Solar-orbiting asteroid that is a quasi-moon of Venus gets a name
The asteroid 2002-VE, discoverd in 2002, is in a solar orbit that makes it a quasi-moon of Venus. This means that the asteroid and Venus are in very similar orbits around the Sun, with 2002-VE shifting back and forth periodically from within Venus’s orbit to outside it.
An official name for 2002-VE has now been approved by the International Astronautical Union, and the history of that name, Zoozve, is a silly one. It appears a podcaster had misread the name on a poster of the solar system that was on the wall of his 2-year-old son’s bedroom. (You can see the poster here). He read “2”s as “Z”s, so that instead of seeing “2002VE” he read it as “Zoozve”.
Since then he has been campaigning to make this misreading official, and has finally succeeded.
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The asteroid 2002-VE, discoverd in 2002, is in a solar orbit that makes it a quasi-moon of Venus. This means that the asteroid and Venus are in very similar orbits around the Sun, with 2002-VE shifting back and forth periodically from within Venus’s orbit to outside it.
An official name for 2002-VE has now been approved by the International Astronautical Union, and the history of that name, Zoozve, is a silly one. It appears a podcaster had misread the name on a poster of the solar system that was on the wall of his 2-year-old son’s bedroom. (You can see the poster here). He read “2”s as “Z”s, so that instead of seeing “2002VE” he read it as “Zoozve”.
Since then he has been campaigning to make this misreading official, and has finally succeeded.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
I think its a good name. The world needs a bit a silliness from time to time
I was going to 2nd approval of the name after looking at the poster.
Good story and face it, many famous things have been named with more silliness.
However, Pluto is missing. So now I must be outraged!
ok I’m over it.
Reminds me of a great story I read in a history of the Pacific rim.
There were a small number of trading posts along the coast of Alaska. A cartographer collected all available trader scribble maps and wrote up a collated map for printing. The printer noticed an ink dot on the map, scribbled the word “name?” with an arrow to it. The word “name” got misread as “nome”, and was written onto the published map. Traders would sail along the coast to that place, see nothing but a large sandy gravel beach, and lay out their skins. Eventually shacks appeared, then a town, and Nome was born.
Matt,
You say that, but then the people in charge reject “Boaty McBoatface”
Silliness is not allowed when you point out that they are, in fact, the silly ones.
They missed the obvious. Moon of Venus, named on Valentine’s Day, it should have been called Cupid
We should probably count ourselves fortunate that this object was given a nonsense name instead of the name of some deity of some obscure non-white tribe somewhere in Backofbeyondistan – those being the sorts of monikers recently popular with the oh-so-woke grandees of the IAU.
There’s a really good video about this, but I can’t find it my browsing history or YouTube search. This article is a good summary: https://skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-news/how-venus-ended-up-with-a-mini-moon-named-zoozve/
The dad actually tracked it all down when he thought, “Venus has no moon” and wondered why the picture had one.
NOW the RadioLab team wants to name one of Earth’s own quasi-moons.
I hope we can focus on 2006-FV35, the “easiest” of several to reach with our current rockets.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/(277810)_2006_FV35
Soft land your instruments there and you — eventually — fly by both Mars and Venus.
It’s easier to market a moon mission, even a quasi-moon mission, if the moon has a cool name.
Meanwhile there are twitter disputes about whether or not to invent a Greek Myth for some novel, fictional (mythically mythical?) character named Zoozve, romantic object of affection by both Venus and Apollo. Also, assuming the classical Greeks DID have a mythical character named Zoozve, how would the name be pronounced? “zoh-OZ-vee”?