I think it was rather unfair in the part of International Astronomical union to demote pluto (it even got a new official asteriod identification) Only 4% of about 9000 astronomers were present in the voting.
New planets that are discovered outside our system are already too big, (some are llike 5 times the size of jupiter, means something like 60 times the size of earth!)
When we get to these planets, are we going to propose new definitions and demote all the planets in the solar system?
Well, if you get more planets, add them to the list. There will be no shortage of planet discoveries, even in our solar system, or the rest of the galaxy (not to mention, rest of the universe)
The new definitions of planet were as if specifically aimed to demote pluto's status.
We could have some simpler guidelines as:
A planet should satisfy all the traditional requirements, orbit the sun, be in approximately round shape.
Put some size cap on the lower limit and upper limit of planet.
As size should be between x (lower limit) diameters and y(upper limit) diameters.
The newly discovered super giant planets(outside our solar system) could be called planets or above a certain size may even classify as brown dwarfs (failed to ignite stars)
If it is below size of pluto call them as dwarf planets! Put Pluto for marking between planets and dwarf planets. Why demote it?
If we discover new objects larger than pluto that go around the sun add them to the list! It doesn't matter if we got 9 or 10 or 10 million planets in the solar system. We do not need names for all of them, catalog names would do.
Let the classical planets remain as classical planets.
Vote for pluto
http://plutopetition.org/
