Tuesday, March 02, 2010

An Inquiring Mind

For some reason Rachel Maddow did a segment on Pluto last night; I didn’t pay all that much attention, had it on while I was doing something else. Apparently most of the world is okay with downgrading Pluto from planet status, but a high percentage of Americans are outraged over it. It’s not about Pluto having been discovered in America; only 10% of those who were outraged even knew that Pluto was discovered here. (I did; it was discovered in Arizona, so all Arizonans know about the discovery of Pluto.) Turns out the outrage has to do with people’s love of Pluto, the Disney cartoon dog. We learn about both Plutos, it seems, at age three, so...

I actually was somewhat pleased with the downgrade, because even as a kid Pluto made no sense to me. Its orbit is too eccentric and far too tilted. When I was still in grade school (many, many years ago) I was sure that something was all wrong about Pluto. And I like cats.

I was also sure that it was not mere coincidence that the Eastern side of the Americas was such a nice fit for the Western side of Europe and Africa. Teachers kept telling me that it was mere chance, but I had this sneaky idea that it was more than coincidence.

Kids today have no idea about the advance of knowledge.

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