Is Pluto Really a Planet?
Many people think of Pluto as a dwarf planet, but many consider it a regular planet.
Pluto is a planet because it has many of the same characteristics as real planets. According to Discovery Education, Pluto has two out of the three possible characteristics to be a planet, but these “must haves” were not created until the year of 2006. Pluto seems to be smaller than the other planets, but size should not matter. According to Universe Today and NASA, between the years of 1979 and 1999, Pluto’s orbit was closer to the sun than Neptune. Also, according to Space, Alan Stern replied to the many people who were saying that Pluto is not a planet because of its “neighbors” by saying that “A river is a river, independent of whether there are other rivers nearby. In science, we call things what they are based on their attributes, not what they're next to." Many people also say that having moons is also something that should define if celestial objects should be thought of as planets. Finally from CNN they interviewed Alan Stern, a member of NASA, who
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This tells us Pluto is just as much of a planet as Earth, Jupiter, or Mars are. If Pluto were to be slightly bigger it would be able to accomplish the third qualification of a planet where a planet must clear its neighbors. This helps with the gravitational pull and force because each planet's mass is so massive, Universe Today tells us about Pluto’s orbit. This tells us that if Pluto was able to top Neptune in orbit, it must be a very important celestial body. When Stern mentions “dwarf planets in the Kuiper Belt are considered planets and called planets in everyday discourse in scientific meetings.” This explains to us that Pluto is called a planet every day and also, it is considered one as well. All of these facts help prove that Pluto should be classified as a