How many officially recognized planets are there?

I know this probably sounds like a basic question that a kid would ask, but i read all the time about new planets being discovered, i just wondered what you consider the main planets that are now known to us?

My kids have posters and books on the planets, they show the main ones in our solar system that we learnt in school, but what do i tell them if they ask me?

Thanks,

CX.

Originally posted by CX
I know this probably sounds like a basic question that a kid would ask, but i read all the time about new planets being discovered, i just wondered what you consider the main planets that are now known to us?

My kids have posters and books on the planets, they show the main ones in our solar system that we learnt in school, but what do i tell them if they ask me?

Thanks,

CX.

google is a tool humans use to research information.


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Perhaps this site can be useful to you:

This page shows information about planetary bodies named by the IAU Working Group for Planetary System Nomenclature (WGPSN), and about bodies named by the IAU Committee on Small Body Nomenclature that have surface features named by the WGPSN.

planetarynames.wr.usgs.gov...

The site also contains interesting info on the mythological background for the names given to different planets and their satellites. Like for instance Mars:

Named by the Romans for their god of war because of its red, bloodlike color. Other civilizations also named this planet from this attribute; for example, the Egyptians named it "Her Desher," meaning "the red one."

Originally posted by prevenge

google is a tool humans use to research information.


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Google also gives you a million answers, many of which are wrong, different and confusing, one reason why i'm asking here. Cheers.

Thanks for the link ziggy.

CX.

reply to post by prevenge


Hmm, yeah, and common courtesy is a tool humans use to get along with each other.

Please, don't be a fool

Forums like THESE are ALSO a tool used by people to ask and DISCUSS questions, something that 'Google' doesn't provide, (except by way of FORUM links)

reply to CX

Your qusetion is welcomed

There are currently EIGHT planets in our solar system. I say "currently" because Pluto recently got classified as a 'Planetoid' (Pfft!! whatever that means )

I'm pretty sure that, 'officially', only four have mean classified as planetoids. There may be others that I'm unaware of, and I'm pretty sure that they've found a new one as recently as this year.

Here we go, pulled up a Wiki Page...

In our solar system Mimas is the smallest body that seems to be in hydrostatic equilibrium, while Pallas may be the largest notably out of round. The IAU has so far declared only four bodies to be dwarf planets: Ceres, Pluto, Makemake and Eris.

WIKI Source

As for Extrasolar or Exoplanets, I think they're breaching the 200 mark.

Here, I found an interesting site that lists a MANY that have been found, with info about individual discoveries, with data included (click on the blue Ref tab on the right of the page.

Catalogue of Nearby Exoplanets

(thats proberbly at bit too heavy for the kids though )

Hope that helps my friend, i;ve got to go now as i think my bean burger is burhning dude to this post

Cheers

AoN

[edit on 22-7-2008 by Anomic of Nihilism]

[edit on 22-7-2008 by Anomic of Nihilism]

Thanks for the info AoN. Thats exactly the kind of thing i was after.

I, like most here was aware of the eight or nine we are all taught about in our solar system, it's the others that i was particularly interested in. I was'nt sure if they were taught or talked about much in schools in anything outside astronomy.

Thanks again, an please pass on my sympathies to the bean burger. Sorry mate.

CX.

Well that would be 9 counting 2003 UB313 or xena, and ten counting uranus.

Uranus is one of the eight major planets, and 2003 UB313 is Eris.

[edit on 23-7-2008 by Mogget]