From: mstsen00@nx36.mik.uky.edu (ming sze tsen)
Subject: Re: *** NEWCOMERS READ THIS: FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ***
Keywords: j
Organization: University Of Kentucky, Dept. of Math Sciences
Date: Wed, 11 Nov 1992 08:34:37 GMT

In article <Bwn2A4.6E5@csn.org> lmpm@teal.csn.org (L. M. P. McPherson)  
writes:
> 
> 
>           ****** FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ******
> 
>          (Date of last modification: July 6, 1992.)
> 
> Here are some questions commonly asked by new readers of
> alt.astrology; the answers to each are given after the list of
> questions.
> 
>                *** Requests for Services ***
> 
>  1)  Could someone please do a chart interpretation for me?
> 
>  2)  I have no idea what to do with my life. Here are my birth
>      data. Can someone please tell me what I should do?
> 
>  3)  I was born on a day when the Sun changes sign. Which sign is
>      my Sun in?
> 
>  4)  Which Sun-signs are compatible with mine?
> 
>     *** Questions About How Astrology is Practiced ***
> 
>  5)  Is the Sun-sign all that is important for assessing
>      personality and for prediction, or is there more to
>      astrology?
> 
>  6)  How can one predict the nature of a relationship using
>      astrology?
> 
>         *** Questions About Learning Astrology ***
> 
>  7)  Can anyone recommend a good book on astrology for beginners?
> 
>  8)  What is the best approach to learning astrology?
> 
>  9)  Where can I find scientific research on astrology? 
> 
>                 *** General Questions ***
> 
> 10)  I have seen people born within days/hours of one another
>      whose lives are really different. How come?
> 
> 11)  What is the meaning of the term "the Age of Aquarius"?
> 
> 12)  How is it possible for astrology to work?
> 
> 13)  Does astrology control my future? Is it "wrong" to use
>      astrology to learn what the future holds for me? I'm scared.
> 
>             *** Questions About Birth Data ***
> 
> 14)  I notice that I need to know the time zone used in the place
>      I was born and the latitude and longitude of my place of
>      birth in order to erect a chart. How can I find such
>      information?
> 
> 15)  I do not know what time of day I was born. Is there some way
>      to find out?
> 
>        *** Questions About Astrological Software ***
> 
> 16)  Does anyone know if there is any software available for
>      astrology?
> 
> 17)  Where can I get a copy of the astrological software
>      Astrolog?
> 
>       *** Questions About Alt.astrology Resources ***
> 
> 18)  How can I obtain a copy of the alt.astrology "resource
>      list"?
> 
> 19)  How do I use ftp to get files from the alt.astrology ftp
>      site?
> 
> *** Questions Asked With Surprising Frequency by Disbelievers ***
> 
> 20)  Every sensible person knows that astrology couldn't possibly
>      work, so why are you people wasting your time?
> 
> 21)  How could planetary forces, of whatever nature, act upon an
>      infant when it is outside the mother, but not when it is a
>      fetus in the womb? Why should the forces only have effect at
>      the moment of birth?
> 
> 22)  Don't you guys know that astrology depends on a geocentric
>      astronomy? Copernicus blew it away.
> 
> 23)  Don't you guys know that no cause for astrological effects
>      is known? Therefore such effects cannot exist.
> 
> 24)  Don't you guys know that tests of groups of astrologers show
>      they do no better than chance? Therefore astrology does not
>      work.
> 
> 25)  Don't you guys know that astrology makes an infinity of
>      claims? You could never test them all. Therefore we can
>      dismiss it out of hand.
> 
> 26)  Don't you guys know that you can't really prove a negative,
>      such as astrology never working, anyway? Therefore we can
>      dismiss it out of hand.
> 
> 27)  Legitimate scientists (or educated people, etc., etc.)
>      universally despise astrology. Can such a weight of opinion
>      be wrong?
> 
> 28)  Why don't astrologers consider the fact that when the Sun is
>      in the sign of Aries, it is not really in the constellation
>      Aries?
> 
>               *** Questions About the FAQ ***
> 
> 29)  I have a suggestion for this FAQ list. What do I do?
> 
> 
> 
> 
>                    ****** ANSWERS ******
> 
> 
>                *** Requests for Services ***
> 
>  1)  Could someone please do a chart interpretation for me?
> 
> Answer: A complete interpretation of a person's chart takes a
> great deal of time and energy to prepare. Someone just learning
> astrology might be willing to do a chart for you as practice, but
> if you want a high quality interpretation, you must either find
> an experienced astrologer on the net who is generous enough to
> interpret your chart without compensation, or, if that is not
> possible, you could consult a local professional astrologer (look
> in the yellow pages or look at ads posted in your local occult
> bookstore; you might also write to people in the group in your
> area and ask if they know of any good local astrologers).
> 
> Of the experienced astrologers in the group, only Tito Domine has
> offered to delineate charts for people when he has the time. (He
> cannot do readings for everyone who makes a request.) His e-mail
> address is tito@ocf.berkeley.edu.
> 
> (If you are an experienced astrologer who wishes to delineate
> charts as a public service to those who cannot afford to pay for
> a reading, and if you would like your address mentioned here,
> please contact the keeper of the FAQ at lmpm@teal.csn.org.)
> 
>  2)  I have no idea what to do with my life. Here are my birth
>      data. Can someone please tell me what I should do?
> 
> Answer: Nobody can tell someone what to do with his or her life.
> However by studying one's astrological chart, one can gain
> insights into one's personality, and one can see areas of life
> where there is harmony or discord. A reading of one's chart by an
> experienced astrologer would be very valuable (see #1). After you
> have such a reading done, you could probably benefit greatly from
> learning astrology yourself and studying your chart at leisure.
> You can also look at "transits," the interactions of planets in
> the sky with your chart across time. This tells you when
> opportunities and difficulties arise in various areas of life,
> and helps you plan your future. An astrologer can tell you about
> current transits, or you could learn to read your own transits.
> With a few good books from your local occult bookstore, it's
> really quite easy. (See # 7 about books.) Interpreting transits
> is much easier than reading a natal chart (which involves a
> synthesis of many factors).
> 
>  3)  I was born on a day when the Sun changes sign. Which sign is
>      my Sun in?
> 
> Answer: Which sign your Sun falls in will depend on your exact
> time of birth. There are two ways you can find out where your Sun
> is in the zodiac. Since the Sun is only one of (at least) ten
> bodies to consider, and since the whole chart is needed for an
> understanding of the personality and the life, it might be useful
> to cast a complete chart, which would tell you the exact position
> of the Sun as well as the exact positions of all the planets and
> houses. This is easy to do these days because there exists
> astrological software for computing charts. The most accessible
> software is a programme called "Astrolog" which was written by
> Walter Pullen, a reader of the group. (See # 17 for details of
> how to get a copy of Astrolog. See # 16 for details of how to get
> information about other astrological software.)
> 
> If you do not want to calculate the chart yourself (e.g., with
> Astrolog), or if you have trouble doing so, another option is to
> order your chart from a chart calculation service. Some addresses
> for companies providing this service are listed in the
> alt.astrology resource list (see # 18 for details).
> 
> Alternatively, look in an "ephemeris," a book that lists the
> positions of all the planets (usually at midnight, sometimes at
> noon) each day. Ephemerides are available in the astrology
> section at occult ("new age") bookstores, or in some libraries in
> the astronomy section. They usually list positions for Greenwich,
> so you must calculate your time of birth in Greenwich Mean Time
> (e.g., if you were born under Pacific Standard Time, you add 8
> hours to your time of birth to get GMT; Mountain Standard Time,
> add 7 hours; Central Standard Time, add 6 hours; Eastern Standard
> Time, add 5 hours; if you were born during daylight savings time,
> subtract one hour before adding [or subtracting if you were born
> east of Greenwich] the number of hours for the time zone in which
> you were born). Next, determine if the ephemeris lists positions
> at midnight or noon. Then work out the number of hours that
> passed between the time for which positions are given (midnight
> or noon) and your time of birth in GMT. (e.g., for an ephemeris
> that lists positions for midnight, if you were born at 4:30 pm
> GMT, the difference is 16.5 hours). Divide this difference by 24
> to get the proportion of the day that passed before you were
> born. Next, calculate the number of degrees and minutes of arc
> that the Sun travelled through during that whole day. Multiply
> that amount by the proportion of the day that passed before the
> birth, and add the result to the position given for the start of
> the day (or noon if the ephemeris gives noon positions). The
> result is the position of the Sun at your birth.
> 
>  4)  Which Sun-signs are compatible with mine?
> 
> Answer: Some people feel that, in a very rough way, people with
> Suns in the same element (fire, earth, air, water) or, to a
> lesser extent, in the same polarity (positive -- fire and air, or
> negative -- earth and water) tend to get along more easily. (The
> fire signs are Aries, Leo, and Sagittarius; earth: Taurus, Virgo,
> Capricorn; air: Gemini, Libra, Aquarius; water: Cancer, Scorpio,
> Pisces.) But interactions among specific planets and houses in
> two charts are far more important in determining how well people
> will get along. Your best match may well be someone whose Sun is
> in a sign of a different polarity, and your worst enemy may well
> have his/her Sun in a sign of the same element!
> 
> Real compatibility can only be determined when the complete
> charts of two people are compared, or a special chart is
> constructed based on the two people's birth data. See answer # 6
> for details.
> 
>       *** Questions About How Astrology is Practiced ***
> 
>  5)  Is the Sun-sign all that is important for assessing
>      personality and for prediction, or is there more to
>      astrology?
> 
> Answer: The most common misconception about astrology is that it
> divides people into 12 categories, "Sun-signs" (and may subdivide
> them further by Moon-sign). This misconception comes from the
> popular practice of publishing "horoscopes" in newspapers and
> magazines for different Sun-signs, and the sale of popular books
> containing predictions for people of a particular Sun-sign.
> Unfortunately, all such horoscopes provide nothing more than
> entertainment. Valid predictions cannot be made on the basis of
> the Sun-sign alone.
> 
> In actual practice, astrology involves determining the exact
> position in the zodiac (not just by sign, but by degree and
> minute, that is, the specific part of the sky) of the Sun, the
> Moon, and 8 planets (Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn,
> Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto) at the time of a person's birth. The
> zodiacal degree of other points and bodies, such as the Moon's
> North and South Nodes, asteroids, Uranian points, and Arabic
> parts, are included by some astrologers. One also calculates the
> positions of 12 "houses" which are specific to the exact place
> and time of birth. The location of planets in these houses and
> the sign on the cusp of each house are important sources of
> information in chart interpretation. One also looks at the
> angular distances in the zodiac between each pair of planets;
> certain specific angular distances, called "aspects," are
> considered meaningful. All of this information is necessary to
> determine the astrological influences present at a person's birth
> and to formulate predictions for the future. The sign in which
> the Sun and Moon fall is only one very small part of the picture.
> 
> This does not mean that people who write horoscope columns
> necessarily just make things up out of thin air. They usually use
> certain astrological concepts, but the application of these
> concepts to sign positions of the Sun rarely produces valuable
> information. To see why, let us look at what typical "Sun-sign
> astrologers" might do. First, they assume that your Sun is
> roughly in the middle of the sign. They then look to see if any
> planets are making aspects to the Sun on the day/week/month in
> question, and they interpret these aspects. If your Sun is at the
> beginning or end of a sign, these aspects will be irrelevant in
> your case. In addition, there may be aspects to other planets in
> your chart that will affect you strongly, and some of them may
> even have an effect opposite to the effect of the aspects to your
> Sun. Sun-sign astrologers might also set up "houses" by assuming
> that the sign your Sun is in is the first house, the next sign is
> the second house, and so on. They then look to see if any planets
> are currently in each "house". A serious astrologer would
> calculate the positions of houses using data about the exact time
> and place of birth, and these houses rarely coincide with the
> Sun-sign astrologer's zodiac-sign "houses." So the Sun-sign
> technique will only work at all for people who happen to have the
> Sun and several other planets in the middle of one sign, and
> whose first house also happens to begin at 0 degrees of the same
> sign. Such people are extremely rare, so for most people
> "horoscopes" will be useless.
> 
>  6)  How can one predict the nature of a relationship using
>      astrology?
> 
> Answer: The most common technique for determining the nature of a
> relationship is called "synastry." This involves comparing the
> positions of all the planets in two people's charts. One looks to
> see where one person's planets fall in the other person's houses,
> and one compares the positions of planets in the two charts to
> see whether any pair of planets is separated by a number of
> degrees in the zodiac that is considered meaningful. (These
> meaningful distances between planets, e.g., 0 degrees, 180
> degrees, 120 degrees, 90 degrees, and so on, are called
> "aspects".) 
> 
> A couple of newer (and still experimental) techniques exist for
> studying the nature of a relationship. One is called the
> "relationship chart" (created by Ronald Davison); the chart is
> cast for the place in space and time that is exactly half-way
> between the two people's birth places and times. The second
> technique is called the "composite chart" (developed by Robert
> Hand). The Sun in this chart is at the mid-point of the two
> people's Suns, the Moon is at the mid-point of the two people's
> Moons, and so on for all the planets. For recommendations of
> books about all these techniques, see the resource list. (See #
> 18 for complete details about the list.)
> 
> The nature of the synastry technique to be applied depends on the
> nature of the relationship contemplated and also on whether the
> relationship is between male and female or people of the same
> gender.
> 
> If two people are contemplating marriage, the technique used is
> different than it would be if they were contemplating a business
> relationship. The technique is also different when evaluating a
> parent-sibling relationship or a superior-subordinate
> relationship.
> 
> As a simplistic example, for marriage, a Sun in Aquarius (female)
> is an excellent match for Sun in Leo (male) (Sun's position taken
> alone -- neglecting other planets for purposes of discussion), as
> long as the two people operate on a spiritual level. This has the
> potential for the highest type of marriage.
> 
> However, if it is a father-son relationship where the father has
> Sun in Aquarius and the son (especially the first born) has his
> Sun in Leo, they will cause each other frustration to no end.
> 
>           *** Questions About Learning Astrology ***
> 
>  7)  Can anyone recommend a good book on astrology for beginners?
> 
> Answer: Recommendations appear in the alt.astrology resource
> list. (See # 18.) Maggie McPherson posted some beginners'
> lessons; if you would like copies of these, they are available by
> anonymous ftp at hilbert.maths.utas.edu.au in the directory
> pub/astrology; the file names are "lesson.intro" and
> "lesson.aspects." If you cannot use ftp on your machine, write
> for copies to Maggie at lmpm@teal.csn.org.
> 
> A huge bibliography of astrology books (all levels) is available
> at the ftp site in the file win.rowe.
> 
>  8)  What is the best approach to learning astrology?
> 
> If you can find a class offered in your area, that might be the
> best approach. It is difficult for the beginner to assess what is
> important in chart interpretation. 
> 
> Two lessons are available at the ftp site (see # 19) in the files
> "lesson.intro" and "lesson.aspects". These cover some basic
> concepts, but they do not explain how to cast or interpret a
> chart.
> 
> See # 7 about beginners' books.
> 
> The most difficult area of astrology is natal (i.e., birth) chart
> interpretation. It takes years to learn the art of synthesis that
> allows for accurate readings of a natal chart. Beginners might
> benefit from concentrating on transits (the movements of the
> planets in the sky across time in relation to a natal chart),
> which are relatively easy to interpret, astrocartography (changes
> in the zodiacal positions of the 12 houses as one moves from city
> to city), for which clear interpretations are available (e.g.,
> from Jim Lewis' work), or synastry (evaluating contacts between
> two charts to determine the nature of a relationship). When the
> basic natures of the planets, signs, houses, and aspects become
> familiar, then one can begin to study natal charts in earnest,
> combining ("synthesising") the various factors wholistically to
> achieve a meaningful reading.
> 
>  9)  Where can I find scientific research on astrology?
> 
> Answer: Brief summaries of a few scientific studies (written by
> Thomas David Kehoe) are available at the ftp site (see # 19) in
> the files "gauquelin" and "jung.synastry," which can be found in
> the directory pub/astrology/articles.
> 
> The most famous research is that of Michel and Francoise
> Gauquelin. Some of their findings have been the focus of decades
> of scrutiny by skeptics, and their results have held up under
> this scrutiny. Some of their studies have been successfully
> replicated with different samples and by independent researchers.
> The highly publicised CSICOP "failure to replicate" on an
> American sample for the "Mars effect" (the appearance of Mars in
> certain sectors with greater-than-expected frequency for eminent
> athletes) has been shown to replicate the effect when the
> athletes are ordered by eminence (see the Winter, 1992 issue of
> the Skeptical Inquirer). (The CSICOP researchers included far
> fewer eminent athletes in their sample than did the Gauquelins,
> and this washed out the Mars effect when the sample as a whole
> was considered. When the athletes are divided into groups
> according to an objective criterion of "eminence," the Mars
> effect emerges among the most eminent.) 
> 
> Some of the Gauquelins' research is summarised in the following
> books: Michel Gauquelin, "Cosmic Influences on Human Behavior"
> (3rd edition, published in 1985 by Aurora Press, P.O. Box 573,
> Santa Fe, NM 87504); Michel Gauquelin, "Planetary Heredity"
> (published in 1988 by ACS Publications, Inc., P.O. Box 16430, San
> Diego, CA 92116-0430); Francoise Gauquelin, "Psychology of the
> Planets" (published in 1982 by ACS Publications, Inc.).
> 
> A preliminary report of a study showing the relationship between
> inspiration in scientific discovery and certain angular
> separations of planets appears in a booklet entitled "The Eureka
> Effect," by Nicholas Kollerstrom and Michael O'Neill. It was
> published in 1989 by Urania Trust, 396 Caledonian Road, London N1
> 1DN. A complete report on this study and some additional data on
> inventions will appear sometime in the next few years.
> 
> The Astrological Association of London publishes a scholarly
> journal devoted entirely to astrological research. It is called
> Correlation. (See the resource list for the address and phone
> number of the Astrological Association; see # 18 for information
> about the resource list.) Prior to its first publication in 1981,
> research articles appeared in The Astrological Journal, also
> published by the Astrological Association. If you are in Britain,
> all issues of this journal are available at The Astrology Study
> Centre (396 Caledonian Road, London N1 1DN), the Oxford and
> Cambridge University libraries, the Scottish National Library in
> Edinburgh, the National Library of Wales in Aberystwyth, Trinity
> College in Dublin, the Warburg Institute, London University, the
> British Library in London, and the York University library. In
> the USA, these journals are available at the Heart Center
> library, 315 Marion Avenue, Big Rapids, MI 49307. Astrologers in
> your local area may have copies of these journals as well.
> 
> Astrological research appears occasionally in academic journals
> of psychology. A literature search (e.g., of the database
> "Psychological Abstracts") for articles containing the keyword
> "astrology" or "astrological" (or "astrolog?" where "?" is a wild
> card) would turn these up.
> 
> Because of the difficulty in publishing astrological research (or
> any unorthodox research), much remains unpublished. Among such
> studies are those described in postgraduate dissertations on
> astrology. A list of these (up to 1981) appears in the December,
> 1982 issue of Correlation. For more recent dissertations, check
> Dissertations Abstracts at a university library. (Our very own
> Mark Urban-Lurain did a multivariate analysis of the birth data of
> members of Alcoholics Anonymous for his Master's thesis at Michigan 
> State University.)
> 
>                    *** General Questions ***
> 
> 10)  I have seen people born within days/hours of one another
>      whose lives are really different. How come?
> 
> Answer: Even a few minutes difference in the time of birth or
> having a different birth place can change the chart
> substantially. Obviously people who have just the same birthday
> will have different charts. Since Earth is the only planet that
> makes a trip around the Sun exactly once a year, all the other
> planets will be at completely different positions in a different
> year. But even if people are born on the very same day, their
> charts can differ quite radically. The Moon moves about 13
> degrees in a day, and the astrological houses, which are an
> extremely important element of the chart, move through the entire
> zodiac in a 24-hour period! And their positions are affected by
> latitude as well. In addition, even if two people's charts are
> identical (which is rare), other factors may influence the way
> the chart is expressed. Some people operate on a material level,
> some on a mental level, and a few operate on a spiritual level.
> The same chart can be expressed on any of these levels. An
> astrological chart does not show the "fate" or "destiny" as such.
> The person always has a choice, and the free exercise of the will
> determines how the influences indicated in a chart manifest
> themselves.
> 
> 11)  What is the meaning of the term "the Age of Aquarius"?
> 
> Answer: Due to the precession of the equinoxes as explained in
> question # 28, the Vernal Equinox enters a new sign in the
> sidereal zodiac about every 2160 years. According to output from
> Astrolog, at the Vernal Equinox in 1992, the Sun will be at 5^
> Pisces 22' in the sidereal zodiac. Because of this, the current
> age is called the "Piscean" age. The Vernal Equinox will not
> actually occur in the sign of Aquarius in the sidereal zodiac
> until the year 2377. Some astrologers, however, believe that the
> equinox is close enough to the cusp of Pisces that we will begin
> to see some of the effects of the Age of Aquarius, hence the
> "Dawning of the Age of Aquarius." Opinions also differ regarding
> the exact boundaries of the constellations and the length of an
> astrological age.
> 
> 12)  How is it possible for astrology to work?
> 
> Answer: There are at least two schools of thought. One common
> explanation is synchronicity, an acausal connecting principle
> proposed by Carl Jung. The general idea is that events on earth
> of a certain nature coincide in time with astronomical events of
> a similar nature (according to the symbolic significance of the
> planets and their relations in the heavens). Although
> synchronicity operates throughout the universe, the planets might
> have special significance because they are part of collective
> experience (that is, we can all see them or know about them) and
> so they can take on a collective meaning -- they can speak to the
> "collective unconscious." But Jung's synchronicity principle is
> still hypothetical and still not well understood.
> 
> Jung's idea is similar to the ancient hermetic idea of resonant
> bonds of sympathy between "similars" (which share a common
> essential design) in the microcosm and macrocosm. This was the
> ancient explanation for the correspondence between cosmic and
> mundane events.
> 
> A less popular explanation is that there are unknown and
> currently undetected forces or energies emanating from the
> planets that affect life on earth, perhaps something akin to
> Rupert Sheldrake's "morphic fields." (This type of explanation is
> unpopular among those physicists who believe that all the forces
> in the universe are already known.) Biological evidence showing a
> harmony between celestial rhythms and biological rhythms suggests
> that known or unknown planetary forces operate on organisms at a
> material level, sometimes through changes in the pattern of solar
> radiation. Such biological effects might alter psychological
> processing and thus human action and the events that arise from
> it.
> 
> Whatever explanation is offered, it is evidence from experience
> and research that convinces people that astrology does indeed
> work. The rich descriptive theory that has evolved over thousands
> of years provides for a deep understanding of human nature and
> the capacity for prediction of the type of circumstances that
> will prevail during specific time periods. As with most areas of
> inquiry, the correct explanatory theory to account for the
> structure of the descriptive theory awaits its discoverer.
> 
> 13)  Does astrology control my future? Is it "wrong" to use
>      astrology to learn what the future holds for me? I'm scared.
> 
> Answer: In Western astrology, it is not believed that the cycles
> associated with the planets control your future; it is believed,
> rather, that YOU have ultimate control over your future through
> the exercise of your will. The planets only indicate some of the
> tendencies inherent in your personality and the conditions that
> surround various areas of life. One cannot determine in precise
> detail exactly what will happen in one's life from day to day and
> moment to moment, but only what kinds of influences will be
> present. There is a famous saying: "The stars incline, they do
> not compel." Within the situational and psychological context
> described in a chart, you are free to act and react according to
> your will, which is in turn guided by the wisdom you possess and
> your stage in your spiritual evolution. As for good and evil,
> there is nothing "wrong" with learning what sort of conditions
> will exist in your life. It may be to your advantage to foresee
> these influences so that you can be prepared and control your
> actions to better work in harmony with the celestial cycles.
> 
>              *** Questions About Birth Data ***
> 
> 14)  I notice that I need to know the time zone used in the place
>      I was born and the latitude and longitude of my place of
>      birth in order to erect a chart. How can I find such
>      information?
> 
> Answer: To find the latitude and longitude of your place of
> birth, you can estimate from a map (which is not really very
> accurate) or look them up in a reference book such as Thomas G.
> Shanks "International Atlas" or "American Atlas" (which also
> provide information about the time zone and the use of daylight
> savings and war time for each city/town); these are usually
> available in the astrology section of occult bookstores. Time
> zone information is usually available in a reference book at your
> local library, but if you think you might have been born when
> daylight-savings time or war time was in effect, you must either
> check a reference book such as Shanks' or phone the
> state/provincial archives for your birth place and check with
> them. Note that some cities changed the time zone they used at
> some point in their history, so it is *always* best to check with
> a reference such as Shanks or phone the state/provincial
> archives. A difference of one hour changes a birth chart
> radically!
> 
> If you were born in the United States of America, there is
> another method for finding latitude and longitude: through the
> database server located at port 3000 at martini.eecs.umich.edu;
> this is accessed by the command "telnet 141.212.99.9 3000". Once
> you are logged in, type in the name of any U.S. city, followed by
> the abbreviation for the state (e.g., Seattle, WA) and the
> programme will display the longitude and latitude. To end the
> session, just enter "bye."
> 
> 15)  I do not know what time of day I was born. Is there some way
>      to find out?
> 
> Answer: To find your exact time of birth, talk to a parent (who
> may have the time written down somewhere) or contact the hospital
> where you were born; sometimes the time appears on a birth
> certificate. If the time cannot be found, some astrologers claim
> to be able to determine the time through a technique called
> "rectification" which involves looking at astrological influences
> present when major events happened in the life, such as meeting a
> future spouse, marriage, birth of children, death of
> parent/sibling/spouse/friend, and so on.
> 
> If no time is known, and if rectification of the time is not
> possible, some information about the person can still be derived
> from a chart. The position of the Moon, which moves about 13
> degrees per day, will be inaccurate, and the positions of the
> planets in the astrological "houses" will be unknown. But the
> relations among the planets will be roughly accurate, and the
> sign positions of the planets (except perhaps the Moon) will be
> correct.
> 
>           *** Questions About Astrological Software ***
> 
> 16)  Does anyone know if there is any software available for
>      astrology?
> 
> Answer: See # 17 about Walter Pullen's "Astrolog" software.
> Information about other software (e.g., commercial software) is
> available in Michael Bulmer's "resource list." If it does not
> currently appear at your site, see # 18 for details on getting a
> copy.
> 
> 17)  Where can I get a copy of the astrological software
>      Astrolog?
> 
> Answer: Walter Pullen posts new versions on alt.astrology as they
> are ready. If you missed the most recent posting, you can get the
> latest version by anonymous ftp at the following ftp site:
> hilbert.maths.utas.edu.au; the code for Astrolog is in the
> directory pub/astrology (along with other useful stuff). Astrolog
> was also posted to comp.sources.misc and is therefore available
> at any of the numerous ftp sites which archive this newsgroup,
> such as ftp.uu.net. It can be found in the directory
> /usenet/comp.sources.misc/volume28/astrolog/*, in six convenient
> compressed shell archives. If you cannot use ftp on your machine,
> write to Walter at astrolog@byron.u.washington.edu and ask him
> for a copy of the programme. Astrolog can easily be loaded on
> UNIX (and less easily on a PC), and it is very easy to run. 
> 
>          *** Questions About Alt.astrology Resources ***
> 
> 18)  How can I obtain a copy of the alt.astrology "resource
>      list"?
> 
> Answer: Michael Bulmer posts the resource list occasionally. If
> it is no longer at your site, you can get a copy via anonymous
> ftp at hilbert.maths.utas.edu.au; the list is in the directory
> pub/astrology. If you do not have access to ftp from your
> machine, write to Michael at bulmer@hilbert.maths.utas.edu.au and
> he will send you a copy. The resource list provides
> recommendations for books on astrology, addresses of astrological
> associations and organisations, information about astrological
> software, addresses of chart calculation services, and other
> useful stuff.
> 
> 19)  How do I use ftp to get files from the alt.astrology ftp
>      site?
> 
> Answer: For many sites (but check with the systems people at
> yours), you type "ftp hilbert.maths.utas.edu.au"; when connected
> to the ftp site, type "anonymous" and then enter, as a password,
> your e-mail address. Once into the account, type "cd
> pub/astrology" to get into the right directory. If you wish to
> see which files are present in that directory, type "ls". If you
> want to transfer a file (e.g., the file README) to your account,
> type "get README"; repeat for however many files you wish to
> transfer. (Note that commands are case-sensitive, so type the
> file name just as you see it in the directory listing, i.e., in
> caps or lower case.) When you are done, type "bye" and you will
> be disconnected.
> 
> 
> *** Questions Asked With Surprising Frequency by Disbelievers ***
> 
> 20)  Every sensible person knows that astrology couldn't possibly
>      work, so why are you people wasting your time?
> 
> Answer: It is impossible to rule out astrological phenomena on _a
> priori_ grounds. Current understanding in scientific circles does
> not shape the actual structure of the universe. Science involves
> research. No mere mortal is omniscient, and so none can predict
> infallibly which effects would show up in research and which
> would not. What is currently known is not all that will ever be
> known. It is a mistake to buy into the current way of thinking as
> if it was an accurate and complete picture of the universe. Dogma
> is antithetical to true science.
> 
> _A priori_ arguments are not the final word in science, which was
> designed, after all, as a means of discerning nature's secrets by
> actually examining nature, as opposed to just thinking about it
> the way Aristotle and Descartes did.
> 
> 21)  How could planetary forces, of whatever nature, act upon an
>      infant when it is outside the mother, but not when it is a
>      fetus in the womb? Why should the forces only have effect at
>      the moment of birth?
> 
> Answer: Given that we do not yet have an explanation for
> astrological phenomena, we cannot assume that astrological
> correspondences are due to some "force" (e.g., gravity) that can
> travel through a mother's body as easily as it can through the
> walls of the hospital. 
> 
> One research finding might be relevant to this question. The
> Gauquelins found that one of their results, the "inheritance" of
> angularity for specific planets (i.e., the child of a parent with
> an angular planet tends to have the same planet angular), was
> only present when the birth was natural. This finding suggests
> that it is not exposure to air per se that produces the
> astrological effect. Rather, the baby is "destined" (for unknown
> reasons) to be born at a certain time, and to retain the
> astrological character of that time. Unnatural births (e.g.,
> C-section, or drug-induced labour) prevent birth at the "correct"
> time, and so the child fails to "inherit" its parent's planetary
> angularity in its own chart. (No studies have been done looking
> at the effect of the type of birth on any factors in actual chart
> interpretation, so the Gauquelins' finding does not speak to the
> issue of astrological charts in general; if future research fails
> to find an effect of the circumstances of birth on the validity
> of the birth chart, then the reason for the child's absorption of
> the character of the time of birth will not be able to be
> accounted for by destiny.)
> 
> 22)  Don't you guys know that astrology depends on a geocentric
>      astronomy? Copernicus blew it away.
> 
> Answer: This is an argument that never occurred to Copernicus,
> who practiced astrology. Heliocentric versus geocentric is a
> method of calculation, and it is easy to postulate astral forces
> indifferent to the current interpretation of orbital mechanics.
> In any case, as the answer to the next question will show,
> demonstration of the possible causation of astrological effects
> is not clearly relevant to showing the existence of these
> effects.
> 
> A force exerts the same influence whether the position of the
> body exerting it was calculated using Ptolemaic, Copernican,
> Keplerian, Newtonian or Einsteinian orbital mechanics. And, of
> course, astrology was originally practiced using observation,
> before astronomy was sufficiently advanced to allow highly
> accurate prediction of the positions of the planets.
> 
> 23)  Don't you guys know that no cause for astrological effects
>      is known? Therefore such effects cannot exist.
> 
> Answer: There are quite a few variations of this very popular
> fallacy. A common variation is to point out that the hands of the
> doctor delivering a baby exert a far stronger gravitational pull
> than any planet could. Again, the reasoning here goes, "no cause,
> therefore no effect." If there ever is a cause advanced for
> astrological effects, it may well not involve gravity.
> 
> All sorts of sciences are based on empirical evidence alone, with
> no explanatory theories available. Genetics was accepted as part
> of science before the discovery of DNA, and, even now, the
> complete mapping from genetic factors to amino acids is far from
> complete. In psychology, the principles that govern the
> organisation of vision and audition (i.e., that determine the
> boundaries and content of separate "figures," "objects," or
> "streams" of sound) are well established, but researchers have no
> idea why perceptual processes follow these particular principles.
> 
> Vast areas of sciences that *do* provide causal explanations make
> specific predictions that cannot be derived directly from the
> believed cause but are based on empirical evidence and
> descriptive theories that capture the structures inherent in the
> data. Tide tables, for example, are calculated empirically.
> Although physicists know enough about the relevant physical
> processes to make it plausible that there should be two tides a
> day, even though the earth revolves only once a day, mathematical
> formulae directly relating this cause to the observed tides do
> not exist.
> 
> To tread but briefly on philosophical ground, the notion of
> causality itself is not well grounded, and is considered by many
> to be a function of human perception rather than a property of
> the universe (see, for example, David Hume in "A Treatise of
> Human Nature" and Immanuel Kant in "Prolegomena to Any Future
> Metaphysics"). As the empiricist Hume discovered, humans make an
> attribution of "causality" when they have certain types of
> perceptual experience (e.g., when A is perceived to precede B in
> time, B is always perceived to be preceded by A, and so on, then
> A is perceived to "cause" B). The famous psychologist Albert
> Michotte did many studies in which he examined the factors that
> give rise to the impression of causality (see "La Perception de
> la Causalite," 1946, or the English translation, "The Perception
> of Causality," 1963). He showed, for example, that animated dots
> on a screen are perceived to be involved in a causal interaction,
> with one dot "causing" movement in another, when the timing
> relations of their movements and the relative direction of their
> movements fall within a certain range. (Of course no "causal
> relation" was ever actually present, since the movement was due
> to animation.) 
> 
> Even so pragmatic a scientist as Sir Isaac Newton argued that an
> appeal to cause is unnecessary because the type of laws he
> discovered, which are purely descriptive in nature (e.g., the
> relation f=m*a among the theoretical constructs force, mass, and
> acceleration), are sufficiently powerful to predict events and
> account for all the available data. He believed that physical
> theories are what the physicist Pierre Duhem called "the economic
> condensation of phenomena" (see "The Aim and Structure of
> Physical Theory"):
> 
>      "To tell us that every species of things is endowed with an
>      occult specific quality by which it acts and produces
>      manifest effects, is to tell us nothing; but to derive two
>      or three general principles of motion from phenomena, and
>      afterwards to tell us how the properties and actions of all
>      corporeal things follow from those manifest principles,
>      would be a very great step in philosophy, though the causes
>      of those principles were not yet discovered; and therefore I
>      scruple not to propose the principles of motion above
>      mentioned, they being of very large extent, and leave their
>      causes to be found out." (Optics, Query XXXI at the end of
>      the second edition.)
> 
> So the descriptive theories of astrology, the relations that have
> been discovered and exploited over a period of thousands of
> years, may not lend themselves to an explanation in terms of
> causes any more than Newton's laws of motion do. The human mind
> seeks "causes" (at least in the West), but Nature herself may be
> indifferent to them. The Eastern vision of an harmonious universe
> with all its interconnected parts dancing in unison may be more
> in line with reality.
> 
> 24)  Don't you guys know that tests of groups of astrologers show
>      they do no better than chance? Therefore astrology does not
>      work. 
> 
> Answer: The same is said of investment managers. From the
> Economist for March 7, 1992, p. 81: "Numerous studies suggest
> that `exceptional' investment managers do not exist. In any given
> period, each has no more than an even chance of doing better than
> the market index; moreover, a manager who does well one year is
> no likelier than others to do well in the next. A few funds may
> beat the index for, say, three years running, but these are no
> more common than chance would predict. Give a sample of
> coin-tossers three coins each. If they obey the laws of
> probability, one in either will toss three heads."
> 
> Does this mean there is no such thing as good investment advice?
> 
> The question of the standard of practice in the profession and of
> the validity of the discipline are not the same, and should not
> be confused. Do the best astrologers participate in such tests?
> Given that astrology is not a closed profession, can testing
> groups of people where the only criterion for selection is that
> they say they are astrologers really say anything about
> astrology? Given these sort of ground rules for the test, would a
> good astrologer decide to participate? 
> 
> Even if highly qualified astrologers agreed to participate in a
> study, did the specific test administered give the astrologers a
> fair shot at accuracy (e.g., if they are asked to match charts
> with people, are they allowed to get to know the people well and
> learn about their lives and personal history in detail, or are
> they allowed just a brief chat with the people)?
> 
> It would be very hard to answer any of these questions with an
> unqualified "Yes." The talent of practitioners and the validity
> of the discipline they practice must not be confused. And
> scientific tests conducted by those attempting to "debunk"
> astrology must be evaluated with as much critical attention as
> any other scientific study. The tests must be fair. The
> conditions of the tests must be conducive to finding an effect if
> any is possible. They must not be arranged so that finding an
> effect is impossible simply by virtue of the experimental design.
> 
> One must be very careful in drawing conclusions from a *lack* of
> evidence (either because of negative findings or because no
> studies have been conducted). The failure to find an effect does
> not mean that the hypothesis is false. It just means that one
> hasn't found evidence in favour of it. Nothing more, nothing
> less. But if one *does* find an effect, then one has evidence in
> support of the hypothesis (and any other hypothesis that would
> make the same prediction, whether or not that hypothesis is
> currently available). So there is an asymmetry that is rarely
> recognised: evidence (data) can support an experimental
> hypothesis, but a lack of evidence cannot refute it (even if the
> lack of evidence is in the form of failure to find a predicted
> effect, e.g., a difference between samples). The possibility
> always remains that our experimental design is flawed and/or our
> measurement techniques are inappropriate and so they fail to
> capture the effect. In psychology, where measurement is often
> very difficult and indirect (as it is in much astrological
> research), one can fail to find evidence to support a particular
> hypothesis even after years of experimentation. Then some clever
> researcher invents a new measurement technique, or creates a new
> experimental design more favourable for the emergence of the
> phenomenon of interest, and the predicted effect emerges!
> 
> Note that many scientific astrological studies that do not focus
> on the ability of individual astrologers (e.g., to match charts
> to people) have found positive results that are replicable. (See
> # 9.) The elements of subjectivity and interpretive ability are
> missing from these studies because they concentrate on objective
> measures (e.g., the presence/absence of a planet in a certain
> area of the chart for a certain group of people) and so effects
> are easier to observe. As any experimental psychologist will
> confirm, subjective judgments are fraught with error, and the
> unreliability in such measures vastly reduces the success rate of
> experimental studies.
> 
> 25)  Don't you guys know that astrology makes an infinity of
>      claims? You could never test them all. Therefore we can
>      dismiss it out of hand.
> 
> Answer: Any non-trivial field makes an infinity of claims. If you
> wished to refute physics you could not track down every
> prediction it makes. This does not mean physics is not a science.
> In verifying physics, you look at the basics. If they hold up,
> you consider it basically valid, and then attempt to replicate
> more abstruse claims. You will never be able to replicate every
> claim implied by physics.
> 
> 26)  Don't you guys know that you can't really prove a negative,
>      such as astrology never working, anyway? Therefore we can
>      dismiss it out of hand.
> 
> Answer: That a negative cannot be proven hardly constitutes a
> refutation of astrology. The argument above reduces to "a
> negative cannot be proven, therefore all negatives are false". If
> you want to be strict, you must accept that all negatives must be
> taken as possibly true, forever. It is not legitimate to say, "a
> negative cannot be proved, therefore all negatives that seem
> weird to me are false." That is simply clothing a prejudice in
> pseudo-scientific language.
> 
> 27)  Legitimate scientists (or educated people, etc., etc.)
>      universally despise astrology. Can such a weight of opinion
>      be wrong?
> 
> Answer: Yes. Easily. Examples in the social sciences of educated
> opinion doing a total about-face are common. Racialist theories,
> now despised by almost all those in academe, were orthodox before
> World War II, as just one example.
> 
> In the health sciences as well, practices such as phrenology,
> acupuncture, hypnotism and chiropractic have all crossed in one
> direction or another the line that separates respected science
> from despised pseudo-science. If astrology does so too, it will
> definitely not be the first time, and probably not the last.
> 
> This question is based on an appeal to authority and, as such, is
> an example of a common fallacy in reasoning. Plausibility based
> on current world views is a poor guide to the nature of reality,
> but scientists, being human, are as fallible as the rest of us in
> embracing modern views with undue passion. (Humans have a deep
> need to feel they understand things. The unknown is a source of
> fear, so many choose to deny it. But the unknown is only unreal
> for those who are omniscient. For those of us who are less than
> omniscient, humility is in order in any discussion of the nature
> of reality.)
> 
> 28)  Why don't astrologers consider the fact that when the Sun is
>      in the sign of Aries, it is not really in the constellation
>      Aries?
> 
> Answer: This is due to the phenomenon known as "the precession of
> the equinoxes." The equinoxes are the points in time and space at
> which the earth, with its tilted axis, is positioned with respect
> to the sun in such a way that the length of day and night are
> equal. Most astrologers, with a few exceptions, base their work
> on a zodiac with sign positions determined by the equinoxes
> rather than the constellations. At the Vernal Equinox, which
> occurs on about March 20th of each year, the Sun enters into the
> sign of Aries. The signs are not defined by the constellations.
> The zodiac positioned with respect to the equinoxes is called the
> "tropical zodiac"; the zodiac based on the constellations is
> called the "sidereal zodiac." Because of the precession of the
> equinoxes, the equinoxes are moving backwards with respect to the
> fixed constellations by about one degree every 72 years.
> Approximately two thousand years ago, the beginning of the
> tropical sign of Aries was aligned with the beginning of the
> constellation Aries (perhaps around 217 A.D.).
> 
> Why do the tropical signs have the same names and symbols as the
> constellations with which they were aligned 2000 years ago? Isn't
> the sidereal zodiac the source of the meanings of the tropical
> signs? And so shouldn't astrologers take the meaning of a
> tropical sign from the constellation most closely aligned with it
> now? This argument is based on the presupposition that the
> meanings of the signs come from the natures of the symbols in the
> heavens that we call constellations. But clearly this is not the
> case. Some of the most dominant traits of Virgo are obsession
> with detail and an analytical and critical nature. How could
> these traits be derived from a picture of a virgin? How could the
> Piscean qualities "spiritual," "selfless," "imaginative,"
> "inspirational," "feminine," and "idealistic" be derived from a
> picture of two fish? Few traits of each sign can easily be
> related to the symbol assigned to the constellation of the same
> name.
> 
> There is no necessity, given current knowledge, for the tropical
> signs to have received their meaning from the constellations of
> the sidereal zodiac; it is possible that the nature of the
> tropical signs suggested a symbol to associate with a
> constellation (since the symbols look very little like the
> pattern of stars we associate with them). Perhaps the
> constellations with which we are familiar came into being during
> the period in which the tropical sign Aries was aligned with the
> constellation Aries. When did the tropical zodiac and
> constellations appear? The tropical zodiac may have been around a
> long time. The Egyptians had a tropical (solar) calendar by the
> early part of the third millennium B.C.; given the direct and
> transparent relationship between the signs of the tropical zodiac
> and the months of the solar year, they may well have had a
> tropical zodiac as well. Tropical calendars in the form of
> standing stones (e.g., Stonehenge) date from 1000-5000 B.C. in
> Northwest Europe, so the tropical zodiac might have existed there
> as well. Unfortunately, the preliterate people of these cultures
> left no records behind. Some sort of zodiac, possibly sidereal,
> with 12 equal signs, existed in India in 3000 B.C. A manuscript
> (in Sanskrit) from that period shows that astrologers then used a
> zodiac, an equal house system, and aspects counted sign to sign
> (as in much modern-day Hindu astrology).
> 
> The origin of the modern constellations is somewhat obscure, so
> it is very difficult to decide whether the constellations were
> around to lend meaning to the tropical signs at the time that the
> tropical zodiac was created. Noonan (1976; Journal of Geocosmic
> Research, Vol. 2, No. 1, pp. 6-7) claims that the first zodiac of
> the constellations appeared around 500 B.C. The constellations
> are believed to have been assigned symbols by the Babylonians,
> but there were originally 36 constellations, and only some of
> them coincide with the modern sidereal signs. We know that some
> of the symbols used for the modern signs are recent, because the
> original symbols were all animals (the word "zodiac," derived
> from the Greek zo^idiako's, means "circle of animals"). We can be
> certain that the modern constellations of the zodiac existed by
> about 30 B.C. because they appear very clearly on the ceiling of
> the Temple of Hathor at Dendera in Upper Egypt. So was the
> tropical zodiac in use by then?
> 
> It might have been. The precession of the equinoxes was certainly
> common knowledge by then. Precession was discovered at the very
> latest in 200 B.C., when Hipparchus wrote about it. But Sir
> Norman Lockyer found that many very early temples in Egypt had
> been moved at different periods in history so that they lined up
> with a particular star as it precessed across the sky. 
> 
> (See, for example, E.C. Krupp, "In Search of Ancient
> Astronomies," New York: Doubleday, 1977.)
> 
>                 *** Questions About the FAQ ***
> 
> 29)  I have a suggestion for this FAQ list. What do I do? 
> 
> Answer: Make your suggestion known by sending mail to the keeper
> of this FAQ file, Maggie McPherson at lmpm@teal.csn.org. The 
> preferred format is to submit a copy of the actual changes being 
> suggested.