Editing 1551: Pluto

When the image is clicked the corresponding [http://www.nasa.gov/feature/new-horizons-spacecraft-displays-pluto-s-big-heart-0 NASA post] opens up.

This comic was posted on Tuesday, July 14, 2015, in honor of the {{w|New Horizons}} deep space probe making its flyby at {{w|Pluto}}, thus breaking the typical Monday/Wednesday/Friday cycle for the [[xkcd]] comics. Also on this day he released the first [[what if?]] in over three months, and it was called [http://what-if.xkcd.com/137/ New Horizons]. Luckily it did not end up back on Earth, as depicted in [[1532: New Horizons]] releases 1½ month before closest approach.

[[Randall]] has taken one of the probes images of Pluto, and outlined humorous examples of {{w|Pareidolia|pareidolia}} on top of it.

The comic probably winks at {{w|Percival Lowell}} whose observatory photographed Pluto in 1915 "known" as Planet X. Unfortunately Percival Lowell is most famous for are his drawings of the {{w|Martian canal|Canals on Mars}} which are widely misunderstood as channels based on wrong translations from Italian to other languages.

 

The title text refers to the debate as to whether Pluto should be classified as a full or dwarf planet. This debate was particularly brought into the public eye, and came to be seen as a matter of controversy, following the 2006 {{w|IAU definition of planet}}. The text may imagine that this debate winds on, with definitions being created and revised until a ridiculous state is reached whereby Pluto has a special class of celestial body named after it called a 'Pluto', but fails to fulfill the arbitrary criteria set up for it, and hence is called a 'dwarf Pluto'.

There actually exist the terms {{w|Plutoid}} and {{w|Plutino}}, that relate directly to groups that Pluto belongs to, but see those pages for details of their use and usage.

A string of small round features which Randall suggests were the result of Pluto getting shot repeatedly, probably by meteorites.

Reference to the what if?, [https://what-if.xkcd.com/54/ Drain the Oceans: Part II], about draining the Earth's oceans onto Mars. In the previous what if?, [https://what-if.xkcd.com/53/ Drain the Oceans], the Netherlands took over the Earth once their problem with the risk of flooding disappeared. And then they continued to issued forth from the portal that drained the oceans on Earth pouring them onto Mars, to claim Mars as New Netherlands. Presumably something similar happened on Pluto. This was already again references in both an entry in the table and in the title text of [[1555: Exoplanet Names 2]].

;{{w|Pareidolia|Full text of the Wikipedia article on pareidolia}}

The {{w|Kuiper belt}} is a region in our solar system that contains an unknown amount of icy bodies, one known is Pluto. Randall jokingly refers to Kuiper Belt as the same kind of belt that's used to fasten clothing, and identifies features on Pluto's surface as loops for the belt.

An outline of the ''Firefly''-class spaceship ''Serenity'', which was the titular vessel from the 2002 TV series ''{{w|Firefly (TV series)|Firefly}}''. One of a number of pareidolic features Randall has outlined.

Nobody can see a dinosaur unless Randall did do this painting on Pluto's surface. And a complex comic needs at least one dinosaur.

A random, arbitrary selection of Pluto that is somehow better than the rest of Pluto. Only Randall knows why.

This could be interpreted as a moon growing/emerging out of pluto, as a bud is "a compact knob-like growth". A round growth is seen at the location marked, resembling a small, emerging moon.

One of a number of pareidolic features Randall has outlined, and the only one (currently) also informally named as such by NASA.

Implying that Pluto is some manner of giant egg. Possibly a reference to the ''Doctor Who'' episode ''Kill the Moon'', in which the Moon is revealed to be an egg from which a monster is hatching. A 2014 article from ''The Onion'', [http://www.theonion.com/article/moon-finally-hatches-36414 "Moon Finally Hatches,"] makes the same joke. Also possibly a reference to ''The Light Fantastic'', a ''Discworld'' novel in which similar objects are revealed to be the eggs of the world turtle. A similar idea appeared in Jack Williamson's 1934 short story "Born of the Sun".

Balls often have a "plug" or opening to insert a needle to inflate or deflate them.

Pluto was reclassified as a {{w|dwarf planet}} rather than a {{w|planet}} following the latter term's controversial {{w|redefinition in 2006}} by the {{w|International Astronomical Union}}.  Arguments about the classification continue to pop up. The same argument is referenced in the title text. The name implies a proposal to put all the people still arguing about it in this hole on Pluto. This proposal further implies that the continued debate is very annoying by 2015, except perhaps to the debaters themselves.

:HEART