Discordians from Outer Space

The semi-planet nicknamed Xena now has an official moniker: Eris.

Comments

[Karen]

Obviously the Goddess was annoyed at being ignored for so long and therefore inspired the astronomer's union to demote Pluto. Maybe now that she has her own, well, whatever it is, she'll let Pluto be a planet again.

[Todd]

With such a stupid name, no wonder they wouldn't make it a real planet.

[Aresen]

Eris - Goddess of Discord & Strife.

At last Reasonoids have a Deity to worship!

[fishfry]

Greetings Earthlings, from the planet Fluffy.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/news/archive/2006/09/14/national/w080628D89.DTL

[Akira MacKenzie]

Personally, I think Persephone would have been more apropos considering Greco-Roman mythology.

Oh well...

HAIL ERIS! ALL HAIL DISCORDIA!!!

Now bow down before she sends you to the Puppet Dimension!

[Pro Libertate]

Akira, "Proserpina" would be better, given the Roman god naming conventions used for the "planets". Frankly, I prefer the Greek names as a general rule, though I don't want to rename the planets at this point. Zeus knows that the Earth trembled and tottered with the demotion of poor Pluto.

[Deus ex Machina]

There already is an asteriod named Persephone.

I guess the guys at Universal didn't pony up enough money to beat the Cartoon Network for the naming rights.

[kevrob]

L. Neil Smith must be chuckling. He wrote a couple of stories set on an "asteroid" called 5023 Eris, collected as Forge Of The Elders.

An anonymous /.er came up with this:

Xena>Lucy Lawless>Goddess of Lawlesssness>Eris

Clever, even if it isn't true.

399 Persephone is a RL "Main Belt" asteroid, BTW.

Kevin

[Ron Hardin]

It's an obvious play for a planet palendrome of some kind.

Sex education advice : Sire not on Eris.

[hale]

This is deeply disappointing to me. I was hoping that they would actually continue in the tradition begun with "Xena" by giving dwarf planets the names of campy pop culture phenomena. This would serve both to emphasize how generally unremarkable dwarf planets are, as well as saving the nifty mythological names for actual planets that we might conceivably have actual reasons to actually talk about. Actually, now that I think of it, Xena may be entirely too important a reference to waste on a crap planet like UB313.

[Akira MacKenzie]

Looks like DeM and I watch the same cartoons.

[treefroggy]

Xena>Lucy Lawless>Goddess of Lawlesssness>Eris

Clever, even if it isn't true.
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Actually, it's pretty close. Dysnomia was the daughter of Eris, and she, Dysnomia, is the "spitit of lawlessness".