[AIPedant]

My point was not about intuiting the distance, it's about what the solar system looks like qualitatively, as a cartoon with orbits drawn around the sun. Most people have no idea if 700AU is closer than Pluto, a little further than Pluto, or much further than Pluto. 15x the distance of Pluto is much more direct.

[zamadatix]

What's the benefit of communicating something is 15x the distance of Pluto if people are expected to have at least a ~15x error in how far away Pluto is supposed to be? At that point it's all nonsense, nothing is relevant anymore. Might as well say something useful for those who do have a clue about the solar system.

Hell, it's been nearly 2 decades since Pluto was itself planet 9. Just bringing the name up in a discussion about planets is going to cause more confusion.

[setr]

15 time further than the furthest once-planet is fairly intuitive to say really freaking far; you don’t need to know how far pluto is, just that it’s the furthest.

[AIPedant]

> Might as well say something useful for those who do have a clue about the solar system.

The source we are discussing is space.com, a website which frequently mentions Star Wars and whose stated mission is to "transport our visitors across the solar system and beyond through accessible, comprehensive coverage of the latest news and discoveries." My comment was about communicating this research in a way that better fits "most readers" of space.com. If you think qualitative orrery models are beneath you and want to exclude those people, then you are not the target audience. Just go read the actual paper.