25 by Tom taking the "art" out of the science of astrology, is like making a robot equivalent and equal to life. Exactly. People have to be put into pigeonholes. Even without that we have to question the usefullness of any statistical study. Gauquelin took the charts of 3,305 scientists and found Mars on an angle 666 times. Chance predicted 565 times. The odds against this being chance about 1 in 500,000. Value? Well if 3,305 scientists walked into the astrologer's lair, 666 would have Mars on an angle, 2,639 would not. Now let us suppose for the sake of argument that 1% of the general population become famous scientists. This is an absurdly high percentage, but let's continue. That means that if an astrologer saw 3,305, 000 members of the general population, the astrologer would look at all the charts with Mars on an angle and correctly identify 666 scientists or .02%. Mars also figured prominetly in the charts of athletes, and military leaders. So the astrologer still has more than one possibility. And even then, this only worked with the top of the field. Average atheltes, average scientists, and average miliatry leaders showed nothing in their charts that was greater than chance. So then what did statistics "prove" that is of value to the astrologer? It "proved" nothing to the scientific community who took 40 years to admit Gaquelin's studies were performed within the rules of statistics. And then they still dismissed them. Sure, statistics have been misused, but that doesn't invalidate the discipline or its applicability. It damn near does, or it at least calls into question it applicability to all the things it claims it can do. For example, pharmaceutical companies use statistics to determine the safety and effectiveness of their products. Lawyers use statistics to claim the pharmaceutical companies products aren't safe and/or effective. Both have champions to defend their statistical studies. Where is the truth? It should be easy enough to determine; patients' health improves without risk or it doesn't. The fact is that nobody knows regardless of how many studies are perfromed because they keep finding other areas to which they apply all sorts of statistics In the cases of medicine it's "side effects," so we apply statistics to that and by using those statistics we endeavor to prove or disprove wheteher or not the companies deliberately misled physicians and consumers and therefore are required to make law firms wealthy, or whether the lawyers are deliberately misuing statistics to make a pile. The pharamceutical companies wish to convince physicians and consumers their products are effective and safe. Lawyers have to convince 12 people picked at random that they aren't. "Safe" and "effective" are relative terms, but I'm sure standards must be met, so both sides use statistics to demonstrate that a) standards have or have not been met, and b) the other guys' stats are wrong (bad method, too small a sample, whatever). The point is that the truth remains hidden, because there is no one sure-fire way to demonstrate it. This calls into question the validity of statistics when two opposite sides of an argument can use experts and the rules of statistics to come to opposite conclusions. Each side uses the data that suits them, and both may have honest defenders or dishonest defenders. We'll never know and neither will professionals as they, too will differ on the results. So where is the value? If we are going to apply statistics to astrology I submit we must first contend with the observation of J.B. Morin. "Ancient astrologers often based their judments on purely ficticious assumtions, contrary to the nature of things, or on certain elements which correspond to the natural order, but which were poorly understood. ... Until now, the study and use of these "universal significators" has been the principal preoccupation of Astrologers. I agree that the Sun by nature has a clear analogy with honors, kings, the father, etc, than with low station, peasants, children etc. and I also concede that the same connection exists between Jupiter and wealth, Venus and the wife, Mercury and the intellect and so forth. But it is absurd to claim that the Sun is the universal significator of the father or honors, and that therefore it follows necessarily, in no matter what horoscope, that the judgments concerning both the father and the honors attained by the native should be made according to the Sun, no matter what house it occupies or rules. Celestial influences are indeed universal causes. But as such they do not manifest in themselves any preference for acting on one individual more than on another. Thus they are able to be determined by individuals. But, because there are many ways in which a celestial influx can be determined (ways which come down finally to two principal kinds: determination by position and disposition of the planets in the Horoscope), it follows that heavenly bodies do not influence beings in the sublunary world except according to the special manner determined by these same beings. That is, celestial influence on a given individual depends principally on the connections present at the moment of birth between the Planets and the Houses. These connections are based either on the physical position of the Planets, or on their aspects or their Rulership in this or that House, or their relationship with the Ruler of the House which they occupy*. In other words, it all depends on the chart. Planets take their particular significance from the individual's birth chart, and how the individual applies his or her free will. Is there a test for that? If not, what can we test? Tom *Notes othe translation: 1) The quote is from the Lucy Little translation of Astrologica Gallica, book XXI pages 11 -12, Emerald Books, 1974. The italics are in the translaion I used. 2)The other major translation of ths book was done by James Baldwin. There are times, and this is one of them, that I wonder if the translators were working from the same text. The quote is taken from the introduction. Little's introduction is about half the length of Baldwin's. They both are on the same topic, but, and this is rare in my experience, Little's seemed more clear than Baldwin's. It is usually the other way around. Little translated from a French translation. Baldwin translated from the original Latin. The Little translation served my purpose better, although I could have used Baldwin's, but it would have required more explanation, wehereas Little's seems to stand on its own. Quote Sun Aug 06, 2006 4:38 pm