Is Uranus an Astrological Planet?
- Thread starter petosiris
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david starling
Well-known member
david starling
Well-known member
Okay. For Mods, the answer is yes. 
is an astrological planet because the telescope is an acceptable astrological tool.
For Trads, the answer is no. is not an astrological planet because it can't be identified as a planet with the naked eye, even though it is visible under the right conditions as a faint star.
For petosirus, the answer is no. is not an astrological planet because it doesn't score high enough on his size/distance ratio scale.
is an astrological planet because the telescope is an acceptable astrological tool.For Trads, the answer is no.
is not an astrological planet because it can't be identified as a planet with the naked eye, even though it is visible under the right conditions as a faint star.For petosirus, the answer is no.
is not an astrological planet because it doesn't score high enough on his size/distance ratio scale.david starling
Well-known member
I have a "thing" about the dishonest, disrespectful name "Uranus", which masquerades as a Latin name for the ancient god that the Romans actually called "Caelus". It's neither Greek nor Latin. In Spanish, it's "Urano", which is an honest contraction of the Greek, again, NOT Roman name, "Ouranos", meaning "of the Heavens".
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david starling
Well-known member
"Uranus" is not an astrological name, but the planet it refers to is an astrological planet, and is Native-ruler of the Sign Aquarius [IMO]. Since we know it exists, and where it's located, there's no reason not to include it in the Chart, unless one insists that Saturn is as far away from Earth as an astrological planet is allowed to be.
waybread
Well-known member
There's good news and bad news on Ptolemy's use of Hipparchus's data in the Almagest. While Ptolemy could have given more credit to Hipparchus, we wouldn't know much at all about Hipparchus were it not for Ptolemy. Also, it seems that Ptolemy did not conduct all of his own naked-eye observations, but extrapolated from Hipparchus's star positions. On the other hand, today Ptolemy is appreciated for mathematically modeling the heavens-- even though his cosmos was geocentric.
It appears that I follow my own interests, and you follow yours. Is this a problem? Your interests are probably not identical with Ptolemy's, either.
If you look back at Tetrabiblos 1:9, you will see that Ptolemy often clusters stars by region within a constellation. In such cases, he takes the bright and dim stars together, collectively. He gives the influence of fixed stars according to analogies with planets. So use his system or don't. It hardly matters to me.
I'm not clamoring for anything. Are you?
In astronomy, Uranus is a planet.
In modern astrology, Uranus is a planet. It is the modern co-ruler of Aquarius. (Some would say, the sole ruler.) Modern astrology is concerned with a few major essential dignities, but ignores the finer points like terms, triplicities, and faces. You may not like or appreciate modern astrology, but there it is. It's been around for over a century.
I don't think you can fit the trans-Saturnians into the table of essential dignities unless you double-up or piggy-back them onto the traditional 7 planets. But I wouldn't recommend this. First of all, there are more dwarf planets out there than just Pluto. Second, a major meaning of Uranus in modern astrology is sudden change from the previous norm, or liberation from it.
Which is why, if you want to shoe-horn Uranus into traditional astrology (and I'm not saying you do) you can solve a lot of problems by treating it as Ptolemy did: as a fixed star.
Put differently, I would say one can use Uranus as a supplementary data point.
I am not particularly interested in any fixed star except for say the 50 or so brighter ones, and even then, not that much. There are a just a few hundred fixed stars that are constantly brighter than Uranus at its brightest. But I am sincerely interested in how one can synthesize the outer planets in traditional astrology along with the seven without changing the whole edifice. Bringing the magnitude of Uranus is not going to change minds. You might as well be clamoring that it is a planet and that planets are more important than fixed stars because they are moving, and cosmic motion transmits change in ancient physics. I bet you are going to have more success in conversion. That is a joke, I know you are not doing that.
It appears that I follow my own interests, and you follow yours. Is this a problem? Your interests are probably not identical with Ptolemy's, either.
If you look back at Tetrabiblos 1:9, you will see that Ptolemy often clusters stars by region within a constellation. In such cases, he takes the bright and dim stars together, collectively. He gives the influence of fixed stars according to analogies with planets. So use his system or don't. It hardly matters to me.
I'm not clamoring for anything. Are you?
In astronomy, Uranus is a planet.
In modern astrology, Uranus is a planet. It is the modern co-ruler of Aquarius. (Some would say, the sole ruler.) Modern astrology is concerned with a few major essential dignities, but ignores the finer points like terms, triplicities, and faces. You may not like or appreciate modern astrology, but there it is. It's been around for over a century.
I don't think you can fit the trans-Saturnians into the table of essential dignities unless you double-up or piggy-back them onto the traditional 7 planets. But I wouldn't recommend this. First of all, there are more dwarf planets out there than just Pluto. Second, a major meaning of Uranus in modern astrology is sudden change from the previous norm, or liberation from it.
Which is why, if you want to shoe-horn Uranus into traditional astrology (and I'm not saying you do) you can solve a lot of problems by treating it as Ptolemy did: as a fixed star.
Put differently, I would say one can use Uranus as a supplementary data point.
Okay. For Mods, the answer is yes.
For Trads, the answer is no.
For petosirus, the answer is no.
Thanks for the summary. The telescope does not appear to contradict the second and third opinions.
david starling
Well-known member
Thanks for the summary. The telescope does not appear to contradict the second and third opinions.
I use Saturn as the farthest planet visible from Earth given the limitation of planetary recognition without a telescope.
And,
is the farthest planet from Earth that is simply visible to the naked eye, planetary recognition without a telescope aside.
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I use Saturn as the farthest planet visible from Earth given the limitation of planetary recognition.
And,
Doesn't seem consistent, mine argument does.
david starling
Well-known member
Doesn't seem consistent, mine argument does.
There's a difference between being completely invisible to the naked eye without a telescope, and just not being recognizable as a planet, rather than a star, without a telescope.
I am pretty sure if someone told the keen ancient astronomers that it was a planet, they would have observed that it really was. This doesn't change the objections to its equalization with the two and five - namely that it doesn't have remotely similar apparent magnitude and size / distance ratio, regardless of whether we take the mean or maximum values.
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david starling
Well-known member
My problem with your size/distance ratio scale, is that I don't see the planets themselves "beaming an astrological effect" directly down on us in a physical way. As I've mentioned before, the body of the Earth would eclipse such an effect when the sender was below the horizon, making it a non-factor in the Chart.
Why would the Earth block their rays? Btw I don't believe the planets beam their influence, that could mean Venus and Mercury become useless at times. I can explain aspects without emission theories - https://www.astrologyweekly.com/forum/showpost.php?p=1017699&postcount=15
As I mentioned to waybread, motion plays a big role in ancient astrology that separates the five from the thousand non-wandering stars.
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david starling
Well-known member
Earth is a solid object, with considerable mass. So, Earth would block their rays. But now you're saying that they aren't emitting an influence, so why would distance from the Earth be a factor?
I think you are missing a lot of core theoretical ideas that are present in astrology. For start you should know that angles and signs often are assigned very qualitative influences - for example Aries is the exaltation of the Sun and the Ascendant is the second most powerful house, even though the first is vernal (moist) and the latter is earthy in nature - the first causes the greatest increase of heat and the second causes the rising of stars above the horizon, which actually does lower the influences of the planets considerably - this is why setting (which are above the horizon but moving towards below the earth - another qualitative not quantitative distinction) and anti-culminating planets have always been known as weaker than rising and culminating ones.
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david starling
Well-known member
They rise into a cadent House though, which supposed to be a weak position compared to an angular House.
david starling
Well-known member
Btw, how do the Nodes fit in with the size/distance ratio theory?