• Tiresia@slrpnk.net
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    6 days ago

    It makes moon a planet, unless you want to include parameters like “must orbit a star”. but that seems arbitrary.

    This is the core conceptual and historical distinction between a moon and a planet. If your definition of moon doesn’t include the moon, our moon, Luna, you’ve fucked up.

    The concept of a planet is about orbits. That’s what the word means; the wandering points of light in the night sky. Moons don’t wander separately from their planet. Dwarf planets aren’t points of light distinct from the rest of the asteroid belt they’re in.

    • Aniki@feddit.orgOP
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      6 days ago

      oh i always guessed that “planet” comes from “plant”, i.e. something that is flat enough that you could do agriculture on it. i.e. hydrostatic equilibrium, etc.