Editor’s Note: The following article on Sedna is from Planet Wiki, the Planet Waves site devoted exclusively to the study of planets and the astrology, astronomy and mythology surrounding them. It was part of the 2008 annual edition, Small World Stories, and is being updated for the upcoming 2009 annual: Next World Stories. The Sedna article is reprinted today in honor of Sedna’s discovery five years ago today. –RA
SEDNA, the undersea creation goddess of the North Pole, arrives just as we are figuring out as the ice caps are melting. She emerges from the collective unconscious just as the cetations (such as whales and dolphins) are dying off and being massacred. In this moment, we get a planetary discovery, honored with a name evoking a myth, that tells us where these creatures come from.
The great ice melt of the early 21st century is indicative of something much larger — oceans and a world in crisis. The oceans are the immune system of the planet, and Jacques Cousteau said as early as the Sixties that the oceans were dead or dying. That is not surprising; we extract the life from them, scraping with trawling nets down to the very bottom destroying the delicate ecosystem for Filet-o-Fish sandwiches; and then we express our gratitude by using them as a garbage dump.