Seven Arguments for why the Sidereal Zodiac is the best form of sign division.

waybread

Well-known member
BTW, on Epiphany, I suggest that skeptics read up on the 12 days of Christmas. Y'all know what the Epiphany commemorates, right?

It got deleted in the other thread, but another argument from antiquity concerning the ''abstract boundaries'' was this:

The sidereal boundaries were put forward by astrologers whose observations comprise entire cosmic periods. Historically, those astrologers have observed the heavens for twice as long as the age of the tropical zodiac today, but according to their statement - 245 times as long (490 000 years or more by some accounts). Their astrology was closely related to fixed stars and constellations, thus they attached 12 eponymous names to the signs.

What do you mean by "an entire cosmic period"?????? An astrological age? The species Homo sapiens didn't exist 490,000 years ago. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_sapiens and nothing resembling horoscopic astrology existed until late in the first or possibly second century BCE.

As you know, detailed calibration of the solar year in many ways predates Hipparchus (ca. 190-120 BCE) because of really ancient archaeological evidence of solstice-oriented cultures. (See my previous posts here on the henge builders.)

Further, horoscopic astrology of any description didn't even exist until about the 2nd century BCE, Schmidt's case for Eudoxus as the founder of horoscopic astrology notwithstanding. http://www.projecthindsight.com/ Eudoxus was another ancient Greek with zero surviving writings, known only second or third hand. Eudoxus lived c. 390 – c. 337 BC, but this doesn't much account for Berossus, the legendary transmitter of astrology to Greece who probably lived after 340 BCE - early 3rd century BCE. There's no evidence that Eudoxus was a practicing astrologer, either.
We've got a bit of a disconnect.

The astronomical signs were invented in Babylon, only ca. 500 BCE; and then to facilitate the forecasting eclipses. Not for all of the other uses to which astrologers subsequently put them. As you know, constellations are not the same as 30-degree signs; regardless of whether the signs are sidereal or tropical.

The sidereal astrologers (including the early Hellenistic astrologers) use the same zodiac +- a couple degrees.

The tropical boundaries were put forward by the astronomer Hipparchus of which there is no record to have practiced astrology.

Right, so don't beat up on poor old Ptolemy. In his day, the two zodiacs were probably equal, plus or minus one degree. Moreover the idea that you can arbitrarily decide that someone was not a practicing astrologer and therefore blow off his credibility makes no sense at all.

The notion that these ancients could have even predicted a sidereal debate 2000 years later beggars the imagination.

This zodiac is currently 23-25 degrees off from the sidereal zodiac that the ancient astrologers used.

Yes, it is so far off. So bleeping what? The tropical zodiac has been used successfully since late ancient times, by oodles of card-carrying traditional astrologers. The proof of the pudding....
 
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waybread

Well-known member
...

Astronomy also was useful for timekeeping and meteorology, two vital things for the ancients. Ptolemy himself makes the distinction in the first chapters of the Tetrabiblos (he says he covers astronomy in his treatise ''Almagest'', but astrology in the ''Tetrabiblos''). This is what motivated the tropical zodiac in the first place.

I don't think the ancient distinction between human and physical subjects was complete. Sometimes scholars today make distinctions that actually did not occur in ancient times. For example, between Babylonian "religion" and "science." Or sometimes we forget how we blur distinctions today. For example, if you read a farmer's almanac today for information on upcoming weather and desirable moon sign times to plant your garden, is this physical or cultural?

Obviously a Roman consulting astrological practice would not require knowledge of astro-meteorology for ancient parents wanting a nativity reading for a new son. But weather was of major importance for merchant shipping trades on the Mediterranean. (See Aratus on that. A point you mention below.)

BTW, the text of Aratus, Phaenomena is on-line at: http://www.theoi.com/Text/AratusPhaenomena.html

Aratus also wrote on astronomical meteorology, and look what Firmicus Maternus says about him:

''To these stars antiquity gave names from fables. In Greek the most
learned poet Aratos traced the number of these stars and in Latin,
Caesar and Tullius, the model of eloquence. These men published the
names of the constellations and their risings but not the significance for
forecasting, so it seems to me that not the science of astrology but poetic
license motivated them.'' - Maternus, J. F. (1975). Mathesis, translated as Ancient Astrology: Theory and Practice, Jean Rhys Bram, Park Ridge.

Firmicus proceeds to use the constellations astrologically, just as most of the properties of the zodiacal signs originate in the Hellenistic tradition.

Firmicus has my respect, but he was entirely unfair about Aratus. As I just indicated, horoscopic astrology probably either did not exist in Aratus's day, or was in a very nascent stage. Poetry (hexameter) was simply the medium that reverent ancient Greek and Latin authors thought appropriate for writing about serious topics like the heavens, the gods, and their legends.

In a way, it's a tour de force that Manilius managed to convey so much really solid practical astrological information by writing in poetry. You try it.

We also have the great need for the qibla direction amongst the Arabs and the great need for the religious date of the Pascha amongst the Jews and Christian population. For this you need proficiency in astronomy. Also for sea navigation, something frequently used in the Mediterranean. These look more important than the astrology itself, which is a system of divination (although made physics later).

Well, obviously Aratus (Phaenomena) was not an astrologer. He lived from ca. 315/310 to 240 BCE, a time when Hellenistic horoscopic astrology either didn't exist or would have been highly restricted in its extent.

Absence of evidence and statements about some of those astronomers that they rejected* or did not practice astrology is pretty strong evidence for me, especially taking the historical period into account.

We have no idea what Hipparchus thought. But you didn't address here my previous point. Why, in heaven's name would Hipparchus have gone to so much trouble to lay the mathematical ground-work on which Hellenistic astrology absolutely depended if he weren't sympathetic to it?? Perhaps you think it's merely fortuitous? If so, I have a bridge to sell you.

These might be of interest:

https://camws.org/meeting/2013/files/abstracts/348.Hipparchus and Aratus.pdf

http://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803095937997

But basically your logic is, "This guy wasn't a card-carrying union member of the International Brotherhood of Practicing Astrologers. Therefore, I reject his support for the tropical zodiac." Big non-sequitur. Does Not Compute.


* There is a statement that Eudoxus of Cnidus wholly rejected Babylonian astrology of nativities.
There is a statement by Valens that those astronomers do not mention computing length of life.
There is a statement that Aratus and other similar poets were not driven by astrology of nativities.

And where might these statements exist, pray tell??? References? Nevermind. More importantly, what is your point here?

Unless you have a pretty wide definition of astrology, for me those are only astronomers. Ptolemy (who never cites Hipparchus on astrology) is an astrologer because he tells you how to delineate a chart, even though he tries to put everything on the ground of physics.

You are engaging in the historical sin of presentism. We have to try to understand the past in its own terms, however imperfectly. Otherwise we're simply looking in the mirror, imagining that we have something to say about the past, when we're only talking about our own beliefs in the present.

Not only does Ptolemy give huge amounts of information on how to interpret a horoscope (to the point where you could use Tetrabiblos as a textbook today, as he was used by astrologers who post-dated him.) He devotes his first book to countering astrology's critics.

Ptolemy was trying to put astrology on (to him) a more rational, Aristotelian footing, by writing a textbook. Do you know how many university textbooks today are written by professors who have never worked in the applied fields in government or industry that they write about? How many English literature professors have ever written a great novel??

Your criterion for credibility seems truly biased.
 

david starling

Well-known member
An aeronautical engineer designs a new aircraft. It's successfully flown by test-pilots, goes into production, and becomes so popular among both pilots and passengers that it corners the market. However, it's criticized because the original designer was never known to have flown the plane himself. :biggrin:
 

petosiris

Banned
An aeronautical engineer designs a new aircraft. It's successfully flown by test-pilots, goes into production, and becomes so popular among both pilots and passengers that it corners the market. However, it's criticized because the original designer was never known to have flown the plane himself. :biggrin:

It seems to me more like there is a mechanical engineer who produces a race car for pilots who need and used planes before, and have never driven cars, when they suddenly have to just deal with it and drive cars. Also this car only drives on the Northern Hemisphere and prefers temperate climate, when the older planes could fly everywhere.
 

david starling

Well-known member
It seems to me more like there is a mechanical engineer who produces a race car for pilots who need and used planes before, and have never driven cars, when they suddenly have to just deal with it and drive cars. Also this car only drives on the Northern Hemisphere and prefers temperate climate, when the older planes could fly everywhere.

Not bad....Tropical IS more "down to Earth", and is better suited for life "where the rubber meets the road". Much less "airy-faery" than Sidereal. :biggrin: Australian Astrologers are pleased with its performance in the Southern Hemisphere, as are those in South America, so that last part is clearly wrong.
 
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waybread

Well-known member
It seems to me more like there is a mechanical engineer who produces a race car for pilots who need and used planes before, and have never driven cars, when they suddenly have to just deal with it and drive cars. Also this car only drives on the Northern Hemisphere and prefers temperate climate, when the older planes could fly everywhere.

Was it awfully late in your time zone when you wrote this?:unsure:
 

david starling

Well-known member
I got a good view of Antares a few nights ago, but the rest of the constellation was obscured by fog. And there was bright Jupiter, just where the ephemeris said it should be, trailing behind about a Sign's distance apart. Jupiter is in Tropical Scorpio, now mostly occupied by the Constellation Libra which was fashioned from the claws of the Scorpion to create the necessary 12 Seasonal divisions. Couldn't see any of the stars of the Libran constellation, but I'm sure it was there. :biggrin:
 

david starling

Well-known member
A Tropical SR is a return to the exact degree, minute, and second of the Sun's position in the Tropical Natal-chart, distant stars notwithstanding. The stars will have advanced slightly in Tropical coordinates each year, due to Progression of the Constellations. So, if Regulus, for example, was exactly Conjunct the Sun in the Tropical Natal-chart, it will move out of Conjunction by a steadily increasing, although relatively small amount, in each SR. By age 72, Regulus will be about 1 degree out of that original exact Conjunction in the Natal-chart, in Direct-motion.
All movement is relative. Stick with your chosen coordinate-system, and all will be as it should be. The problem arises when one locating method is mixed with another. A dislike, for whatever reason, of a consistent coordinate-system other than one's own favorite, does not invalidate the former, and does nothing to enhance the latter. :biggrin:
 
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david starling

Well-known member
Fixed stars do not move.

The point or points one decides to HOLD fixed are stationary, and are used to measure the movement of everything else. So, you're absolutely right--IF you CHOOSE the distant stars as your fixed points, they are stationary, and CAN be used to measure the movement of the seasonal points. If, one CHOOSES to hold the seasonally-measured locations of our star, the Sun, as fixed points, THEY are stationary, and can be used to measure the movement of the distant stars. It's usually called the "Theory of Relativity", and was first espoused by Galileo. If you need to anchor your Astrology to the distant stars, by all means, CHOOSE them as your fixed points. Not a problem!
 

david starling

Well-known member
Is it important to your Religion that the distant stars are considered fixed points? That WOULD explain why you find Tropical coordinates so heretical.
 

petosiris

Banned
Is it important to your Religion that the distant stars are considered fixed points? That WOULD explain why you find Tropical coordinates so heretical.

Don't call them distant. Call them by their names - fixed.

And if [the believers in Ptolemy’s precession theory] adduce the computations of the motion of the planets and the settings out of nativities [made] on the hypothesis that the fixed stars move with this motion in the direction of the trailing parts [i.e. the westward motion at a rate of 1° per 100 years] and think that they pronounce things in agreement with the phenomena, it has to be said to them that those who do not believe that the fixed stars move with this motion, they too, are in exceptional agreement with the phenomena, and they have published tables concerning the motions of the planets and labored diligently about the subject of horoscope interpretation [γενεθλιαλογίαν] without being in the least forced to adduce this [motion] in the setting out of tables or the discovery of nativities. I might say that the Chaldeans were such people par excellence, whose observations comprised entire cosmic periods and whose foretellings of things happening to individuals and the broad community [τῶν τε ἰδίων καὶ τῶν κοινῶν παθημάτων] were irrefutable. Why do we appeal then to the testimony of newfangled displays researched from a few observations and without such great accuracy when those others are testifying to the teachings of the ancients concerning the motion of the fixed stars? Do we not know this, that it is possible to arrive at a true conclusion also from false hypotheses, and that one ought not to consider the conclusion’s agreement with the phenomena as sufficient evidence of the truth of the hypotheses? - Jones, A. (Ed.). (2009). Ptolemy in perspective: use and criticism of his work from antiquity to the nineteenth century (Vol. 23). Springer Science & Business Media.

Proclus believes that the fixity of the non-wandering stars is an argument against precession. From a geocentric perspective, if precession is true, then either the seasons (something based on the equator) move in relation to the fixed stars, or the fixed stars (of the ecliptic) move in relation to the seasons (something based on the equator). And the ecliptic clearly goes through 12 constellations from which the names and properties of the signs/images (which all authors, including Ptolemy mention having shapes) were derived. And if we define the zodiac by the ecliptic, then we should use the ecliptic rather than the turnings of the Sun.

The decision between thousands of moving points and two moving points - the tropics, is an argument from simplicity (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/simplicity/) that we should choose the latter. In the end, nature did prove simple, as the fixed stars were discovered to slowly move by proper motion and parallax, while the somewhat swift movement observed by Ptolemy and Hipparchus - by the precession of the Earth.
 
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petosiris

Banned
Tropical ASTROlogy's Star is the Sun. Hence the term "Astro", meaning "Star". :smile:

Sidereal astrology does both. The Sun defines the ecliptic of the twelve images. You might notice that the ancients made them of 30 degrees each, because the year is close to 360 days. However, they marked the passage of the seven stars through the sidereal images while observing the equinoxes at different degrees of the signs.

The tropical zodiac is however defined not by the ecliptic and the path of the Sun, but by the spring equinox.

Therefore it is not so much about the sky and the stars, but more about the equinoxes and the seasons, in this case the Northern Hemisphere spring. Ptolemy is quite clear about this. Any attempt to defend the tropical zodiac with other rationales is modern, and this is why traditional astrologers like Deborah Houlding continue to use the seasonal rationales, but they say that the same apply to the Southern Hemisphere, even though the seasons are reversed there.

Jupiter is in Tropical Scorpio, now mostly occupied by the Constellation Libra which was fashioned from the claws of the Scorpion to create the necessary 12 Seasonal divisions. Couldn't see any of the stars of the Libran constellation, but I'm sure it was there.

Libra is the house of Venus, masculine, equinoctial, anthropomorphic, upward-trending, airy,
feminizing, vocal, noble, changeable, a diminisher of estates, the Lower Midheaven of the universe, public,
ecliptic, the supervisor of crops, vineyards, olive groves, aromatics, homesteads, measures, and artisans.
Men born under this sign are noble and just, but malicious, covetous of others’ goods, average in fortune,
losing their original possessions and falling into vicissitudes, living through ups and downs of fortune,
being in charge of measures, posts, and the grain supply - Valens, Riley translation

I personally know a person with the Moon right at the ascendant at 26 Libra (tropical both are in Scorpio) who works with law, administration, who has changed many jobs and has endured many vicissitudes (because of the tipping of the Scales), for while he has a small vineyard and a garden (they belong to a relative), he does not own property directly, in course of time it was given to others. He speaks well and is also crafty.
 
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petosiris

Banned
But, they are ALWAYS distant, compared to the close Star we're using to define the Ecliptic. And, they're NOT always fixed, as in the case of Tropical coordinates. So, "distant" is more consistent description.

Sirius and the Sun are quite close relative to Betelgeuse which is almost hundred times more distant than Sirius is.

You are going to say that does not matter, well neither does the minute of proper motion the stars have accumulated in the past thousand years right? So they ARE both distant and fixed, relatively speaking. Most tropical astrologers call them fixed stars:
https://astrologyking.com/fixed-stars/
http://www.constellationsofwords.com/Fixedstars.htm
http://www.skyscript.co.uk/shelley.html

There is no way the ancients could have known the distance of the fixed stars, although some school of Greek astronomers believed they were capable of movement, but that it was not noticeable - see A History of Ancient Mathematical Astronomy pg. 1084 by Otto Neugebauer.
I do think that there was some opposition to the very idea, for example the quote above from Proclus.
 
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