9 planets!

oh, my fault. i see what you mean now.

 

My fault too. Should of stated I meant OP.

 

I find it ironic that you say "lolwiki," but then cite About.com. Either way, that article doesn't make any effort to classify artificial satellites as moons, so I'm not sure as to what I'm supposed to be arguing against?

 

look at the top of the page, where it credits authorship.
http://space.about.com/bio/John-P-Millis-Ph-D-65326.htm

also:

points of fact: ISS is a distinct, whole and solid object, and it orbits the earth. criteria fulfilled. nowhere is it stated that a moon has to be "natural". it does, however, offer "satellites" as a synonym of "moon".

so, according to the body internationally recognized as being the definitive authority for such matters, the ISS is an artificial "moon". if you have issue with that, i suggest you lobby the IAU to tighten their definition of "moon".

 

And? Interesting fact: wikipedia's editors include PhDs as well.

Except those aren't criteria. Let me quote it for you:

That's it. They are "commonalities," but they are not definitive, as you would get if you continued reading:

So not every piece of space debris in orbit around a planet is a moon, despite the fact that such debris shares those three commonalities.It then goes on to talk about how the status of captured asteroids as moons is questionable:

So you're saying that the ISS is more of a moon than Phobos or Deimos, which this article says are questionable?

John P Millis is the definitive authority???

Again, not if you actually read the piece you linked to. While there is a lot of fuzziness involved in what is and is not a moon, that fuzziness does not include man-made objects. There's a reason that the Mars Express is not listed as a martian moon here.

 

You all smoked pot, can we agree on that atleast?

 

the US geological survey is now an authority on astronomical bodies?

 

Apparently IAU thinks so:

 

Does refer to naming convention, not the definition of a body. Also it says the IAU helped the USGS, not the inversi

 

Yeah, the IAU just directs people to the USGS page, so obviously the USGS has questionable information that needs to be taken with a grain of salt. Science works that way, you know: once information leaves the organization that created it, dark spirits inhabit it and make it all unreliable. I think St. Heisenberg prophesied that. That's why you need Pope Hawking I to perform a data exorcism.

Anyway, I eagerly await your link to the IAU's list of moons that includes the Mars Express (which, according to you, must have been named by the IAU and not the ESA, as the IAU is responsible for the naming of all moons; not quite sure which Greek or Roman god "Mars Express" is, going with the IAU's naming conventions, but if you can find that mythological story, that would be great as well).

 

i would imagine they would be a very important resource in the research of astronomical bodies. especially now that we are finding extrasolar planets by the hundreds each year. as tech improves and we start to identify surface features i would think they would be essential. geology would seem critical to me in defining features and composition. after all, who do you think makes all the maps the military and government use?

 

they are..... for working with surface features and the like. the IAU defines astronomical bodies, and they do not have a strict definition of moon.

anyone has a problem with that, take it up with the IAU and get them to tighten the definition, as they did with planets.

 

Now THAT was mature >_>

 

Now THAT is a knife

Agreed