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Landlubber77 t1_j6877kg wrote

Christ, I know it got demoted from being an official planet but we didn't have to burn the guy to death over it.

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BrokenEye3 t1_j67u8er wrote

Somebody wanted to be extra sure Clyde stayed dead this time

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fredsam25 t1_j68lysy wrote

Did... Did he want this? Because there's something depressing about launching your remains into deep space away from everyone on earth. Having said it out loud, I can understand the appeal.

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ReadingGoat t1_j68buxp wrote

He was at Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, AZ when he found it. You can go there today and see the telescope he used, among other really cool stuff. It’s a great place to visit.

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JJohnston015 t1_j69cxx8 wrote

I had the good fortune to be at NMSU at the same time as Dr. Tombaugh. I don't think he was on the faculty, I think he just lived in Las Cruces, but why wouldn't he be at the astronomy department all the time. I attended on of his last lectures, and he was "on". He must have been 150 years old, badly hunched over with osteoporosis, but his mind and his voice were still strong, and he gave a lively and fascinating lecture on the search for Pluto - one of the highlights of my time there.

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scuzzy987 t1_j6ayyy5 wrote

I saw a presentation by him on how he discovered Pluto. He said he had two photographs of the same small region of space and flipped them back and forth to find a white dot that moved. He said it was very tedious and he looked at lots of pairs of photographs. He was a very interesting presenter

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JJohnston015 t1_j6azbqn wrote

Yes, he showed us those same 2 pictures. As he flipped the projector back and forth, he pointed out the one that jumped back and forth. That was it.

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Tank905 t1_j67jtpz wrote

A small portion.

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PresentAd3536 t1_j67xu5v wrote

He will be reborn as a brain cylinder on Yuggoth!

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DIDiMISSsomethin t1_j68moxi wrote

Imagine aliens, or even future generations, finding that spacecraft and thinking up reasons why we burnt up a person and blasted them out of our solar system.

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PorousArcanine t1_j6826hv wrote

I feel like this is simultaneously really cool/sweet, but also a bit far (HA!) when it's not something you can really ask him if he'd want. The idea of my remains being sent billions of KMs away from the warmth of my home planet gives me the willies.

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Seraph062 t1_j6a01i8 wrote

If it makes you feel better they only sent a little bit of his ashes.
A person makes a few pounds of ashes when they're cremated. The probe had about an ounce worth.

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ElfMage83 t1_j699udh wrote

I'm old enough to remember that mission.

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LordRumBottoms t1_j68d1ch wrote

2 Skinnee Js taught me Pluto is indeed a planet.

0

DirtyDanTheManlyMan t1_j6a7p0d wrote

public school taught me it was a planet then shortly after had to re/teach us that it wasn’t a planet, which was really confusing for some reason

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