It’s all in a word. Pluto is still as much or as little as it was yesterday, last week, and when it was identified decades ago. Science is evaluative and reevaluative. It also strives to be consistent. So, Pluto hasn’t changed; merely our terminology has. As a result, those of us who normally keep some distance from astronomical issues, have learned more about the complexity of way out there. This is perhaps the best poor Pluto can offer us layfolk at this point, and it’s not trivial….
Ok, if that doesn’t satisfy you, maybe this will: to make your coffee taste like you expect it to taste, although “the characteristics of the bean partly determine taste and aroma, naturally occurring fungi also put the zing in your favourite brew.�? (from Judy Skatssoon and ABC Science Online, via News in Science). Also, different places/regions have different fungi, helping give their beans distinctive flavors. (Many of you are aware that I must be tongue in cheek including this, as I “quit�? coffee years ago, much to my spouse’s dismay.)
So, Pluto is/is not whatever you want to believe (including “it’s a planet�?), and remember that fungus is your friend (sometimes).
26 August 2006 at 8:32 am
mouse's moom says:
I thought you were drinking coffee at your cabin this summer??? Wasn’t there that discussion about that extra good coffee?
26 August 2006 at 9:53 am
Sammy says:
Sorry, it was an illusion; or, jcb’s enough of a fanatic that it seemed like everyone was drinking coffee!
26 August 2006 at 10:38 am
mouse's moom says:
I’m pretty sure I was drinking it! I am *usually* a once-a-week coffee drinker, Monday coffee with Marci at Barry’s. By the time I’ve gotten up, taken a shower and a 3-mile walk, I don’t need it much. But I’ll drink it just about any time somebody else is having some. Sometimes it almost seems to have a sort of cumulative effect, like if I drink a couple of cups every day for a while, it take *much* less for me to start jittering and bouncing around.
26 August 2006 at 10:52 am
Sammy says:
Oh, yes, there was coffee! Just not ME drinking it (it made me so jittery, really jumpy jittery, that I had to take it off my personal menu)…. I was waiting for the bacon, maybe?
26 August 2006 at 11:05 am
mouse's moom says:
I’m not sure you ever got any of that bacon ;-).