Christine Lavin - Planet X lyrics

In Arizona at the turn of this century astromathematician Percival Lowell was searching for what he called "Planet X" because he knew deep in his soul that an unseen gravitational presence meant a new planet spinning in the air joining the other eight already known circling our sun up there Percival Lowell died in 1916 his theory still only a theory 'til 1930, American Clyde Tombaugh in his scientific query discovered Planet X, 3 point 7 billion miles from the sun a smallish ball of frozen rock, methane and nitrogen It joined Mercury, Venus, Earth and Mars, Jupiter Saturn, Uran*s and Neptune our solar system's newest neighbor two-thirds the size of our moon a tiny, barely visible speck cold! minus 440 below not exactly Paradise they named the planet Pluto That same year, 1930, Walt Disney debuted his own Pluto as well but a cartoon dog with the very same name as the CEO of Hell was not the normal Disney style most thought he was riding the coattails of Pluto-mania sweeping the land (not unlike our love for whales) For the next five decades mysterious Pluto captivated our minds as late as 1978 its own moon Charon was seen for the very first time but telescopes and satellites and computer calculations now say Pluto may not be a planet at all causing great consternation (Some scientists say). . . It's a "trans-Neptunian interloper" swept away by an unknown force or a remnant of a wayward comet somehow s**ed off course others say it's an asteroid in the sun's gravitational pull but if you ask Clyde Tombaugh he'll tell you it's all "bull" "I get hundreds of letters from kids every year," he says, "It's Pluto the planet they love not Pluto the comet or Pluto the asteroid they wonder about above" The International Astronomical Union's Working Group For Planetary System Nomenclature agrees that Pluto's a planet reinforcing Tombaugh's view of Nature Norwegian Kaare Aksnes, professor at the Theoretical Astrophysics Institute says Pluto is still a planet and an important one, to boot but at the University of Colorado astronomer Larry Esposito says if Pluto were discovered today it would not be a planet. End of discussion. Finito He says it was not spun off from solar matter like the other eight planets we know by every scientific measure we have is it a planet? No! and now twenty astronomy textbooks refer to Pluto as less than a planet I guess if Pluto showed up at a planet convention the bouncer at the door might ban it It takes 247 earth years for Pluto to circle the sun it's tiny and it's cold but of all heavenly bodies it's Clyde Tombaugh's favorite one he's 90 now and works every day in Las Cruces, New Mexico determined to maintain the planetary status of his beloved Pluto But how are we going to deal with it if science comes up the proof that Pluto was never a planet how do we handle this truth? as the Ph.D.'s all disagree we don't know yet who's wrong or right but wherever you are, whatever you are Pluto, we know you're out there tonight And in 2003 you're going to see the NASA Pluto Express fly by and take pictures of your cool surface to send to your web page address: h t t p colon slash slash d o s x x dot colorado dot edu slash plutohome dot html your own web page? you've made quite a splash Though now St. Christopher is looking down says, "Pluto, I can relate when I was demoted from sainthood it didn't feel too great" and Scorpios look up in dismay Pluto the planet rules their sign is reading their daily Horoscope now a futile waste of time? At the turn of this century astromathematician Percival Lowell in his quest for "Planet X" started this ball to roll at the end of the 20th Century we think he may have been way off base now we look at the sky and wonder what new surprises await us in outer space