In two recent articles “What is a Planet?” by NASA and “When is a Planet not a Planet?” by Daniel Santos, they both proclaim that the IAU reclassified Pluto as a “dwarf planet”. There is much controversy going on about if Pluto should be a planet or not. I strongly believe that the IAU’s decision to reclassify Pluto as a “dwarf planet” was wrong. The reasons I think that are because the third criteria/definition for a planet is very vague and unclear. Also textbook creators don’t want to change the textbooks and museums, and experts want Pluto to be a planet for historical reasons, since Pluto has been a planet for more than 70 years.

One reason is the third criteria of a planet is it must have a cleared orbital neighborhood (that means it must have all objects around it be out of the way) but what does that mean.  Experts state that the definition is “Awful” and “Sloppy science” and they say the definition is too vague. Also the criteria doesn’t’ state how much it has to clear. However, there is one more reason.

The other reason is textbook creators and museums don’t want to change the textbooks for Pluto being a “dwarf planet” since the books say it’s still a planet.  Could you imagine how much money that would take to make over one million textbooks and museums. That’s about over one billion dollars. However, there is still one more reason.

The last reason is experts want Pluto to be a planet for historical reasons. Pluto has been a planet for more than 70 years, so why do we change it now? Some supporters say “Leave Pluto alone! ” Even some angry schoolchildren wrote the IAU demanding that Pluto should stay a planet. Those are my three reasons Pluto should be a planet.

That is why I strongly believe that the IAU’s decision to reclassify Pluto as a “dwarf planet” was wrong. What do you think, do you think the decision to reclassify Pluto was wrong or right? Those are my reasons why I strongly believe the IAU’s decision to reclassify Pluto was wrong.