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xkcd #3063: Planet Definitions (xkcd.com)

submitted 5 days ago by [email protected] to c/xkcd

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Under the 'has cleared its orbital neighborhood' and 'fuses hydrogen into helium' definitions, thanks to human activities Earth technically no longer qualifies as a planet but DOES count as a star.

https://explainxkcd.com/3063/

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[–] [email protected] 31 points 5 days ago (4 children)

He's mixed up the first two diagrams - Pluto should be coloured in for the first and not for the second.

[–] cobysev 13 points 5 days ago

He fixed it. They're swapped now.

[–] Donjuanme 12 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

This is really really frustrating to me, very unlike Randal.

What's worse is he's got Neptune's moon highlighted in the first row

[–] teft 8 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Ultratraditionalist is messed up too. The sun and moon were considered planets when geocentrism was king.

It comes from the fact that the word planet comes from the Greek and means wanderer. Any celestial body that wandered around compared to the stars was considered a planet.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 5 days ago (1 children)

The judgemental one has 7 coloured instead of 6 too.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 5 days ago

Good catch - he's updated the graphic but this is still wrong.