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I suppose it isn't worth mentioning that, in the real world, there is nothing "impossible" about a planet orbiting a black hole? (Not to mention that the term 'geostationary' doesn't apply to a stationary orbit around a non-Earth body.) [[Special:Contributions/174.110.143.94|174.110.143.94]]<sup>[[User talk:174.110.143.94#top|talk to me]]</sup> 03:42, July 27, 2012 (UTC) | I suppose it isn't worth mentioning that, in the real world, there is nothing "impossible" about a planet orbiting a black hole? (Not to mention that the term 'geostationary' doesn't apply to a stationary orbit around a non-Earth body.) [[Special:Contributions/174.110.143.94|174.110.143.94]]<sup>[[User talk:174.110.143.94#top|talk to me]]</sup> 03:42, July 27, 2012 (UTC) | ||
::The origin of geostationary does refer to Earth specifically, but as we've put satellites, etc, into orbit around other bodies (Mars, Venus, etc), use of the term has tended to become more generalised to mean synchronous to a particular point on the surface of whatever body is being orbited. It's a reasonable conclusion that this trend would continue, so I wouldn't see anything wrong in using that term in this case. As for the impossibility of orbiting a black hole, you're of course correct. The impossible nature of this particular case might be a matter of how close the planet is; meaning, if it's at a low enough orbit that it should really have fallen into the black hole already, but it seems to be in a completely stable orbit. That was how I interpreted it, but I agree that they could have expounded on it a bit. [[User:Spreee|Spreee]] [[User talk:Spreee|<span title="Talk to me">☎</span>]] 16:52, July 30, 2012 (UTC)Spreee |
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