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I didn’t accept Ron’s argument here because defining categories isn’t naming, it is taxonomy, which *is* science. Then, to justify the connection between naming and taxonomy he accidentally insulted all the non-Greek or Roman cultures of the world. /1
2/ He said the IAU needed to determine if the body that was eventually named “Eris” was a planet or not because planets are, by tradition, given the names of “major gods” (whereas if it is a non-planet then it would not be given the name of a “major god”), so they had to decide!
3/ But doesn’t this imply that Hawaiian culture (Haumea) and Rapa Nui culture (Makemake) and all the other cultures that have had dwarf planets and other bodies named after their gods are of lesser importance than the Greeks and Romans.😾😾😾
4/4 Wouldn’t it have been better to just change the process of naming planets in the Kuiper Belt, recognizing the inner planet names were too Western-centric and we can discard that tradition now, naming them anything the world wants regardless whether dwarf planets are planets?
5/4 The Rapa Nui people really did consider Makemake to be a major god: en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Makemake_…
