16
Hi Mark,
thank you again for interesting references. I'll read the article you mentioned.

Yes, I've read "Spheres of Destiny" a few years ago. A most interesting book, and one of those that furthered my ponderings about the nature of planets. When one is using a sidereal zodiac (like did at a few points in the past), one has to think and even seriously question the nature of the planets, if one wants to make rulerships to fit with what one observes about the signs. So you can belive that I?ve toggled with the planetary symbolism.

The table you put here confirms nicely that Jupiter is prominent both in soldier's and politician's charts, and Mars is prominent both in sportsmen's and scientist's charts.

(Edited: removed some theoretical ponderings that proved erroneous at a closer look.)
Last edited by Papretis on Fri Jun 28, 2013 3:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.

17
Papretis wrote:
thank you again for interesting references. I'll read the article you mentioned.
Actually I need to thank you for the article link! I was looking for old Skyscript discussions on the Gauquelin data and found this thread from 2005 which you participated in:

http://skyscript.co.uk/forums/viewtopic ... 0f89a8e544

Mark
As thou conversest with the heavens, so instruct and inform thy minde according to the image of Divinity William Lilly

18
interesting link mark. i hadn't read that before.. i like an attempt at a tie in to the golden ratio.. that was interesting..

"To summarize, there are four golden ratio axes according to Landscheidt and these are:

42.5 and 222.5: major golden ratio of 360 degrees
137.5 and 317.5: minor golden ratio of 360 degrees
111.2 and 291.2: major golden ratio of 180 degrees
68.8 and 248.8: minor golden ratio of 180 degrees
"

the first 4 numbers are quite close to the semisquare and sesquisquare aspects.. the last 4 are directly connected to my favourite 16th harmonic aspect - 22.5 degree aspect with a 1 degree orb.. essentially all these numbers are 8th or 16th harmonic numbers with a 1 to 2 degree orb.

"Gauquelin was also inclined to reanalyze the data with an interest in personality traits rather than a more superficial association of a profession with the planet."

i was unaware of this statement that i picked up in the article as well. that too is quite revealing as he opted to chose data from those who fit the personality traits rather then the profession only..

Statistical research: YES!

19
Thanks to Mr Papretis for attempting to test the clockwise octotopus system statistically. Indeed, Monsieur Michel Gauquelin's findings were somewhat embarrassing for astrologers who often were as much or more critical of his work than aggressive, dogmatic sceptics.

Astrology and astronomy were not separated until relatively recently. Astrology attempts to correlate celestial with terrestrial phenomena. It was understood by nearly all astrologers as a science until the 19th century CE.

The French astrologer-author Monsieur Daniel Verney in Fondements et Avenir de l'Astrologie pointed out that Gauquelin's findings concerned visible, notorious persons, not 'nobodies'. This, according to M. Verney, corresponds to the importance of the outer 'social' planets in the correlations found and with S?l?n? who represented the public. Gauquelin found some comparatively weak correlations for Aphodit?, none for Herm?s (mostly invisible), nor for the Great H?lios (too visible, blinding?) nor for planets beyond Kronos (invisible).

Mr John Addey found that some of Gauquelin's findings combined certain waves round the zodiac that are clearer when separated. Mr Addey, however, was apparently more interested in integrating his astrological studies into neo-Platonic philosophy than in painstaking statistical research. Prof. Dr. Percy Seymour, in addition to waves, included magnetic, plasm and light phenomena is his works, also, like Gauquelin's, mostly ignored by astrologers.

Monsieur Jacques Dorsan wrote a lengthy book explaining a 12-house clockwise system and has been followed in this by some other French astrologers. He did not find an 8-house system convenient due to its lacking correspondences between signs and houses. (Beware: the English translation currently available does NOT faithfully reproduce the original French.)

IF one prefers to consider astrology a natural science rather than a 'mantic science' [sic], THEN there is plenty of research work to do by Mr Papretis and others duly qualified. To speculate and add a few positively selected charts by way of anecdotal evidence is certainly the easier road. One might call to mind that statistical research and calculations can show probabilities but no absolute verities. Even if a sample revealed a probability of 1 or 0, subsequent samples might show less or more. There is always a margin of error due to the impossibility of including an indefinite amount (ad infinitum) of data. Philosophers of the sceptical school recommended that one 'suspend judgement'.

In my humble opinion those who believe they might discover the Great Astrological Truth (or any other) in some ancient manuscripts revealed to and/ or by Seers may be closer to some Hollywood films than to reality. But, like others, they are free to believe what they like and to propose whatever astrology they prefer.

Best regards,

lihin
Non esse nihil non est.

20
Nice discussion. I appreciate Papretis' sincere and strenuous efforts to make sense of astrology (and have enjoyed as well the thoughtful responses to his initial post). As one who adheres to the notion of doubt as an examiner, I also appreciate and sympathize with his difficulty in maintaining belief in astrology. To honestly be aware of and bothered by problems with one's belief system is to constantly skate on the edge of unbelief. Yet I am not sure it's possible to discover a more empirically and conceptually adequate astrology in the absence of adherent truth seekers who possess this mentality.

There are I think several ways to pursue knowledge of a kind of natural order that could be termed "astrological" (as per my article After Symbolism on Patrice Guinard's CURA website) and Gauquelin-type research is one of them. That research and its implications are, however, regularly misconstrued even by astrologers who recognize its importance and wish to extend the Gauquelin achievement. I hope it won't be taken amiss if I suggest that such misconceptions are present in this discussion, as I wish only, by my own efforts and by supporting the efforts of like-minded researchers, to contribute to bringing a truer and more real astrology into the light of day.

Papretis says he "didn?t know that Gauquelin flirted a bit with [the] Octoscope in the 80/90?s." To the best of my knowledge he didn't. Papretis apparently has in mind Mark's reference to Patrice's "conclusion that Gauquelin proposed a simple eightfold division." But Patrice doesn't say that in the quotation in Mark's post. The key phrase is "the only really valid discovery, made unawares [my emphasis], namely: the presence in the global curves of the eight astrological houses." What Patrice is saying, it seems to me, is that he sees something in the Gauquelin results that the Gauquelins themselves overlooked. I suspect what he means is that there are four areas of the chart termed plus zones and four areas in between. Ergo, eight areas in all, and therefore tacitly an Octoscope.

I think Patrice is mistaken, and that the notion that the Gauquelin work says anything at all about houses is mistaken. Whether there are eight or twelve houses, running clockwise or counterclockwise, beginning at the Asc or at some point prior to the Asc is all beside the point, at least insofar as the Gauquelin work is concerned. The definitive beginning and ending of plus zones makes them look at first glance like houses, but that's an artifact of the statistical procedure. It requires defined areas within which we can definitively say how often Mars should appear and how often it actually does. The size of the plus zones is in essence a rough guess of the size of the orb of effect. Because Gauquelin of necessity used bounded sectors and plus zones doesn't mean the Mars effect itself is sharply bounded and uniform within those boundaries. More to the point, If a plus zone were a house there would be eight or twelve of them with eight or twelve different effects. Instead we have a single effect present when Mars is in a plus zone and absent when it isn't. Binary, on or off effects are indicative of aspects, not interpretive boxes like signs or houses. The Gauquelin work shows the effects of aspects, not house positions.

Dean's discussion of the Gauquelin work in Recent Advances in Natal Astrology appears to support this conclusion. Although uncertain of the reference point ? "The MC may be merely a harmonic of the Rising Point or vice versa . . ." ? he concludes that "the most important aspects are conjunction and opposition the Rising Point or MC (or at least to a position about ten degrees past those points . . .)." Thinking that the aspects are phase shifted about 10? doesn't deter him from seeing them as aspects. If an effect is strongest and the aspect presumably partile at 10?, 100?, 190? and 270? from a reference point, they're still aspects and not interpretive boxes.

However, a phase shift isn't the only possible explanation for the peaks being slightly past the angles. Dean notes, "During a birth the attention of those involved is usually anywhere but on the clock. After the delivery various duties have to be attended to. In Europe the responsibility for recording the birth usually falls on the father: in the early days he was prohibited from the delivery room and therefore had to rely on secondhand information. Hence it is plausible that the registered birth time should tend to be too late." My own birth is a case in point. It was at home, there was a clock on the wall opposite the foot of the bed that was corrected daily (my grandmother ran a country store to which the house was attached), my mother was comfortable, awake and watching the clock (I was her firstborn) and clearly remembered the time: 12:55 am. But my birth certificate shows 1:05 am, undoubtedly for the reasons given above. Dean notes that an average lateness factor of 15-30 minutes would put the peaks exactly on the angles.

But Dean adds, "However, this intriguing explanation is not supported by direct evidence," noting that Francoise Gauquelin compared over 10,000 registered times with hospital records and found a low error rate, and when large errors did occur they were as likely to be before the hospital time as after it. I see two problems with this argument. One, the latter times were from the Paris area 1923-30. Most of the subjects used in the eminent professionals experiments, on the other hand, were born from 1850-1910, most of them not in the Paris area, probably a great many of them not in hospitals. Two, and this is the more decisive point, at most F. Gauquelin's test showed, and this only for hospital births in a later time period, that the clerks with whom the births were registered didn't systematically write down a time later than the one they were given. It doesn't mean there wasn't an average lateness in the times reported to them. No doubt my own birth certificate accurately reflects the time observed by the doctor who delivered me. It was his observation that was in error. Dean's phrase "not supported by direct evidence" is misleading because F. Gauquelin tested the least likely source of error. More likely sources of error are the time initially being observed erroneously (e.g., by the doctor who delivered me), or the person registering the birth giving the registrar a time that didn't match the initially observed time. (Dean himself, in The Gauquelin work 2: Opinions, artifacts, puzzles, suggests that the latter has been a significant source of error, although he's making a different point than I am here.) It seems to me an average lateness factor remains a viable and indeed likely possibility.

An obvious question at this point is, what is Mars in aspect to? Dean seems to think it's either the MC or the Rising Point. I suggest that if Mars in your chart is in a plus zone it's in hard-angle aspect to you, more specifically to where you were at the moment of birth. We don't think of it as an aspectable factor because we erect a framework around it, call it a house system, and see a set of interpretive boxes containing planets and through which transiting and progressed planets move. But just as planets move in a circle relative to the earth, with positions along the ecliptic even though they're most of the time not on it, so too does a point on the earth's surface not exactly on a pole move in a circle, carried by the earth's spin, and so too can its position be stated in terms of the ecliptic even though it's not on it. We can specify its ecliptic position in two ways. If we draw a line from the birthplace along a geographic meridian, the point where it crosses the ecliptic is the MC. If we draw that line along an ecliptic meridian, perpendicular to the ecliptic, the point where it crosses the ecliptic is the Nonagesimal (NG). The Asc and Dsc are 90? spherically from the birthplace, and 90? zodiacally from the NG. They're aspects, not primary reference points. The primary reference point is your position at the moment of birth.

I'm going to stop here for the moment. It's taken me about a week to write this much. I'll continue with another post analyzing Papretis' research (to the extent that it can be analyzed given the details he's shared so far), describing the Gauquelin results more fully, and suggesting how experimentalists (i.e., statisticians) can most effectively clarify, extend, and augment them in our efforts to determine what's astrologically "true" in what ways.
Article: After Symbolism

21
Lihin/Spock,

Just to clarify Papretis is female.

regards

Mark
As thou conversest with the heavens, so instruct and inform thy minde according to the image of Divinity William Lilly

22
Spock wrote:
......the notion that the Gauquelin work says anything at all about houses is mistaken. Whether there are eight or twelve houses, running clockwise or counterclockwise, beginning at the Asc or at some point prior to the Asc is all beside the point, at least insofar as the Gauquelin work is concerned. The definitive beginning and ending of plus zones makes them look at first glance like houses, but that's an artifact of the statistical procedure. It requires defined areas within which we can definitively say how often Mars should appear and how often it actually does. The size of the plus zones is in essence a rough guess of the size of the orb of effect. Because Gauquelin of necessity used bounded sectors and plus zones doesn't mean the Mars effect itself is sharply bounded and uniform within those boundaries. More to the point, If a plus zone were a house there would be eight or twelve of them with eight or twelve different effects. Instead we have a single effect present when Mars is in a plus zone and absent when it isn't. Binary, on or off effects are indicative of aspects, not interpretive boxes like signs or houses. The Gauquelin work shows the effects of aspects, not house positions.
This is an excellent point and very well put. I had been thinking along these lines myself. The Gauquelin data seems to be informing us about planetary power in any the plus zones but I struggle to see how we can draw separate topical meaning from them as Papretis suggests.

On the other hand the research does provide interesting data on the traditional astrological idea of angularity. For astrologers utilising dynamical systems to assess planetary strength the Gauquelin research give a clear steer that both sides of an angle can be linked to power/eminence. Hence dynamical systems that facilitate this seem more promising.

Spock wrote:
It seems to me an average lateness factor remains a viable and indeed likely possibility.


Another excellent point. The heavy focus of Gauquelin plus zones behind the angles may be a reflection of the time delay allowing planets to disproportionately pass diurnally behind the angles. The possibility that the plus zones contain a statistical artifact is certainly a possibility.

I know here is Scotland birth times are now recorded much more accurately now than in the past and times are rounded off to the nearest 5 minutes rather than the 15 minutes round off of my generational cohort. Its an awesome task but collecting a new collection of accurately timed nativities outside of Gauquelin seems necessary.

Spock wrote:
If we draw that line along an ecliptic meridian, perpendicular to the ecliptic, the point where it crosses the ecliptic is the Nonagesimal (NG). The Asc and Dsc are 90? spherically from the birthplace, and 90? zodiacally from the NG. They're aspects, not primary reference points. The primary reference point is your position at the moment of birth.
Very interesting. I had always assumed the Gauquelin plus zone above the horizon were picking up the MC. but you seem to be suggesting instead it is proximity to the Nonagesimal which is the point squaring the ASC zodically. It corresponds to the equal house 10th cusp.

I have taken this definition from Michael Wackford's article on Global Horoscopes here on Skyscript:
... Equal House 10th, otherwise known as the Ecliptic Zenith or Nonagesimal. This cusp, which is always the point of the ecliptic highest in the local sky, is the ecliptic point closest to the celestial position of the birthplace ( = the celestial zenith). Any Equal House 10th cusp therefore represents the ecliptic longitude of the birthplace - or even that of the native!
Just to recap the The midheaven (MC)? is the part of the part of the ecliptic that corresponds to the highest point in a celestial object's apparent daily traverse of the visible sky, midway between its ascension on the eastern?horizon?and descension on the western horizon.

The midheaven does not represent the point immediately overhead (our local?zenith), but the point at which that meridian intersects with the?ecliptic.

I know astrologers often overuse the term synchronicity. Still, your focus on the Nonagesimal is quite a coincidence. I have checking out the sparse astrological references to this point on the internet for the last day or so and intended to create a thread on this topic in the General forum!

Mark
As thou conversest with the heavens, so instruct and inform thy minde according to the image of Divinity William Lilly

23
hi spock,

welcome to skyscript!

i especially liked your post and what you had to say. i also note astrologers emphasis on house systems as opposed to some of the other ways of getting insight into a chart, such as aspects. it is an interesting thought to consider how aspect relationships to the angles instead of various house system positions might produce different results.

i especially liked your comments in the opening paragraph copied below..
spock wrote:As one who adheres to the notion of doubt as an examiner, I also appreciate and sympathize with his difficulty in maintaining belief in astrology. To honestly be aware of and bothered by problems with one's belief system is to constantly skate on the edge of unbelief. Yet I am not sure it's possible to discover a more empirically and conceptually adequate astrology in the absence of adherent truth seekers who possess this mentality.

Restriction of astrology to human psychology?

24
Good morning,

Dr. Patrice Guinard, alas - perhaps in deference to the general academic, astrology-adverse environment - largely restricted astrology to human psychology in her work on the clockwise octotopus. In my humble opinion Mr Cyril Fagan's basic interpretations of the eight clockwise places are more suitable for research.

The basic correspondence of a solar day to a life cycle is rather evident to many if not most people, also to non-astrologers. Asc -> sprout, MC -> fully developed plant, Desc -> death, IC -> dormant seed. Much if not most modern astrology, however, has attached more importance to the secondary counter-clockwise zodiacal cycle even to the extent of largely ignoring primary motion.

Of course, one can make a good case for the night rather than the day. Celestial phenomena are largely obscured by H?lios during the day. Humans, diurnal by nature, tend to assign relatively little importance to the Night.

Best regards,

lihin

PS Apologies to Ms Papretis for the gender error, avoidable if i had properly considered the final 'is' in Greek, masculine being 'os'.
Non esse nihil non est.

Re: Octoscope giving promising statistical results

26
Papretis wrote:Hi all and sorry for the long post,

I was a frequent contributor here a few years ago. Then I stopped astrology altogether. I was fond of statistical studies and scientific view on astrology, I also studied extensively the sidereal zodiac. Then I concluded that astrology simply doesn?t work, or if it works, then possibly on the intuitive / divinatory / occult level, which I am not interested in.

Still recently I?ve been drawn to the statistical studies on astrology again. I had some of my old software left and most importantly, lots of samples from the old Astrodatabank CD-rom.

In the past years I studied especially thoroughly the houses, different house systems, first the usual ones, then whole signs, then even Indian Sripati style houses, where the houses spread on the both sides of the cusps. The results were poor. The twelve houses, let alone their rulers, simply don?t behave on the real charts as expected, not with any kind of system, not with whole signs, no tropically, no sidereally; neither statistically nor on the charts of friends or loved ones.

Also the Gauquelin results baffled me. How come that the most influential areas are located in houses that are classically considered cadent and therefore weak?

Then I found out about Cyril Fagan?s idea of Octotopos or Octoscope, an ancient(?) eight-fold house system, where the houses have the same meanings as the first eight houses of the usual 12 house system, but the last house is the house of death, and that?s it. Neat, isn?t it? Fagan suggested that these houses are located on the both sides of the cusps, Sripati style, and they run clockwise, the first house being located on the both sides of the Ascendant, the second house after that above the horizon spreading over the classical 11th house, the third house on both sides of the MC, and so on.

The problem was that there seemingly was no way to study Octoscope statistically with Jigsaw. But actually there is: Diurnal arc, divided in 40 sectors. Five sectors = one house. Fine!

But if Gauquelin was right, then the first house should not be located on the both sides of the Ascendant, but it should start on the Ascendant, clockwise. The 1st house (?the Saturn house?, if we think about the Chaldean way of associating houses with planets) would then contain the classical 12th house and half of the 11th house; the 2nd house (Jupiter) would be half of the 11th house and the 10th house; the 3rd house (Mars) would begin from the MC and contain the classical 9th house and half of the 8th house; the 4th house (the Sun) would contain half of the classical 8th house and the 7th house; the 5th house (Venus) would begin from the DC and contain the classical 6th house and half of the 5th house; the 6th house (Mercury) would contain half of the classical 5th house and the 4th house; the 7th house (the Moon) would contain the classical 3rd house and half of the 2nd house; and finally the 8th house (death) would contain half of the classical 2nd house and the 1st house.

I like the idea of the early houses dealing with physical and public things being located above the horizon, and the latter, ?deeper? houses being located below the horizon. It fits well with the diurnal / nocturnal concept. I also like the idea of planets located in the house of death being just below the horizon, invisible but ready to rise again.

I like it how the 1st and 2nd houses are on the sanguine, wet and increasingly hot quarter of the horoscope; the 3rd and 4th houses associated with fiery Mars and the Sun being on the hot and dry midday quarter; the 5th and 6th houses associated with creative and inventive Venus and Mercury being on the melancholic evening quarter; and finally the 7th (the Moon) and 8th houses located on the wet and cold night quarter symbolizing rest and inner life.

Enough for poetry, let?s do some calculating to test this idea. I have 174 different samples, mainly from AstroDatabank, but also some Gauquelin data and samples from Jigsaw. I created a huge (>48000) charts from random data for comparison and run all the 174 samples through using Jigsaw and Excel. The idea was to look, in which Octoscope house the tropical Ascendant ruler is most often located in every group. Would groups with similar themes be gathered under the same houses? Would those themes reflect the suggested house themes?

The results were convincing. The winners seem to flock in the first Octoscope house exactly as we should expect from a cardinal house (no 12th house themes here!). I give some examples: 147 conductors, 132 opera singers, 362 fine art artists, 312 composers, 622 fiction writers, 237 dancers / teachers, 293 poets, 101 critics, 107 fashion designers ? all of those artists have the Asc ruler most often in the first Octoscope house. The individual statistical effects of each group are not statistically significant as such, but together they would seem to make a pattern.

There?s also another 1st theme represented, that of a beautiful, healthy and vigorous physical body. 366 good looking people, 80 tennis players, 191 outdoors people, 83 PR people, 150 adventurers, 667 army servants, we can mention those 237 dancers also here, and 109 polices all have their Asc rulers most often in the 1st house. Again, if we looked at individual results, they might well be accidental, but all of them together? maybe not so accidental.

Let?s look at the 8th Octoscope house for comparison, which should mainly be the first house in the classical 12h house system. What do we see here, Gauquelin?s 9279 infant birth deaths, out of that group 1263 charts have the Asc ruler most often in the 8th Octoscope house, in the house of death (the expected value being 1167). Just as they say in books, except we have always thought that the area in consideration should be the first house, not the last. The effect is again not big as such, but when we find that also Gauquelin?s 622 murderers have their Asc ruler most often in the 8th Octoscope house, that kind of rises one?s hair up. What else do we find here? 322 acute delusion cases (Gauquelin), 81 nervous breakdown cases (ADB), 876 mentally deranged people (Gauquelin), 85 rapists (ADB) and 1265 schizophrenics (Gauquelin). This is beginning to sound really scary!

Fortunately we realize that there is a brighter side too: 682 people with kids more than three, 82 nurturing personalities, 33 psychiatrists, 41 US presidents (Jigsaw), 145 sports coaches / managers, 169 baseball players, 142 football players and 90 people excelling in martial arts all have their Asc rulers most often in the 8th Octoscope house. What?s the unifying theme here? Maybe sacrificing your individual aspirations to a bigger cause, be it children, your sports team, or the welfare of the United States. The classical 12th house themes, but found in the area we thought would mainly be the 1st house.

I?ll take one more, the 2nd Octoscope house because that is especially interesting. We are looking at the Jovian house of money (also friends in hindu astrology) and what do we have here? 202 people with a happy marriage (the effect is so strong that it?s actually statistically significant alone giving a p-score < 0,05: 47 charts out of 202 when the expected value is 26); 186 gracious / social people, 1002 politicians (Gauquelin), 198 social activists, 86 restaurateurs, 234 political activists, 1102 politicians (ADB), 37 trade union activists, 394 attorneys, 460 editors / publishers, 78 bigoted personalities, 134 ambitious personalities and 400 journalists. Money means politics in today?s world! Such Jovian themes: society, extroversion, influence, power.

These are not the only results that I?ve got, but this is too long a post already. Now what we need is that astrology software makers would start to include Octoscope in their programs. Programmers, please?
Hi Sari
Would it be possible to post your research or some sample charts

thanks
Anja

27
Anja,
I'm preparing an artricle about my study with the lists of the samples and results, example charts with a lot of planets in certain houses, etc. I'm planning to put that on the internet for free download. I hope it will be ready in a few weeks.

Thanks again for everyone for good comments. lihin wrote:
The basic correspondence of a solar day to a life cycle is rather evident to many if not most people, also to non-astrologers. Asc -> sprout, MC -> fully developed plant, Desc -> death, IC -> dormant seed. Much if not most modern astrology, however, has attached more importance to the secondary counter-clockwise zodiacal cycle even to the extent of largely ignoring primary motion.
Yes, I agree with you. There's one astrologer in Finland (Markku Manninen) who puts a lot of emphasis on the time of day of one?s birth. He says that people born in daytime differ crucially from people born in the night, and he uses a somewhat similar system that the Octoscope gives, expect a three-fold one (day ? afternoon & evening ? night).

In my study it was really revealing to see how the quarters of the diurnal cycle followed the sanguine (morning) ? choleric (day) ? melancholic (evening) ? phlegmatic (night) cycle and how the nature of the eight houses reflected that cycle.

lihin wrote:
Monsieur Jacques Dorsan wrote a lengthy book explaining a 12-house clockwise system and has been followed in this by some other French astrologers. He did not find an 8-house system convenient due to its lacking correspondences between signs and houses. (Beware: the English translation currently available does NOT faithfully reproduce the original French.)
I can understand Dorsan?s unwillingness to adopt an eight-fold house system because of lack of symbolic correspondences. One reason for early astrologers for adopting a 12 house system might really have been the (assumed / comfortable, etc.) correlation between the signs and houses. But with the eight houses we can use the Chaldean order of the planets as a reference point, which is used also for the twelve houses, but in a somewhat clumsy way. With the Octoscope houses it really seems to work the 1st house corresponding with Saturn, the 2nd with Jupiter, the 3rd with Mars, the 4th with the Sun, the 5th with Venus, the 6th with Mercury, the 7th with the Moon and the 8th again with Saturn.

Yes, as Mark wrote, I am female :wink: . ?papretis? is an alias and it has nothing to do with my own name. Nowadays I rather wish to remain as anonymous as possible to what comes to astrology.

lihin wrote:
In my humble opinion those who believe they might discover the Great Astrological Truth (or any other) in some ancient manuscripts revealed to and/ or by Seers may be closer to some Hollywood films than to reality.
We?re of the same mindset. Sophia Centre has recently started to publish a new journal on the internet, Spica, http://www.astronomy-and-culture.org/jo ... 2013-1.pdf , and I was actually quite horrified to read in the first article (?Do consumers of astrological services use astrology as a method of actively seeking divine guidance? If so, what astrological services are sought for the purpose? A Pilot Study.? by Marcia Butchart), how people deeply involved in astrology use it as some kind of religious practice. If divination really is all there is in astrology, I must politely say that it will never be my cup of tea.