What’s in a name? What’s in a word? Good questions. They’ve been around at least since William Shakespeare wrote “Romeo and Juliet.” And they seem like simple questions, but these questions touch the very heart of what people believe. Names are the very core of our language. Change them and people get confused. “Bad” used to mean “not good.” Now it has an additional meaning in our culture that can mean “great” or “awesome.” Many names and words get changed in our culture and most of those changes, like the definition of “bad” go relatively unnoticed. But one change, that has not gone unnoticed is the redefinition of the word “planet.” Since the members of the International Astronomical Union (IAU) in their infinite wisdom – or should I say “finite” wisdom – changed their definition of a planet in August 2006, many people have noticed and the debate about the wisdom of that changes goes on.
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