I think this is a case of pretty bad journalism. In the English version of the Asahi Shimbun, a big Japanese newspaper, there was an article this morning on the controversy over the "10th planet." It said that the IAU will make an official decision on "whether the planet belongs to our solar system." I'm pretty sure this is a fairly big error, because, IMO, the IAU can't make that decision -- either it belongs to the solar system (it does) or it doesn't. The IAU is simply deciding how to classify it.

I think this problem may come from some kind of a translation issue; maybe in Japanese, "belongs to our solar system" means "is a 'full member' of our solar system, i.e. a planet." But still, it gives the wrong impression that it's unsure whether the object is actually in our solar system or not.

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As above, so below

what, do they think it might belong to Alpha Centauri? you're right; that's phrased badly. (you know, one of the few problems with how quickly I read is that I spend a lot of time waiting to make posts.)

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Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"