The Astrologer is the key component. Wrong charts, "correct" charts w/ different methods and basic divinatory instruments (e.g.tarot) all rely on a couple of intrinsic components. First you must believe that prediction of future events is possible, and as a condition of that you must be disposed toward prognostication.
The birth chart of an individual usually will show if a person is a diviner or a scholar or a dabbler or what. If one practices traditional or classical astrology you must be objective enough to know if your chart promises such things as knowledge of future events, anyone can practice something, producing the intended results is another thing.
To take it even further you could call it what the ancients did, Dignification.
With that in mind I see how different zodiacs and techniques can yield the same results, still, even one with the gift of foresight needs a medium to express it and a methodology can help.[/i]

Thanks Ren?. In Dutch we use a similar word for coincidence 'toeval'. I don't really have a problem with it and I still think it exists. I doubt if a child choses the moment of birth. Natural elements or on the other side Caesarean sections which depend on the decision of doctors etc. are stronger I think. Perhaps there is also something like 'divine intervention' which can be seen as the 'free will' of a 'supreme being'.

Quote:
What about 'wrong charts' that still seem to work?


I have very firm opinion on that but we can of course debate it.
To me, this is lousy technique coupled with self-delusion! I have to put it that drastically because more often it happened to me (and my astrologer friends) that when a chart reading with a client just didn?t make sense ? including metagnosis, when several events didn?t fit -, it was the wrong chart.

When the wrong chart 'works' I tend to think that the applied astrology is wrong. Probably too vague and flexible for different interpretation. I have read about astrologers who discovered afterwards they had been using the wrong chart when explaining it to a client. However everything seemed to have fit and the client left satisfied. I think there needs to be some falsifiability in astrology. Yet allowing for a small margin of non verifiability because there is always some unknown human factor in astrology. But in general the astrology must 'work'. When I had just started with astrology I had an argument with my eldest brother who thought I was wasting my time with 'that nonsense'. "Predict something for me", he said provokingly. I looked in the chart and saw that Uranus was going to conjunct his MC the next year. He was unemployed then and I predicted that he would get a sudden change in job circumstances. Later I discovered that the MC was way off because I had used daylight saving time which wasn't used when my brother was born. Yet these changes in job circumstances came, he started following courses and got jobs through these .

I'm convinced that astrology works but not all astrology. It's difficult to know which is the correct astrology. We are humans dealing with humans. I heard about a story of a crime case where a witness a terrain guard had stated that his dog was never mistaken. The lawyer questioning him asked the guard if he himself could sometimes be mistaken. "Sure, I sometimes am mistaken" he replied. The lawyer then asked how he then could be sure if the dog might not be mistaken .

Part of the problem is that astrology is so complex one can always ascribe an outcome to different influueces in the chart. This is why I keep coming back to the consciousness of the astrologer. I believe the astrologer has to have total faith in their technique. Call it the 'Tinkerbell effect' if you like but once we become riddled with doubts it cripples our ability to make the magic work. I am experiencing a bit of that myself right now on house systems.

Your other remark, that the astrologer has to have total faith in their technique, I agree

Why would doubt be a problem. I think some doubt makes a person more careful and more willing to research. Some doubt is as necessary as having a bit fear for a stunt man.

Concerning horary, since I don't know much about it I'm not in the position to judge it. It seems to be the achilles heel of a pure natural view of astrology. From a technical point of view the main difference with say Tarot is that if for example in two different rooms next to eachother a horary is done at the same time for the same question the chart will look the same and the answer would resemble if the same techniques are used (e.g. Lilly's). The chance that the Tarot cards laid down would be the same however would be extremely small. However there it may be possible to find a link between all these by which all stem from a natural source. Moreover studying a chart (whether horary or natal) or the Tarot (or any kind of divination art) seems to bring you in a sort state of mind where intuitively a connection is made with the other person/client. Without this, both arts could simply be performed by machines.

Quote:
No we don't put the planets in different places,


Well actually we do if we use a different zodiac or house system .

I too think we don't put them in different places. It's just the position we look at them. The spider hanging on the ceiling sees the room from another perspective than the mouse down in the corner does, however it is the same room.

Quote:
At the same time, I?m a bit perturbed if some of you (especially Kirk) seem to put the only emphasis on the Astrologer. What about the planets? Is it not important that they are physically there at the ?moment of astrology??


Hi Rene,

No offence but that approach is too literal for me. Partly, because I dont see astrology working on the basis of Newtonian physical cause/effect at all. Astronomers are fond of telling us that the Surgeon has more gravitational impact on the birth of a child than the planet Jupiter. Yes the stars and planets are 'out there' as actual physical points of reference. However, we dont relate to them astrologically as lumps of gas and rock the way science tells us they are. We see their actual cycles as symbolic principles which mirror ourselves and the world around us.

On this point I rather agree with Ren?. While Kirk is right that much depends on the astrologer and much happens in the interaction between astrologer and the other person, this view could be subject to the often heared criticism that all astrology and divination is a variant of 'cold reading'. There indeed is such a thing as 'cold reading' and I believe this kind of criticism should be rather acknowledged than rejected, because then the astrologer can learn to discern what is really astrology and what is merely a psychological effect.

Perhaps there is something else we don't know yet and that cannot be explained by newtonian physics. We shouldn't give in too much to scientists' remarks that the gravity of the doctor or midwife is many more times greater than that of Jupiter and also of the Moon. Sure the Moon doesn't 'pull' on us individually but she excerts the gravity for certain on the sea. With the tides the sea goes up and down and within it all fish and other creatures. I think this also happens with humans. I'd say 'something' around us over the whole Earth is somewhat affected by the planets and we are within it. The moment of birth being the most sensible moment for us.

The drawback of a pure symbolical view is that one needs to be 'initiated' in it or one needs an astrologer to explain what is happening. However the relation of weather with astrology and the possible effects of astrology on animals and plants indicate that there should be something physically related and couldn't be explained from a pure symbolical view. Our emotions are in fact minutely small chemical reactions in the brain. Often these emotions appear blurred to us. Our culture in which we grew up affects that what we see or experience. For the one dreaming about a snake would mean the devil and for the other the cycle of life.

Note that Galileo Galilei rejected that the Moon caused the tides referring to this as magic or occult. Although he has another physical explanation for the tides, this example illustrates how the rejection of a phemomenon, based on the assumption that it doesn't correspond with another (usual) theory, could be done too easily.

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/galileo/

article wrote:Galileo argues that the motion of the earth (diurnal and axial) is the only conceivable (or maybe plausible) physical cause for the reciprocal regular motion of the tides. He restricts the possible class of causes to mechanical motions, and so rules out Kepler's attribution of the moon as a cause. How could the moon without any connection to the seas cause the tides to ebb and flow? Such an explanation would be the invocation of magic or occult powers.

I prefer the view of Ptolemy of humours etc. I think this view was always there with the medieval astrologers, notwithstanding their symbolic approach. Only with Rudhyar this view was totally rejected. I could never be a pure humanistic astrologer, rather a humouristic astrologer .

However the relation of weather with astrology and the possible effects of astrology on animals and plants indicate that there should be something physically related and couldn't be explained from a pure symbolical view. Our emotions are in fact minutely small chemical reactions in the brain.

Oh my . . . You've explained away and so seriously diminished a huge part of your experience, your creativity, and your life. And astrology ? it's thrown into the same battle. Let us all bow down to the scientists who measure chemical reactions in the brain.

It's absolutely disgusting.

?If one Astrologer uses the NAIBOD and the other the PTOLEMY key, then at least one of them has to be wrong?

Not necessarily - at least according to one astrologer. The way I understand Rumen Kolev's methods, when he works with a chart and primary directions, he checks the chart against known events to see which key works best for that individual. Sometimes it's Ptolemy, sometimes its Naibod, sometimes it's something else. Whichever it is, he sticks with that key for that chart.

But this is part of the hunt for precision. Do we need to be all that precise all the time? When one technique gives a timing that is years different than another, I think we need to do better than that. But "You'll marry at age 26" might be good enough given all the other events that have to occur prior to the marriage (meet someone, get to know him or her for a few years, set up some kind of finances etc). On the other hand being told, "You'll encounter health problems at 55" and they occur at 51 or 60 might be a bit problematic. Still the point is that the information give to us by Naibod and the difference in the information given by Ptolemy is one of timing only. The promise is the same. A certain amount of precision is valuable, but it isn't the most important thing astrology has to offer. Knowing about potential for health issues outweighs the importance of the dates of occurrence.

I also think that this hunt for precision obscures larger issues. Perhaps wrong charts "work" because astrology, by its nature isn't that precise. Including the outers there are only 10 planets, 12 signs and 12 houses (unless we load up the chart with even more stuff). That is very little to combine that will describe the human experience, so there is often more than one possibility in a given chart. Does Mars in the 7th mean divorce or a Mars type spouse? Or both? Our quest for precision ought to be to sort that out rather than fretting over Naibod or Placidus to find the exact date of the marriage. Perhaps precision in timing is overrated or we have a lot more work to do with more important things before we tackle that one.

I think broader questions are at least as worthy of our attention. Does the chart show us a map of our psyche? If so, how do we understand it with the chart? If not what does it do? Burying ourselves in technique sells books. It doesn't add to our experience, if we already have more than enough techniques to work with. Maybe we just don't know how to use what we have very well.

On the mundane forum a thread began with the observatioin that a whole bunch of astrologers "missed" WWII. This in turn resulted in the rejection of the technique, which resulted in a book espousing a new technque which resulted in more books based on that technique and so on. Meanwhile, a guy using the old techniques accurately predicted the war, and, if he is to be believed, he could not get his article published! So the entire astrological world has passed by the guy who got it right and we have a whole bunch of new stuff to work with that might not have been necessary in the first place or may not work any better than what it replaced. Whether it was or not is well beyond the scope of this little essay.

Find a system that makes you comfortable and stick with it. Experiment with other things a bit as you encounter them, if they interest you. If you're wrong at times so what? You're human. The hunt for perfection is only frustrating, and often counterproductive. Everything and everyone have limits including astrology and astrologers.


Tom

Kirk wrote:

However the relation of weather with astrology and the possible effects of astrology on animals and plants indicate that there should be something physically related and couldn't be explained from a pure symbolical view. Our emotions are in fact minutely small chemical reactions in the brain.

Oh my . . . You've explained away and so seriously diminished a huge part of your experience, your creativity, and your life. And astrology ? it's thrown into the same battle. Let us all bow down to the scientists who measure chemical reactions in the brain.

Hi Kirk,
At first sight it might appear that I see humans and life just as a result of chemistry. Far from that, I'm not a supporter of 'physicalism' that believes that everything in life is ruled by physical processes and denying the spiritual. There's a very thin line between 'soul' and physical processes in the brain.

I think that soul is totally free from astrological influences and therefore feel for the view of Thomas Aquinas who viewed the astrology as affecting the body while the soul has free choice. He did acknowledge however that the effects can be so strong that free will is very difficult to maintain.

An astrology ruling over the soul through symbols is in my opinion far more fatalistic than 'physical astrology'. Sometimes modern astrology is even more fatalistic than classical astrology. According to some, a Pluto transit definitely means a transformation of the soul which cannot be avoided. On the other side classical astrology could warn people to be carefull when they are about 41 and shouldn't do hazardous things like jousting. The transformation issue is sometimes also used for something called 'astrological alchemy'. Transits are used in the transformation process of the soul. However interesting this may sound, the issue I don't like is that it denies free will of the soul. What if I just started astrology today only to discover that I missed great opportunities to conduct my transformation during a Pluto transit of a few years ago. Or I have to wait for the next transit.

The problem is not only that people want to control astrology like Deb explained, but also that some always try to find something astrological that allegedly is said to control us. I think that a smaller percentage can be attributed to astrology, the rest is due to social political economical natural circumstances and free will, perhaps part of this can be found through mundane astrology and we might be subject to these forces overruling our individual chart. This is how Ptolemy explains it in Tetrabiblos IV.10.

Quote:
?If one Astrologer uses the NAIBOD and the other the PTOLEMY key, then at least one of them has to be wrong?


Not necessarily - at least according to one astrologer. The way I understand Rumen Kolev's methods, when he works with a chart and primary directions, he checks the chart against known events to see which key works best for that individual. Sometimes it's Ptolemy, sometimes its Naibod, sometimes it's something else. Whichever it is, he sticks with that key for that chart.

I'm not sure if I can totally agree with this. It resembles a bit the recent idea (made possible by software?) that there are several house systems fitting to different people, according to this idea there are 'Placidus types', 'Campanus types' etc. If there's a distinction to be made then there would be the purely symbolical view of 1? of right ascension equals 1 year and the view that directions should reflect the year. The key then depends on the technical view of the astrologer. This may not simply be an attempt to be more precise, but rather a search for a theory that appeals to you.

In that case it's indeed better to stick with it:

Find a system that makes you comfortable and stick with it. Experiment with other things a bit as you encounter them, if they interest you. If you're wrong at times so what? You're human. The hunt for perfection is only frustrating, and often counterproductive. Everything and everyone have limits including astrology and astrologers.

I don't see how you get from here:

If there's a distinction to be made then there would be the purely symbolical view of 1? of right ascension equals 1 year and the view that directions should reflect the year.

to here:

The key then depends on the technical view of the astrologer. This may not simply be an attempt to be more precise, but rather a search for a theory that appeals to you.

Mars directed to Jupiter is Mars directed to Jupiter regardless of what key we use. The key tells us "when" - nothing more no matter what reasons we may come up with for using a particular key. We can, of course, look for a theory we like in any subject for any reason. That seems to be beside the point. Claiming one key has to be correct in all instances and therefore every other key is necessarily wrong is just as easily a search for an appealing theory as any other. The real problem, as I see it, is trying to square all of astrology with the scientific-materialist worldview. If there is more than one astrological way to skin a cat then it is the scientific viewpoint that may need to change, not astrology.

Tom

My ditty on this....

http://au.geocities.com/marty_0750/arti ... ptain.html

Martin

Tom wrote:I don't see how you get from here:

If there's a distinction to be made then there would be the purely symbolical view of 1? of right ascension equals 1 year and the view that directions should reflect the year.

to here:

The key then depends on the technical view of the astrologer. This may not simply be an attempt to be more precise, but rather a search for a theory that appeals to you.

Mars directed to Jupiter is Mars directed to Jupiter regardless of what key we use. The key tells us "when" - nothing more no matter what reasons we may come up with for using a particular key. We can, of course, look for a theory we like in any subject for any reason. That seems to be beside the point. Claiming one key has to be correct in all instances and therefore every other key is necessarily wrong is just as easily a search for an appealing theory as any other. The real problem, as I see it, is trying to square all of astrology with the scientific-materialist worldview. If there is more than one astrological way to skin a cat then it is the scientific viewpoint that may need to change, not astrology.

Tom

Hi Tom. I'm not sure if I totally understood your question but I try to look at the basis of the distinction. The 1?=1 year method gives a cycle of 360 years. This reflects the 360? of the zodiac. 360? reflects the 'ideal year' of 12 lunar months of 30 days wich formed the basis of the signs. This could be viewed as arbitrary like Kepler wrote about this or could be accepted as a symbolic representation. Although I feel a preference for a scientific view I'm willing to have a look at the symbolic values too.

The key of Naibod is one of the first attempts to make the cycle look like the year of 365.25 days. However, since the year is irregular due to the changing speed of the Sun, Naibod's key can also be seen as using too 'mean' values. More perfections can be made. Discussion about this is difficult because everybody thinks to have the correct key.

Making calculations for several keys I managed to 'find' events for the same direction every key. I also believed that a direction should at least should be exact within a margin of a couple of months before and after exact. I never believed it should be exact to the week or so but finding deviations of several years using directions made me doubt strongly about them. I was about to quit looking at them but when Martin wrote in the mystery rectification answer thread that:

So, assuming that the birth time was correctly noted, it is almost certainly relevant that this Saturn squared the Asc around the age of 16. Yes, I know that this was four years before the accident! But there is still a Saturn influence on the Asc until it reaches its next aspect (which is another square, this time from the Moon, and not helpful).

Being always in the assumption that the event had to be within several months of the direction, this remark revealed that primary directions show a bigger picture of periods in life rather than pinpointed events. This suddenly helped me to understand long periods in my life which I couldn't using transits alone.

This means that the keys are less important for the sake of exactness, although they can deviate a few years at high age. The deviations based upon the use of latitude or not can even make bigger deviations. However this point of view is different from the 'key' issue but rather based upon perspective.

Perhaps it may be impossible to find a satisfying key from a 'scientific' point of view and even the concept of timecycle x = timecycle y could be considered arbitrary from a strict scientific astrology point of view, and then perhaps only the transits would be acceptable. But even I wouldn?t go too far in my ?scientific? views for otherwise I should abandon astrology entirely. And that is something I don?t intend to do.

Recently I?ve been working on a new key but it doesn?t mean that I believe to have found the final solution. Maybe I will open a thread on this but next week I'm going on a holiday so I may have not enough time for it. If I don?t manage to find a satisfying key then I?ll simply use 1? = 1year. At least it would make things much easier to calculate .

My thoughts on the subject go to the question of what we believe astrology to be. We vary from those who believe in physical causation to those who believe it's a collection of modelling tools and methods to those who believe it's an oracle. And there's some validity to each position.

I come from a software development background (though I started on astrology long before that). I think there's a very good analogy between astrology and the kinds of modelling methods used in many disciplines including software development.

Each such approach can have different ends to its analysis (eg the analysis of the viability of a business can be taken from a number of perspectives), different emphases, different elements to be considered, different ways of assigning them value, different methods for integrating the elements, and different ways of interpreting the results. In the end, hopefully, there is some sense of methodology (the evaluation of the methods used and their effectiveness for their chosen purpose).

These are all human attempts to understand phenomena and as often as not to predict outcomes according to a model that can extract what is important about a set of phenomena, and finally to use the information gained for appropriate action.

Astrology is no different, but like many of the kinds of modelling done in other disciplines, there tends to be a lack of methodology (in the sense of how to evaluate effectiveness to purpose).

- Ed

Tom wrote:Does Mars in the 7th mean divorce or a Mars type spouse? Or both? Our quest for precision ought to be to sort that out rather than fretting over Naibod or Placidus to find the exact date of the marriage. Perhaps precision in timing is overrated or we have a lot more work to do with more important things before we tackle that one.

Tom[/color]

I don't think there any absolute answers to any aspect or position in a chart by any planet. That posited Mars in the 7th in the charts of 400 million people will be expressed in many different ways at many different times for each of them. There may be some similarities and in some cases it could probably be said that the experiences were "identical", but if there were an absolute answer all astrologers, with a certain length of experience or drawing from the shared work of others, would be making absolutely correct predictions on a daily basis. The same goes for the Sun, the Moon, and the rest of the planets.

But what if a technique, tested over decades, in thousands of charts, that used only what really existed in nature and nothing that was presumed by man (except for what attributes might be assigned to a planet or a combination of planets), that claimed to be an excellent tool for timing, in comparison to available tools, was to be presented? Wouldn't it be in the best interest of astrologers, no matter what other technique they favored, to have an earnest look at it? Isn't having as accurate a time for a nativity a desired starting position?

It seems to me that for years astrologers have been adopting techniques that have been handed down as dogma without any proof of how much testing (in amount of time or number of charts used) was done using this principle before it was recorded to be handed down through centuries. How long was the life expectancy of people (astrologers) centuries ago? How far were they able to travel to share and/or collaborate on findings or ideas in their lifetime? How many contemporaries did they have to communicate and work with? How many did some serious research of their own or had access to extensive research of their peers? And again, what was the length and breadth of that research? How many subject charts did they have to work with? And how much feedback did they get?

One would think that if a technique were presented that could verify or establish a correct or very close time of birth (in a much shorter period of time than is claimed to be necessary for current methods of rectification) using possibly a single life experience, that serious astrologers would not hesitate to give it a fair try before passing judgment on it. Astrologers are rather fond of saying that critics of astrology should not be making judgments about something they haven't studied - the same applies to astrologers and astrological techniques they haven't studied.

I have presented a new technique and make claims for its accuracy in timing. I have presented links to where instructions in 2 different methods on how to perform the calculations may be found, along with many finished examples which may be be examined and/or reconstructed.To my knowledge not 1 person (members of a group that would be quick to proclaim their open-mindedness) has given the technique a try. Perhaps the open minded claim should be re-examined.

Not picking on you Tom. I respect your knowledge. This seemed to me to be an opening to opine on this subject.

Bob

"How Many Astrological Methods Do We Need?"

That's a great, thought-provoking question!

Rather than (immediately) philosophize, let's examine it empirically. If we look out at the Astrologers that come to the Forum and post and if we look at the literature in the field, it seems that the answer must surely be INFINITY.

Thinking about it, perhaps that is what Astrologers seem to WANT. What they NEED is perhaps a different question altogether.

My only real fear in this approach to the question is that I think of SuperCuts (a hair "salon" in the States). I don't know if it is still this way (I live in Germany for years now), but when one got a haircut, the time was noted and the "manager" would occasionally come back and let the "stylist" know how much time was LEFT. In short, your haircut wasn't finished by quality or progress of the haircut, it was determined by when your time was up. Since, in Astrology, we are often an ORACLE to the client, we have to do what helps most regardless of the time involved.

Now, in Astrology, we see some astrologers (won't mention any names) that use hundreds of asteroids and look at "the future" with more than a half-dozen specific techniques. On the other hand, we have someone like Noel Tyl, who uses (mostly) transits and solar arcs, with a nod for the progressed Moon. (I have a sneaking suspicion that the correct answer is somewhere BETWEEN those two extremes, BUT LEANING TOWARDS THE LATTER, not in particular technique, but in NUMBER.)

From a "service" oriented perspective, we only need the techniques that are NECESSARY to give the service that the client wants. Part of the problem is that we are all fighting against negative P.R. (and let's say general misunderstanding of what Astrology IS). Because of this, we have a strong drive to be "righter than right", which can lead us quite easily into chasing every leaf that blows in the wind. (in terms of techniques)

I know that, no matter how satisfied *I* am with a particular technique, there is always the urge to learn more and to examine more possibilities. I think this is healthy as long as we don't get LOST IN THE SEARCH or take too strong of a "hit" in terms of how many people we can ultimately "help".

The bottom line is to use Astrology to IMPROVE THE HUMAN CONDITION. (hope we can agree on that broad definition) We must be watchful of things that might deter us from that.

Now, Unique_Astrology has mentioned the importance of having an accurate birthtime and though I am hesitant to use the "rectfication" word in recent days on this Forum (there is absolute disagreement from MANY about *HOW* to go about doing this in the best way); still, I feel that Unique_Astrology is entirely correct. There is a question of PRECISION, which is necessitated based on TECHNIQUE. If one only uses transits and solar arcs, a birthtime to the minute is basically enough. (in solar arcs, one minute accuracy is 15' of arc on the Midheaven, or of course, 3 MONTHS time) I won't tangent onto the idea that, in 3 months, so many different things can happen that it stretches reliability to try and "define" a 3 month period, when so many varied things can happen in that amount of time. (Generally) if we're talking about Primary Directions, then a birthtime to the minute is an unfinished rectification...it's not usable. (This is because a SLIGHT change in birthtime leads to a LARGE change in timing) [Now, of course, the HINT is in that last sentence about HOW we should go about rectifying, but I'll leave that as a pointing finger, rather than a "do it this way!" comment.]

Unique_Astrology HAS presented a method and I personally have not looked into it yet, so I can't critique or even "review" it. It does appear to be math-heavy, which I think would likely scare away MANY in these days of computerized, instant presentation of information.

The problem, or one way to be sure and get side-tracked in obtaining a super-accurate birthtime is to allow the subjective mind of the astrologer too large a sway in the process. The best way, ie. the objective way, would be to have a system of NEVER-CHANGING, DEFINED symbolism. One has to use tight orbs, so that the time period is brief enough that it has MEANING when an event occurs in that time. (This previous point is IMPORTANT. On another website, a psychologically oriented one, again, won't mention any names, there is an astrologer putting forth rectifications and basing them often on Solar Arc activity with a WHOLE DEGREE range of applicability, ie. one year. It should be obvious that any of us can find SOMETHING that occurs in our life relative to the astrological aspect, IF WE ARE ALLOWED A WHOLE YEAR OF TIME IN WHICH TO SEARCH. If a certain solar arc occured in July 2005, then we are talking about BASICALLY THE WHOLE OF 2005 as the period of its applicability according to that particular astrologer's approach. So, in that year, if the solar arc related to a possible accident, then do I see my fender bender in May or my fall down the stairs in August or both? If the solar arc seems to suggest a death in the family, are we thinking of Uncle John dying in March or Aunt Betty dying in November, or both? What about the years where I had two accidents and NO attending solar arcs to "blame" it on? It should be obvious that the larger time period that we "envelope" into having relevance, the LESS precise we CAN be.)

Now, Unique_Astrology has mentioned a method where rectification can be done based on one event. There was recently a rectification challenge on this Forum using three events. I don't remember Unique's attempt or IF he participated, but I know that Matt was the closest to the correct answer, whatever the method. However, because Unique normally presents sound reasoning (to my eyes), I am forced to work through the math, which (though I was a math major in college!) I have been hoping to avoid. The claim was thrown on the table and, in the interest of at least LOOKING at anything that MIGHT be useful, I can't avoid it just because it's momentarily unpleasant.

There is so much more to say on this topic...and I look forward to reading everyone's take on this topic.

How many Methods do I need? After 20 years, it still seems like the answer must surely be "ONE MORE." The last two techniques that I have found useful and often PROFOUND are Topocentric Primary Directions and PSSR's. I always feel that I am "getting there", but that it is like the mathematical paradox, where I continually HALVE the distance to the "finish line" each time, but thusly never actually reach the finish line. As my wife would corroborate, I am definitely a "work in progress" and my Astrology is the same...

Central Scrutinizer

I come from a software development background (though I started on astrology long before that). I think there's a very good analogy between astrology and the kinds of modelling methods used in many disciplines including software development.

This is also an interesting way of approaching astrology. It reminds me of models used for weatherforecasting.