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By the way, astrologers don't have to get fingerprinted in every city or state in America. Only some. I've lived in four places in the US and none of those places required it.

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Thanks Tom for the law info. Fingerprints for prevention?! That?s extreme. I have to get my passport renewed end of this year and I?m already worried about my privacy. Europe too is getting worse on privacy. Is Philadelphia?s municipality firm religious? Perhaps the reason for this outlawing could be derived from a certain culture in a state.
?Deb? wrote: Why do you find it bizarre that astrologers are upset Eddy? Don?t you think it?s perfectly understandable? Regardless of what zodiac is used, all zodiacs have a 12-fold division, and that?s a simple fact.
Perhaps I expressed myself in the wrong way but rather than meaning upset as being angry. This I understand, but I meant upset as being bothered by this news and suddenly feeling compelled to change the astrological techniques. Unless people don?t know anything about astrology, there will be no urge to change. Just like the last two decennia?s discoveries of new asteroids beyond Neptune?s orbit didn?t upset the (traditional) astrologers so doesn?t this remark on Ophiuchus. Every serious astrologer knows that it?s the 12-fold division which is to be used and this ?discovery? can?t hinder the technique. Just think about the change of the astronomical status of Pluto. Those who use Pluto weren?t really shocked and simply continued the use of it when Pluto was degraded by the IAU. Astrologers have a different gradation system than astronomers of qualifying planets/signs to be used. E.g. for the astrologers the Sun is a ?planet? even now we know it?s not a planet in the astronomical sense. What astronomers say need not to have big consequences for astrologers. The shocks already have taken place in the past, discovery of precession, heliocentrism, the Sun as a glowing ball of gas, but it didn?t largely change astrology. The changes rather came through cultural change than astronomical discoveries. The issue among astrologers isn?t the question what to do with Ophiuchus but rather the question of how to handle/respond to the ridicule.

I even doubt whether that astronomer is to blame. He probably doesn?t know anything about astrology. Newsmakers want sensation and in tv interview they pull out remarks eliciting just that remark and when the emission is not live, edited in a certain way to cause the unrest. It obviously worked, hence the number of discussions on the question. In the last few years, a hundred thousand asteroids were discovered, but no astrologer saw their system collapse because of this.

I'm reminded of this thread: http://www.skyscript.co.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5260
Perhaps some US state should be added to this.
Ali Hussein Sibat: Do not travel to Saudi Arabia

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I learned last week that in Germany and Sweden, if anyone moves from one town to another he is expected to register with either the police
Eeeek! I'll add Germany and Sweden to the list of "Don't emmigrate here" countries. I'm surprised though, surely the Human Rights Act states that people have a right to privacy - I wonder if it's ever been challenged in the European Courts.

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Deb wrote:...
The problem is that astronomers don?t like to use longitude because it rests upon an earth-centre perspective ? which is perfectly valid in its own terms, and which perfectly suits astrology?s earth-centred symbolism; but it?s not current amongst modern astronomers, because they are not interested in astronomical measurement which conforms to geocentric principles. ...
Is this really true these days? Thirty some years ago when the US government printed the American Ephemeris and Nautical Almanac, position were given in geocentric ecliptical and equatorial coordinates, referred to a standard equinox (1950 or 2000). Those are the same coordinates astrologers use (in both cases reduced to the equinox of date).

I'd be surprised to see ephemeris outputs expressed in another coordinate system. except perhaps helio (which I believe were included in the above ephemerides).

- Ed

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Paul wrote:...
I disagree, I think the 'problem' is in educating on what astrology actually is and how it works, but we'll never manage to do that when astrologers are not given an equal voice to their detractors...
But this becomes a bit difficult when even serious astrologers, who engage in critical thinking, fundamentally disagree about what astrology is and how it works.

- Ed

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Hello

For a couple of reasons I think that astrologers should take a really long term view of this, irrespective of any short term actions being taken.

Firstly, astrology has a long, long history. The news cycle is 24 hours long. Don't overreact to it. It can chew you up and spit you out if you're not fully 'tooled up' for engaging with it, and even if you are. We can afford to think in terms of longer periods of time: decades, centuries, even millennia and longer. Isn't that 'long-termism' part of astrology and astronomy? If we join the media then we are joining the 24-hour cycle and will have to slot ourselves into it. What's to be gained from that? What's to be lost?

Secondly, astrology is strange; that's why it's fascinating and has a lot to teach us about what we are living in and what we go through. Our understanding of the reality we live in is incomplete, therefore our understanding needs more time to gestate. We can beaver away in the backroom working things out and bettering our understanding for a few more centuries if we want to. It's not a loss or a weakness or a fear of going head-to-head, it's a protection and a gift. We don't want to score an own goal. We can afford to have patience, and trust. The media chase ratings, nothing more, nothing less. Therefore the media will use whatever you give it for the purpose of gaining ratings, not for the purpose of representing you (the BBC is identical in this). The media know that the majority of the public believes in astrology, therefore the media cannot turn against astrology.

I suspect that the long-term solution is for astrologers to become increasingly literate in the subjects of astronomy and history and the history of astronomy and astrology. This website already plays a tremendously important role in that. This website is an 'essential and accidental dignity' which we can feed further strength into and draw strength from, precisely because it doesn't function in the way other websites and the media function. Let it and sites like it, not the people misrepresenting astrology in the media, be our touchstone. Let's not be pulled away from what we are already playing our part in doing, i.e. educating ourselves, educating each other, educating our clients, and educating the public.

Regards

H.
Last edited by handn on Mon Jan 17, 2011 7:03 pm, edited 3 times in total.

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I see that hthe bbc news website has allowed a couple of astrologers the right of reply.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-12207811

The gist of it is the reasons we know and it concludes that the 13th sign is an old chesnut and everyone is the same sign they always were.

The media and dumbed-down science seem to need each other, the former to fill space and the latter to see their stuff in print.

If the problem is that astrologers can't agree on what they are doing perhaps we need to look at this. It is more than a choice of saying I am a scientific atrologer or I am a mystical one. There seems to me to be some history behind this.

Matt
Last edited by mattG on Mon Jan 17, 2011 7:02 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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matt23z wrote:I see that hthe bbc news website has allowed a couple of astrologers the right of reply.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-12207811

The gist of it is the reasons we know and it concludes that the 13th sign is an old chesnut and everyone is the same sign they always were.

The media and dumbed-down science seem to need each other, the former to fill space and the latter to see their stuff in print.

If the problem is that astrologers can't agree on what they are doing perhaps we need to look at this. It is more than a choice of saying I am a scientific atrologer or I am a mystical one. There seems to me to be some history behind this.

Matt
A good starting point is "Astrology in the Year Zero". Not sure the conversations has progressed much in the last decade.

- Ed

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Indeed,

Some people simply cannot deal with something that it different from what they were taught. "Reality is not at fault - adjust your mind" as they used to say

Matt

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handn wrote:I suspect that the long-term solution is for astrologers to become increasingly literate in the subjects of astronomy and history and the history of astronomy and astrology. Regards
Agreed. A Western Tropical Judicial Astrologer who can't discuss in some depth the ideas of those such as Plato and Aristotle is likely to be taken apart, and rightly so, by an intelligent sceptic.

Nick Campion addressed this in the Gary Phillipson interview where he mentioned Russell Grant had gone on TV. No disrespect to Mr Grant but I am not convinced if push comes to shove he could talk intelligently, and critically, for 3hrs about the Greeks, the Hermeticists and Jung. If someone of this calibre cares about astrology's public profile he ought to say no and leave it to people who can!

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Deb wrote:No astrologer is disputing the constellation boundaries ? this is a problem about constellation boundaries being confused for zodiacal signs.
On other forums, astrologers are indeed questioning the validity of the constellational boundaries, Deb. They never learnt any astronomy. For that matter, they can't read a chart that comes without an aspect grid and are shocked at those of us, who seemingly by magic, can look at a chart alone without benefit of lines or grids, and not only see aspects, but can tell whether the aspects are applying or separating.

In other words, many so-called astrologers nowadays seem to have skipped basic astronomy as well, sad as the situation is. Quite a lot of them think that Ophiuchus (we won't mention the constellations they don't know about) ought to be part of the zodiac, as that's more honest than 'hiding' it.

And then the conspiracy theories start, and its an absolute mess. And yes, many of these people DO receive money to read charts for clients.

I'm not in favour of astrological certification, that would be madness. Plus given the make-up of astrological societies these days, you, I, and 90% of the astrologers who post on this board would be out of work if we didn't quickly brush up on midpoints and what Pluto septile Venus means, for example, in a psychological or evolutionary way.

I'm not sure where the break happened, but it did - perhaps when astrology software became popular and one no longer had to learn at least a modicum of astronomy and maths to calculate charts by hand?

These people do consider themselves educated in astrology, but they're not only lacking any historical background (as were most of us until perhaps 20 years ago), they're also lacking the 'mechanical' background as it were.

If anything, I hope that the most recent trotting out of Ophiuchus will wake up the astrological community in that regard.

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Olivia wrote:...
I'm not sure where the break happened, but it did - perhaps when astrology software became popular and one no longer had to learn at least a modicum of astronomy and maths to calculate charts by hand?

These people do consider themselves educated in astrology, but they're not only lacking any historical background (as were most of us until perhaps 20 years ago), they're also lacking the 'mechanical' background as it were...
That's about right. The scary part is that even prominent astrological spokesmodels are getting it wrong in their refutations by saying that the sidereal zodiac is affected because it's based on constellations. A sad state of affairs for us fogeys - how did we fail?

- Ed