Spheroid reasoned that Jupiter and Earth are oblate spheroids owing to their centrifugal force. Earth's diverse cartographic and geodetic systems are based on reference ellipsoids, all of which are oblate. A science-fiction example of an extremely oblate planet is Mesklin from Hal Clement's novel "Mission of Gravity". The prolate spheroid is the shape of the ball in several sports, such as in rugby football. Several moons of the Solar System approximate prolate spheroids in shape, though they are actually triaxial ellipsoids. Examples are Saturn's satellites Mimas, Enceladus, and Tethys and Uranus' satellite Miranda. In contrast to being distorted into oblate spheroids
Solar System in fiction close to the Sun and its surface was exposed to extremes of temperature. The asteroids were too tiny and airless. By the early 20th century, prospects for life in the Solar System focused on Venus, the larger moons of Jupiter and Saturn, and especially Mars. With the onset of the Space Age, planetary probes cast increasing doubt on the likelihood of extraterrestrial life in the Solar System, at least life of any magnitude greater than organisms such as bacteria. By the mid-1960s, it was firmly established that life could have no foothold on the hostile surfaces of Mercury or Venus,