The Psychotic Monkey » Science http://www.psychoticmonkey.co.uk Musings from the banana patch Thu, 25 Aug 2011 18:57:56 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 A blog is born http://www.psychoticmonkey.co.uk/2007/10/04/a-blog-is-born/ http://www.psychoticmonkey.co.uk/2007/10/04/a-blog-is-born/#comments Thu, 04 Oct 2007 11:52:11 +0000 The Monkey http://www.psychoticmonkey.co.uk/2007/10/04/a-blog-is-born/ So as promised much earlier in the year, the first of my new blogs is now ready for action. At World’s End will focus on all things science and nature related, and will also include my own views on these topics. At the moment there is only a welcome post on there, but I’m currently working up the first of my “controversial” posts and this should appear over the next few days. As a consequence of having a dedicated science and nature blog, I’ll no longer be posting here about these. I’ll also copy any relevant articles from here shortly.

]]> http://www.psychoticmonkey.co.uk/2007/10/04/a-blog-is-born/feed/ 0 New “planet” named http://www.psychoticmonkey.co.uk/2006/09/15/new-planet-named/ http://www.psychoticmonkey.co.uk/2006/09/15/new-planet-named/#comments Fri, 15 Sep 2006 06:56:50 +0000 The Monkey http://www.psychoticmonkey.co.uk/2006/09/15/new-planet-named/ BBC News are carrying the story that the mysterious 10th planet in our Solar System has now been given a name. Named Eris (after the Greek Goddess of Discord) the new planet is also causing some scientists to re-think the way a planet is classified. Eris is only slightly larger than Pluto (estimates vary between 70 and 700 km bigger in diameter) and both have now been dropped into the new classification of “dwarf planet”. It seems that had a new classification not been introduced, then an additional 50 planets would have to be recognised within the Solar System (hence the new planet being associated with discord).

So what does this all mean?? Well to be honest I’m not sure. How many other planets might there be in the Solar System? Potentially hundreds I suppose. I guess it shows that there is always something new to learn (how many of us were told that there were only ever 9 planets?). It’s also good to see that the scientific community can adapt when new information comes to light, on the number of planets at least…

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