Split Thread General astrology discussion with Astro Teacher

[AvalonXQ]

What does any of that junk have to do with the topic at hand? This is what I mean about your lack of knowledge. You are saying that the ancients did not know that there were stars and planets?

Ahem.

The point I was making, of which there is no doubt, is that they had no idea what the stars and planets actually were, so they had an excuse - which you and I don't have - to believe they affected their daily lives. Do at least try to follow the argument.

 

[SumDood]

I think you might have missed this teacher:

Yes, as examples of ideas that have as much credibility and evidence to support them as astrology does, i.e. none whatever. Disagree? Then make a case, and offer some evidence to support it.

(my bold)

 

[Olowkow]

The Greeks called them "planeta", because they thought the planets were "wandering stars". Ah, yes, when logic fails, try the ad homs. What else is new?
How you coming with that evidence for the 10% brain use?

 

[Foster Zygote]

Hi, I missed your post Foster, the home of Astrology and Agriculture came from Mesopotamia, this region that includes the country we know today as Iraq.

"Modern civilisation began in Iraq. The Iraqis invented agriculture. They invented astronomy and astrology. The entire astrological system still in use today in every Daily Newspaper was invented in Iraq over five thousand years ago. They discovered the planets, they mapped the stars. They invented the 24 hour day, the sixty minute hour and the sixty second minute. In a very real sense we still live within Iraqi time. They invented the seven day week. They invented mathematics and writing. The earliest known work of literature, the Epic of Gilgamesh, written in cuneiform script on clay tablets in about 2750 BC in the land of Sumeria, in a region of modern Iraq , talks about a place called Uruk, of which Gilgamesh is the King."

See - http://perun.users.sbb.co.yu/articles_astrology_types.htm

This does nothing to support the claim that astrology is responsible for the development of agriculture. The Neolithic Revolution is thought to have developed independently in at least seven or eight places around the world. In fact, agriculture is what made those much later civilizations possible. The Neolithic Revolution occurred in the Middle East around 10,000 BCE. The Sumerian civilization doesn't appear until around 6000 BCE. That's four thousand years after the advent of agriculture in the region.

By the way, your source doesn't seem to be very historically literate. The Epic of Gilgamesh was collected from a number of poems and stories not long before the 7th century BCE. That's over nine thousand years later. It's thought that there might have been a real King Gilgamesh upon whom the mythical character is loosely based (unless you believe that he really was two thirds god) who lived during the 27th century BCE. So your source doesn't even get the date for the Epic of Gilgamesh right.

Book, Scientific Proof Of Astrology - http://www.amazon.com/Scientific-Proof-Astrology-Music-Planets/dp/0572029063

I found an interesting article from The Guardian regarding this book:

The argument Seymour puts forward is that the movement of the Sun, moon and sundry planets from Jupiter to Mars, interfere with the Earth's magnetic field. In doing so, the unborn offspring of expectant mothers around the world are exposed to different magnetic fields that toy with the development of their budding brains.

Seymour's suggestion that the stars and planets rule over us has largely been received with the shortest of shrifts. "All I can say is that I have yet to meet another scientist that agrees with his views," says Jacqueline Mitton of the Royal Astronomical Society. "It's right up there with stuff like crop circles being made by extra-terrestrials," says Robert Massey, astronomer at the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, where Seymour worked as a planetarium lecturer in the early 70s.

Most scientists dismiss Seymour's arguments simply because the changes in the Earth's magnetic field that he believes are so significant for our behaviour are so minute. The magnetic field, which is generated by the Earth's spinning molten iron core, is pathetically weak compared with the magnetic fields our gadgets and infrastructure produce. Earlier this year, the government's radiation watchdog, the National Radiological Protection Board, recommended that Britain cut magnetic field exposure from power lines to 100 microteslas, which is still twice the Earth's natural field strength.

"If the Earth's magnetic field collapsed to zero, we'd get a higher dose of radiation from space and that would have an effect on our behaviour, but I don't think it would make it any easier to predict if you're going to come into money one week or the next," says Massey. "Your mobile phone, your television, your washing machine - any electrical equipment you have generates far stronger magnetic fields than the Earth's field."

And this doesn't really address what I asked anyway. I wanted to see evidence that a significant number of scientists practice astrology. Can you back up this claim?

Abraham - http://zaqen.info/hislangu.htm

Come on, this isn't an academic source. This site speaks of the Noachian Flood as an historical event.

http://www.yogaofabraham.com/the-yoga-of-abraham/the-22-letter-alphabet.html

This source is no more informed, but it doesn't even support your claim that Abraham invented the Chaldean alphabet.

Also - http://books.google.com/books?id=RG...m invented alphabet and as astrologer&f=false

Again, not an informed source. The idea that Abraham invented the Chaldean alphabet is an old legend, like the legend that the Emperor Shennong invented tea (not to mention agriculture and medicine. Go figure). There is no historical evidence that Abraham was the inventor of the Chaldean alphabet any more than Moses personally wrote the Pentateuch.


What I would really like to see is some evidence that a significant number of scientists practice astrology. If you cannot justify this claim with evidence then you are doing exactly what you have accused others of doing

 

[AvalonXQ]

It's thought that there might have been a real King Gilgamesh upon whom the mythical character is loosely based (unless you believe that he really was two thirds god)

How can you be two thirds any ancestry? Don't we have to stick to fractions of powers of two?

 

[Nonpareil]

Your comments show a lack of knowledge of this subject, it's history, and its basic language, which you should have in order to debate Astrology, do you not agree? What is so difficult about learning more about serious astrology before engaging into a debate with one knowledgeable about the subject?

Argument ad hominem does not advance your position. Claiming that your opponent has no knowledge of the subject doesn't change the fact that it is you who is making stuff up.

What is so hard about reading some serious materials to learn more so that you will be able to sound intelligent on this topic?

Or, is it much easier for you to sit behind your computer and opinionate to death while wasting valuable learning time to actually be able to form your arguments with knowledge of the subject you have chosen to debate?

I would post the irony poster again, but I'm afraid that it would clutter up the page, and there's really no point as you can't see it anyway.

...Ah, what the hell.

Such as the pseudo-skeptic comments you've written? I don't find you serious at all considering that you clearly haven't studied this subject, of which you are ignorant, from the content of your own words. One can be a skeptic and be informed on the topic of debate. I do not find that you are one of them. Period. Until you change that Pixel, you should serious review the "drivel" that you have submitted on this subject.

See above comment. Astro Teacher, you are the one ignoring the facts at hand. You are the one trying to support your position with lies and appeals to authority. To claim that someone who is doubtful of your truthfulness is not a skeptic is ludicrous, as well as ironic.

Still, no trip to the library, huh? A shame, England has such wonderful libraries. You should take a long tour of them.

See - http://www.discord.org/~lippard/rawlins-starbaby.txt

Argument ad hominem again? Come on, AT. You can do better than that. At least, I hope you can. If you can't... well, then I feel sorry for you.

Hi, I missed your post Foster, the home of Astrology and Agriculture came from Mesopotamia, this region that includes the country we know today as Iraq.

"Modern civilisation began in Iraq. The Iraqis invented agriculture. They invented astronomy and astrology. The entire astrological system still in use today in every Daily Newspaper was invented in Iraq over five thousand years ago. They discovered the planets, they mapped the stars. They invented the 24 hour day, the sixty minute hour and the sixty second minute. In a very real sense we still live within Iraqi time. They invented the seven day week. They invented mathematics and writing. The earliest known work of literature, the Epic of Gilgamesh, written in cuneiform script on clay tablets in about 2750 BC in the land of Sumeria, in a region of modern Iraq , talks about a place called Uruk, of which Gilgamesh is the King."

See - http://perun.users.sbb.co.yu/articles_astrology_types.htm

Book, Scientific Proof Of Astrology - http://www.amazon.com/Scientific-Proof-Astrology-Music-Planets/dp/0572029063

Abraham - http://zaqen.info/hislangu.htm

http://www.yogaofabraham.com/the-yoga-of-abraham/the-22-letter-alphabet.html

Also - http://books.google.com/books?id=RG...m invented alphabet and as astrologer&f=false

This does not show that agriculture, mathematics or medicine were invented by astrologers. They came from the same area, yes. So what?
Nice try at covering up your lies, though.

Yes, mainly because I do not enjoy, nor agree with you mixing in such silliness like you have in your posts above, i.e., flat earth, Santa Claus, (and his reindeers quantum jumping?) creationism, etc., etc. What does any of that junk have to do with the topic at hand?

This is what I mean about lack of knowledge of Astrology. You are saying that the ancients did not know that there were stars and planets? What they were? As opposed to what - perhaps Santa Claus and reindeer? Make my case? Why don't you get outside more and then visit your excellent libraries and while you are at it take out some decent books on the subject?

No, the "ancients" did not know that the lights in the sky were stars and planets. They believed them to be various other supernatural phenomena. A popular explanation was that the stars and planets were the gods flying across the night sky in their chariots of light.

Winter is coming on, and by next year, you might have at least a general idea of this topic enough to participate in a intelligent debate? Is that even possible for you to do?

See the irony picture again, please. I think posting it twice in one go would count as spam.

Until that time, please, spare me from your flat earths-creationism-Santa Claus-and reindeer-quantum-jumping and all the rest of that total crap. What are you smoking?

Don't waste my time with such posts Pixel. Just unbelievable. Is this the kind of "critical thinking" to be found on JREF?

Yes. Impressive, isn't it? In less than one hundred and fifty of your posts we have managed to prove you to be completely and utterly ignorant of any scientific facts on your own subject, as well as discovering that you are incredibly self-deluded, as evidenced by the fact that you consider yourself to be winning this debate.

 

[Marduk]

Astrology did use to work in Mesopotamia, but thats only because they based their real life decisions around celestial ritual dates

e.g.new buildings were not begun until the court astrologer divined that a certain date would be most auspicious

Wars were not started until it was perceived that the stars were showing good fortune

marriages were arranged when the stars said was a good time for union

Astroteacher, a lot of your posts contain accurate information, its the context your missing, heres a legend about a Babylonian king that should serve as a warning

The only person i know of who ever really benefited from astrology was a grdener called Bani and he was the luckiest Gardener on earth. Irra-Imitti was a king who ruled at the end of the Akkadian period just before the rise of Babylonia. He was not a particularly good king and had started his reign as an usurper to the throne. One day his soothsayers had approached him with terrible news. A terrible omen towards the king had been foretold and Irra Imiiti decided to enact an old tradition that acted as a safeguard in these sort of events
He chose a gardener to act as “king for a day” and planned at the end of the day to have the new king executed therefore drawing the bad omen to him and leaving Irra unscathed. The plan was going well until that night Irra-Imitti drank some soup too quickly without realising it was boiling and so managed to achieve “death by soup” by Asphyxia caused by the swelling. This left the gardener on the throne as the rightful king and he was crowned King Enlil Bani in honour of Enlil, who surely because of his God like luck, had been entered by the holy spirit and was him the whole time. A poem was written to commemorate the event and it starts with the following lines

“Enlil-bani, wondrous king among the princes! Created by An, elevated by Enlil, like Utu the light of all lands, born to princedom, girded with all the divine powers, watched over by Enlil and listened to by Ninlil on account of the widespread people living at the boundary of heaven and earth! Fair of face, lordly of limb! With the shepherd's crook you have settled innumerable people.

he ruled for 24 years
and as it later turned out
the astrological prediction that foretold the bad omen was based on the movements of Venus
and the tables the Soothsayers had used were years out of date
Gardeners have all the luck

after this they didn't rely too heavily on using astrology in mesopotamia, they made a science out of hepatomancy instead (foretelling omens from studying a sacrificial animals liver) and started studying astronomy as a pure science
so by promoting that the Mesopotamians used astrology and it worked you are stating a fact, but you are missing that they found they could get the same or better results from looking at goat entrails and so they abandoned astrology as junk belief. They moved on, some people could learn from their example.....


as with all of my posts on this subject, if anyone would like supporting links from credible academic sources just say so.

 

[Pixel42]

Don't waste my time with such posts Pixel.

It's clear I'm wasting my time by trying to engage with you. You seemed to be a lot more articulate than most of the astrology apologists we get here, but alas you've turned out to make no more sense than the worst of them.

Is this the kind of "critical thinking" to be found on JREF?

Pertinant questions and a tendancy to notice when they aren't answered, requests for evidence and a tendancy to notice when none is offered, and an ability to recognise pseudoscientific drivel and gross scientific errors? Yes, I'm afraid it is.

 

[Kuko 4000]

No. All it's necessary to know in order to debate the validity of astrology are the claims astrologers make for it, and the evidence they offer to support those claims. That evidence can then be examined by anyone familiar with the scientific method to see if it does indeed support the claims. None of the evidence I have examined (and I have examined a lot over the years, though you yourself have yet to offer any) stands up to the most casual scrutiny.

The minutia of how calculations are made, the history of how those ways of doing the calculations were arrived at and the explanations of how astrology may or may not work are irrelevant until it has been established that it does work. Until you, or any other astrologer, have established that I will not waste my time reading more about the supposed workings of something for which there is no evidence, and which is no more credible than creationism, homeopathy or Santa Claus. If there were people who spent their time writing serious books which attempted to explain how Santa's reindeers fly, or how by using quantum tunnelling he can visit every child in the world, should I have to spend time reading them before I'm allowed to ask whether they have any evidence that Santa Claus actually exists?

Astro Teacher, Pixel makes a very good point in this post (my emphasis). It would benefit the whole discussion if you'd address this point seriously.

 

[Marduk]

How can you be two thirds any ancestry? Don't we have to stick to fractions of powers of two?

his father was a god king, and his mother was entered by the holy spirit of Inanna at the time of his conception so she was half and half. = 2/3 god

it must be true, it was in a story

 

[Professor Yaffle]

3/4 god by my calculations.

 

[jakesteele]

4. French statistician Michel Gauquelin

Isn't this the guy that came up with the Mars Effect that caused founding member of CSI, Dennis Rawlins, to resign from CSICOP?

Mars effect

An early controversy concerned the so-called Mars effect: French statistician Michel Gauquelin’s claim that champion athletes are more likely to be born when the planet Mars is in certain positions in the sky. In late 1975, prior to the formal launch of CSICOP, astronomer Dennis Rawlins, along with Paul Kurtz, George Abel and Marvin Zelen (all subsequent members of CSICOP) began investigating the claim. Rawlins, a founding member of CSICOP at its launch in May 1976, resigned in early 1980 claiming that other CSICOP researchers had used incorrect statistics, faulty science, and outright falsification in an attempt to debunk Gauquelin’s claims. In an article for the pro-paranormal magazine Fate, he wrote: "I am still skeptical of the occult beliefs CSICOP was created to debunk. But I have changed my mind about the integrity of some of those who make a career of opposing occultism."[18] CSICOP's Philip Klass responded by circulating an article to CSICOP members critical of Rawlins' arguments and motives;[19] Klass's unpublished response itself becoming the target for further criticism.

 

[AvalonXQ]

his father was a god king, and his mother was entered by the holy spirit of Inanna at the time of his conception so she was half and half. = 2/3 god

That doesn't work out unless "god king" = 5/6 god.

 

[jakesteele]

Neally;5265125]

4. French statistician Michel Gauquelin

Neally;5265125]
Quote:
4. French statistician Michel Gauquelin

Isn't this the guy that came up with the Mars Effect that caused founding member of CSI, Dennis Rawlins, to resign from CSICOP?

Quote:
Mars effect

An early controversy concerned the so-called Mars effect: French statistician Michel Gauquelin’s claim that champion athletes are more likely to be born when the planet Mars is in certain positions in the sky. In late 1975, prior to the formal launch of CSICOP, astronomer Dennis Rawlins, along with Paul Kurtz, George Abel and Marvin Zelen (all subsequent members of CSICOP) began investigating the claim. Rawlins, a founding member of CSICOP at its launch in May 1976, resigned in early 1980 claiming that other CSICOP researchers had used incorrect statistics, faulty science, and outright falsification in an attempt to debunk Gauquelin’s claims. In an article for the pro-paranormal magazine Fate, he wrote: "I am still skeptical of the occult beliefs CSICOP was created to debunk. But I have changed my mind about the integrity of some of those who make a career of opposing occultism."[18] CSICOP's Philip Klass responded by circulating an article to CSICOP members critical of Rawlins' arguments and motives;[19] Klass's unpublished response itself becoming the target for further criticism.
__________________
In the insane society the sane man must act insane
Mr. Spock

 

[jakesteele]

Sorry about the double post, I screwed up.

 

[Olowkow]

It's clear I'm wasting my time by trying to engage with you. You seemed to be a lot more articulate than most of the astrology apologists we get here, but alas you've turned out to make no more sense than the worst of them.
Pertinant questions and a tendancy to notice when they aren't answered, requests for evidence and a tendancy to notice when none is offered, and an ability to recognise pseudoscientific drivel and gross scientific errors? Yes, I'm afraid it is.

Well spoken. I suspect AT may be using only 10% of his brain.

 

[Astro Teacher]

It's clear I'm wasting my time by trying to engage with you. You seemed to be a lot more articulate than most of the astrology apologists we get here, but alas you've turned out to make no more sense than the worst of them.


Pertinant questions and a tendancy to notice when they aren't answered, requests for evidence and a tendancy to notice when none is offered, and an ability to recognise pseudoscientific drivel and gross scientific errors? Yes, I'm afraid it is.

So be it. That is your uninformed opinion and it is duly noted.

 

[Astro Teacher]

This does nothing to support the claim that astrology is responsible for the development of agriculture. The Neolithic Revolution is thought to have developed independently in at least seven or eight places around the world. In fact, agriculture is what made those much later civilizations possible. The Neolithic Revolution occurred in the Middle East around 10,000 BCE. The Sumerian civilization doesn't appear until around 6000 BCE. That's four thousand years after the advent of agriculture in the region.

By the way, your source doesn't seem to be very historically literate. The Epic of Gilgamesh was collected from a number of poems and stories not long before the 7th century BCE. That's over nine thousand years later. It's thought that there might have been a real King Gilgamesh upon whom the mythical character is loosely based (unless you believe that he really was two thirds god) who lived during the 27th century BCE. So your source doesn't even get the date for the Epic of Gilgamesh right.


I found an interesting article from The Guardian regarding this book:


And this doesn't really address what I asked anyway. I wanted to see evidence that a significant number of scientists practice astrology. Can you back up this claim?


Come on, this isn't an academic source. This site speaks of the Noachian Flood as an historical event.


This source is no more informed, but it doesn't even support your claim that Abraham invented the Chaldean alphabet.


Again, not an informed source. The idea that Abraham invented the Chaldean alphabet is an old legend, like the legend that the Emperor Shennong invented tea (not to mention agriculture and medicine. Go figure). There is no historical evidence that Abraham was the inventor of the Chaldean alphabet any more than Moses personally wrote the Pentateuch.


What I would really like to see is some evidence that a significant number of scientists practice astrology. If you cannot justify this claim with evidence then you are doing exactly what you have accused others of doing

Please. I included those reference links so you could get started on your own. Do more reading and study and you will find more on these subjects. Thanks.

 

[AvalonXQ]

Please. I included those reference links so you could get started on your own. Do more reading and study and you will find more on these subjects. Thanks.

So you believe that a lot of respectable scientists practice astrology, but you can't actually name any?

 

[Astro Teacher]

Astro Teacher, Pixel makes a very good point in this post (my emphasis). It would benefit the whole discussion if you'd address this point seriously.

I would respond to her question if I didn't have to sift through the obvious fluff that Pixel goes on about... Santa Claus and the whole bit, etc., etc. Once she learns to actually form a intelligent thought minus the silliness, and intellectual snobbery then perhaps we can talk. Until that time, she is better off doing some homework on the subject of astrology and drop her bull****.