Exegesis Volume 07 Issue #030

In This Issue:

From: Patrice Guinard
Subject: [e] Re: exegesis Digest V7 #20 (ASTROLOGICAL SYMBOLS)

From: "JG or DF"
Subject: [e] physical basis for progression theory


Exegesis Digest Thu, 21 Feb 2002


Date: Thu, 21 Feb 2002 10:22:36 +0100
From: Patrice Guinard
Subject: [e] Re: exegesis Digest V7 #20 (ASTROLOGICAL SYMBOLS)

Hi! Some points about symbol.

Dennis wrote:
 > >The only immediate criticism I would make of this fine description (that she
 > >and Patrice here produce in combination) is the appearance of the word
 > >"symbols" in that particular context. The description is of how the planets
 > >seem to manifest internally - the crucial issue of contemporary astrological
 > >belief.

& L. Smerillo replies:
 > >I think a symbol is a symbol because someone made it a symbol. It is a
 > >'throwing together' ( >Gk. sum + bollein) between two disparate objects.

I'm afraid that it is not sufficient to understand what a symbol is about. A symbol isn't a mere linguistic SIGN, a convention between various users to indicate an object. Nor is it a 'throwing together' despite the Greek etymology. What are the disparate objects in the case of an astrological symbol?? There is the planet, Sun, Saturn or Pluto, but there is no VIS-A-VIS.

First of all a symbol does't speak about OBJECTS. Secondly, there is no definite reference for a symbol. Otherwise it would be a sign, not a symbol. (Probably some people would say that such an entity without any accurate (or even verifiable) reference is of no interest, or that it's of no value... The damages of the Popperian sophistry on modern thought... But let's go on! )

I've discussed the concept of symbol in my analysis of Peircian semiotics (see http://cura.free.fr/16peiren.html). See also the analysis of Aldo Mazzucchelli on the same subject: http://cura.free.fr/xv/12mazz-e.html) I've defined the symbol as a sign of aspiration, i.e. a sign that speaks of a psychic reality which can eventually be recognized or represented by an exterior "signifier", here a planet or even a zodiacal sign, which is a "constructed" object.

What's the usefulness of symbols for astrology? Symbols are names for interior, psychic-astral energies. Nothing else, & especially let's take special care to not confuse these rather indeterminate energies with myths or other such representations, invented in some cultural context, as if they have some relation (or not) with astrological symbols.

I've proposed the following explanation of the astrological fact:
1) the astronomical signal is integrated into the neurophysiological organization.
2) the astral impression is the inaperceptible psychic effect of this signal. It is a "quasi-lived ".
3) the astrological symbol is the psycho-mental and cultural translation of this impressional.

The impressional (astral impression), or the "astrological IN-SIGN", is the only evidence (for astrologers) of the astral incidence. All astrologers, I presume, have had the "experience" of transits. A transit of Mercury or Jupiter on the natal Sun, for instance: this is not mythology!

Patrice Guinard


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From: "JG or DF"
Subject: [e] physical basis for progression theory
Date: Thu, 21 Feb 2002 22:54:24 +1300

The astrological technique of progressing the horoscope to `predict' derives from the 19th century technique of directing. I always found that no matter how many explanations I read in astrology books and articles, no sensible rationale for these techniques was ever given. The premise underlying these techniques is a metaphysical equation of `a day for a year'. Each day after someone's birth correlates with a year of their life. Mathematically this is usually rendered as a degree for a year.

The closest thing to a physical basis for the technique is the relation between sidereal time and solar time. You can see this on your astroclock: look at any particular time each day, note the degree of the Ascendant, and compare with the following day same time. You will observe a one degree progression.

Okay, so much for the status quo. If I got anything wrong, do say so: my comprehension of this subject is tentative! Now check out the following scientific report...

"Recent work by seismologists Xiaodong Song and Paul Richards of the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, New York, suggests that the inner core of the planet rotates faster than the rest of the planet. According to their research, which rests on changes over time in shock waves caused by earthquakes bouncing off Earth's interior, the inner core turns about one degree farther than the planet as a whole each year. In approximately 360 years, the inner core, rotating on its own, would make one more complete revolution than all the layers outside it. The faster rotation of the inner core may explain Earth's magnetism, a still poorly understood phenomenon that Albert Einstein once declared one of the great unsolved problems of modern physics.

According to a computer model developed by Gary Glaizmaier and Paul Roberts, the inner core is solid iron spinning in an electrically conducting liquid outer core. The result is a kind of dynamo that produces an electrical charge that in turn maintains a magnetic field. Glatzmaier and Roberts, working independently from Song and Richards, also posit an inner core that rotates separately from the rest of the planetary layers at about the same rate of one degree more per year."

[p150, "Voices of the rocks: a scientist looks at catastrophes and ancient civilisations", RM Schoch, 1999]

The author is a geologist on the faculty of Boston University. He achieved a measure of global fame a decade ago by advocating a re-dating of the Sphinx to several millennia earlier due to its erosion pattern.

It is generally understood by physicists that the Earth's magnetic field is generated by the rotation of the core of the planet. I was taught this in my physics classes in the '60s, and it remains the status quo. The above findings appear to indicate that the core is keeping sidereal time rather than solar time. This suggests significant implications for the link with the magnetic field. Looks like the well-known diurnal variation in the field has an annual phase-locked coordination.

The degree per year progression just happens to be exactly the same as that of the occultist astrologers (which so far as I can recall they got from Ptolemy). Obviously a cue for the sceptics to step right up and claim loudly, in unison, "It's just a coincidence!"

If Bill Tallman and Bill Sheeran are still subscribed, I'd be interested in their opinion of this remarkable development. We seem to be confronted with hard evidence of a physical basis for progression theory!

Dennis Frank


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End of exegesis Digest V7 #30

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