Ophiuchus -- New Zodiac Sign, Change of Old Zodiac

xKam

Hi Everyone!

I wanted to know if anyone had heard about the new zodiac sign "Ophiuchus" and how it changes the dates of the other zodiac signs? It apparently only applies to people born after 2009 when the constellation/set-up was officially "discovered" and confirmed to be shifting into our planetary alignment.

What do you guys think about this? I am young (21) so it leaves me mildly unsettled for whenever I have children (as change does with all humans) and looking at these dates... several articles are below...

http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/01/13/horoscope-hang-up-earth-rotation-changes-zodiac-signs/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/13/new-zodiac-sign-dates-oph_n_808567.html

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/blog-post/2011/01/new_zodiac_sign_dates_dont_swi.html
 

dadsnook2000

Not again

This subject has appeared on this list before, and is a constant "discovery" by someone every few years. I remember several cycles of books that proclaimed this constellation as "new" or as being the "13th sign" etc. We've even had very extensive, almost divisive (except that we are all too tolerant here to really take some things seriously), here on the Astrology Forum.

Be assured that this constellation and its stars have been in the sky for many eons of time. Astrology is based, in the present and pervasive system of use, on "twelveness" -- twelve signs, twelve houses, and the ability to divide by both 3 and 4. Astrologers in most of the world, and in virtually all systems, use 12 signs or 12 constellations of 30 degrees each --- this in spite of the fact that the visible star patterns are not 30 degrees in length but vary quite a bit.

We are dealing mostly with a symbolic language that has a relationship with the sky above and our seasons, but which is still a construct of our minds. So, you can look at the Whale but don't expect to see it play a role of any kind in our interpretations. Dave
 

Grigori

:laugh: I love this comment on one of the articles!!

osofar said on 13 Thursday 2011 pm31 8:18 pm: said:
I can see it now, the 13thers fighting the 12ers. Massive societal disruptions. Violence pitting one group against another...moving to a new country that promotes Astrology freedom to practice what you want to believe. Massive arguments for the seperation of Astrology and state. And the far right saying that the Founding Astrologists were 12ers, and the commie, pinko, weirdo, socialistic, marxist, no birth certificaters, 13ers are leading to the downfall of America. When astrology is outlawed, only outlaws will have astrology.

:thumbsup:

Seriously though, xKam to find out more about this from an astrology perspective have a read about the difference between Tropical and Sidereal zodiacs. This is really not a new discovery, astrologers have known about it for hundreds of years, it just doesn't matter to most of them. Most in our culture are using a system where the "star signs" are actually areas of sky that are named after a constellation that used to be in them, and they keep the same name and features irrespective of the fact that the signs moved on a long time ago. There are some astrologers however who still care about where the stars actually are and so they work a bit differently so maybe they are more open to thinking about adding a 13th sign, though I suspect not by much.
 

AmethystEyes

I heard that it was an astronomer and not an astrologer who rediscovered it. That would explain this uncalled for uprawr.

I know some people believe in sidereal but it always gives me a big laugh :laugh:
 

Ffortiwn

Would any motivated and knowledgeable astrologers on this board be willing to email any of the papers and individuals I mentioned in the thread I created yesterday (fourth post down)? This thing has legs again and it's creating havoc all over the place. For instance, about an hour ago Pee-wee Herman posted on Facebook that he's now a Leo. Uprawr indeed!
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Minderwiz

I think Dave and I share that same feeling, the ignorance of Astronomers about the history of their own discipline is woeful.

Dave mentions 'twelveness' - and i's important to have at least some understanding of why 'thirteenness' just won't work. If we take as a starting definition, that Astrology is the application of Astronomical change to the human condition' (Sounds good but I just made it up) then the earliest use of Astronomy was to predict the turning points between the four seasons - the four cardinal points, the two equinoxes and the two solstices. Bring in a circle as a good approximation of the Sun's path and we have a circle divided equally into four segments.

Now if we want to be more precise, each of these segments needs to be divided in turn into equal units - we can divide by 2 or 3 or 4...... but NONE of these would produce a 13 segment circle.

We can of course refer to the Solar/Lunar cycle, which produces a year of 12 lunar months and very occasionally a year that has 13 New Moons (but never 13 Lunar months). That would point to a 12 segment zodiac and this is what we now have (well now = last 2,500 years approx). We've also known about Ophiucus for much longer and we've known about it continuously too - some Astronomers just don't look at their own history.

As Dave says, there are also 12 Houses. There's no necessary reason why a 12 sign Zodiac should lead to 12 Houses but it's the path of easiest movement, especially when that easy movement is to take a whole sign as a House.

No matter how much we try to make this point it doesn't do much good globally - these 'rediscoveries' happen at regular intervals spurred on by ignorance and unless the media want to run a story entitled 'Astronomer Makes Fool of Himself' we won't see the end of it. It's a sign (pardon the pun) of how divorced modern science has become from it's origins.

If you want to do anything to combat it, the best is to put a link to these two threads (the other one being the thread on precession).
 

rachelcat

Wow, it's like a giant game of telephone--it just gets more and more garbled by writers (and I use that term loosely) who are worse than parrots. They can't get their mindless repetition of nonsense correct!

This mindless repetition of nonsense was also on the Today Show this morning. Sigh . ..
 

amethyst57

was quite surprised by this too...after all these centuries it would have
to be changed? what would be the characteristics of this new sign, isn't everything pretty much in the 12?
with this 13th sign it throws everything else off kilter...charts, forecasts, relationships,etc...
i think it's b.s., and something to be ignored...


not much of an astrology student, but....
i will always be a Pisces...