NASA has declared war on the Astrologers. (“We just do the math” is their story. And they’re sticking to it.) They have added an extra constellation to the Zodiac and changed all the dates. The Zodiac is grounded in history more than science. In short, the Babylonians created the Zodiac as we know it some 3,000 years ago. For their own reasons they left out the Constellation Ophiucus even though the Sun passes through it. Perhaps it was because the Babylonian lunar calendar only had 12 months meaning one of the 13 had to go. Perhaps it was because Ophiucus also drops below the horizon in winter months that it was most likely the prime candidate to be dropped. Whatever the reason, it was.
The dates we use today for the Zodiacal boundaries also do not translate to the stars properly any more because of the wobbling of the Earth and the movement of the stars themselves. So NASA has joined the long parade of groups trying to restore this missing 13th Zodiacal sign. After they “did the math” the came to the only conclusion they could. Ophiucus must be restored and the dates had to be shifted around as well.
So the NASA group has recalculated the proper dates for the various astrological signs. The Sun spends only three weeks in Ophiucus so it won’t be your Sun Sign unless you were born between November 29 and December 17. Virgo, by contrast, has a six-week window.
Ophiucus is the sign of architects and snake-bearers, snake-charmers, and so on. If you’re one of them then your personality traits are: seeker of wisdom, flamboyant, and a builder.
The new (or more accurately “restored”) Babylonian Zodiac is:
Capricorn: January 20 to February 16
Aquarius: February 16 to March 11
Pisces: March 11 to April 18
Aries: April 18 to May 13
Taurus: May 13 to June 21
Gemini: June 21 to July 20
Cancer: July 20 to August 10
Leo: August 10 to September 16
Virgo: September 16 to October 30
Libra: October 30 to November 23
Scorpio: November 23 to November 29
Ophiuchus: November 29 to December 17
Sagittarius: December 17 to January 20
For all those people who take this astrology stuff seriously and now find themselves in a “different” sign, the distinct possibility of an “identity crisis” suggests itself. Over the years I’ve met a few psychiatrists who use astrology to diagnose their patients and there are numerous astrologers who advise their clients for a fee and more than just a few people who consult their horoscopes every day. I can imagine what’s coming:
“I used to be a Scorpio. Now I’m something I can’t even pronounce. I don’t want to be a snake-bearer. I don’t even know what a snake-bearer is.” It’s going to be very traumatic. Therapists will have to clear their calendars.
Will the newspapers and magazines make the needed changes? Will astrologers set up help-lines and chat rooms to aid those making the transition?
The Astrological changes proposed by NASA will only be relevant to people following the Western/Babylonian Astrological signs. There are many kinds of astrology. Every ancient culture had it’s own. These changes only really impact cultures with roots in Greece and Rome.
Identity crises seem to everywhere in Western Cultures.
First gender-identity, now sun-signs, what’s next? Race? Ethnicity?
Race and Ethnicity are already being challenged by all those do-it-yourself DNA tests. “I thought I was German but now I know I’m Irish”.
Is there no stability left in the world? Will we finally wind up having to take some kind of test each morning to find out what identity we will have today?
Which reminds me of my long-languishing “Past Lives Horoscope” project. While teaching epidemiology I had to deal with many MDs including psychiatrists. One day at lunch two of them turned out to be hypnotherapists who did “past life regression” which sent people back into their previous existences to get to the “real roots” of their present psychological malaise. One of the problems I recall was that of a woman who was still angry with her husband because when he was a Mongol warrior riding with Genghis Khan he had attacked her village and abducted her. On the other hand, they’re still together.
Another one of the psychiatrists, though, rejected all this and said he did astrological charts based on the (12 sign) Zodiac to determine what was the source of the problem. Misaligned stars and all that.
I should have been silent but instead I suggested people should just input all of the various astrological systems in the world into a software package, then put the daily tribulations and triumphs of all the patients into a database, and run correlations to find out which “past life horoscope” was dominant on any given day.
I waxed eloquent (or at least I thought I did) in telling them how they could use this to validate the horoscopes as well as determining which people had been members of what culture and in which previous life. Instead of a discussion about how to make sure of the correct birthday or other such important facts, they just looked at me. One of them said: “It only takes the signatures of three MDs to have a person committed for 90 days for psychiatric assessment.” Then the fourth of them — who had been quiet up to this point — said: “My husband is a judge. You won’t win your appeal to get out.”
Be careful what you say when you’re having lunch with psychiatrists.
And maybe it’s time we asked ourselves if all this “identity redefinition” anxiety which is the present rage is actually a form of distraction which is sucking our energy away from the real problems facing Western Culture in particular and the human future more generally. Will the future really be brighter if the culture that is trying to cure cancer, has almost ended Alzheimer’s, and Parkinson’s, put the Rosetta probe on a comet, is going to stitch the Cassini probe through Saturn’s rings 22 times, is preparing to colonise Mars starting in 10 years, and ended slavery (within its own borders) gets taken over by ISIS instead?
I wonder what the new refinements to the Zodiac will tell us about that?