonly used phrases like - astonishing, massive, etc. But you have to take some of it with a grain of salt because after all, they are trying to 'sell' news and if it was mundanely presented who would care? Japanese Universities are no different than most. they have to 'celebrate' their discoveries if they want more grant money (you can tell they need grants by all the starving scientists out there.)

By the way they (NASA) did detect an IR body approaching our solar system back in the 80's on what could possibly be an oblique elliptical, but nobody paid attention to it because of the importance of other things in the news at the time. Probably something to do with Rock Hudson having AIDS or Amelda Marcos' shoe collection.

I'm not one to cry out Planet X or Nibiru or Marduk or Wormwood or whatever. That's just window dressing. But I am willing to bet - there is something out there, whether it's part of our solar system we will most certainly learn - either for good or ill.