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Chapter 10 When Professor Bart J. Bok visited the New York Society of Astronomers in the 1940s, he was shocked to find astronomers mingling happily with astrologers who had come to hear his talk. Naturally he could not give his talk as planned, and exhorted the organisers not to permit such mixed audiences in the future. He urged confrontation and denunciation in place of dialogue1. In the 1940s he published an attack upon astrology, then in 1975 co-ordinated and launched the world-renowned Objections to Astrology in The Humanist, whose Editor was Paul Kurtz, later to preside over the US Sceptics society.
We here envisage a dialogue being attempted at that same New York astronomical society, in the early 1980s, with Mr Bok representing the views of astronomers. A group of astrologers have arrived. Their spokesperson is called Hypatia2. Hypatia: Mr Bok, to you astrology appears as the 'mad sister' of astronomy, a shadowy figure that keeps grabbing the limelight. How baffling you must find it, that such a superstition has survived centuries of derision by both science and the church, to re-emerge more popular than ever! Is it true what I hear, that astronomy courses here in America sometimes offer some astrology as a bait to attract students?3
H: But aren't such matters rather unprovable? I am disturbed that you get so much government funding for this. The study of mere objects in distant space is so unimportant, it's people that count. But, I'll agree with you that facts are not my prime concern. The word 'fact' means 'that which has been made', it is something in the past tense, something supposed to stay the same, irrespective of how we feel. I am more concerned with the present situation and our personal experience. B: A fact is objective, something reasonable men can agree upon: for example, it is a fact that astrologers seem unable to pick out the chart belonging to a person from others at above chance level, unless they know the birth date. Quite a bit of time has been wasted by psychology departments in showing this. H: Of course facts are important, but they are rather transient and forgettable things. Pick up a textbook of twenty years ago, how outdated its 'facts' will seem to you! In contrast, the forces we work with are archetypal, and only change slowly over the millenia, assuming different garbs and modes of expression. They are at once inner and outer. B: But proof, what proof can you offer for your procedures? It's all make-believe and prescientific analogies, from when people believed in magic. As an astronomer my work can be confirmed or refuted by the published work of others. H: ... and then you're upset that the public have no interest. My concern is human self-realisation - and how can that be proved in your sense? My tools are fate and destiny, which means that I believe in the human spirit. Your attempts to dismiss these concepts have, thank goodness, not been entirely successful. Proof is found in the test of experience. B: Science is public knowledge, it can be communicated. Your antique hocus-pocus with its Lord of the Ascendent and so on cannot be reconciled with the universe science has established. I doubt whether a single astronomer in this country would take astrology seriously. H: ... and if one did, I fancy your academics would soon terminate his contract as not being 'politically correct'. Try to understand, Mr Bok, the human spirit does have an innate connection with the stars above. B: That is the height of absurdity. As Shakespeare said, the fault lies not in the stars but in ourselves. How could such a connection exist? Fortunately, science has weaned mankind away from such primitive illusions. H: The human form was created in the divine image, which is why there is an inherent accord between the movements in the larger body of the solar system, and human fate. That accord is potential. As Kepler - the last astronomer to take astrology seriously - put it: 'The human soul is not larger than a single point, and on that point the form and the character of the entire heavens is potentially engraved4. So, if someone is just going to stick to a routine job, get their inner life from a television tube and seek comfort though socially-acceptable drugs, then the potential as shown in their birthchart may well not manifest.
B: I don't think you will get far with this outdated mysticism. Science is mapping fate and destiny via the DNA structure of the living human cell, whereby it is now unlocking the secrets of health and disease. That's real knowledge. H: You quoted Shakespeare just now. His plays are full of astrological references. But, it is only the villains in them who express scepticism, such as the murderer Cassius in Julius Caesar who you quoted, or Edmond in King Lear. In Romeo and Juliet we find a passive acceptance of fate, with Romeo sensing that he and Juliet are 'star-crossed.' Whereas Prospero in The Tempest, the last play, discerned a 'most auspicious star' (probably Jupiter) which he had to follow, as his whole fortunes depended upon it5. That is an active working with one's birthchart - a wise man rules his stars, as the saying goes. THE SECOND DAY Strains of Holst's 'Planets Suite' are heard. Galaxy pictures glow on the walls. B: Ah - Holst! Glorious stuff, that Jupiter section. Always reminds me of the pictures which Voyager relayed back from its Oddysey to Jupiter. A triumph of engineering, science and the human will! H: Indeed, and how feeble is the Venus section by comparison! I'd say Holst had an afflicted Venus in his chart - as well as a well-aspected Jupiter - and that perhaps his love-life wasn't up to much. However, the world must forever be grateful for his vivid portrayal of the planetary archetypes6. B: My dear lady, aren't we muddling up the subjective and objective worlds quite badly here? I doubt whether his love-life had much to do with a section in his planets suite. More seriously, I'm distressed by the burgeoning of sun-sign columns in the media. Surely you must agree that they are total rubbish? H: I never read them myself. One regrets that an astrologer can hardly earn a living today without writing such a column. It may be a prostitution of the art, but it's what the public want. One would prefer to have clients coming to inquire about their lives as a pathway of self-knowledge and overcoming the difficulties of the past. B: You've avoided my question. I'm proud that I forced a lot of newspapers to add the disclaimer that their sun-sign column was for entertainment value only. H: But then, why do something like two-thirds of the entire population read these columns? That is a lot more than go to church, or read science magazines. Is this not some terrible failure on your part, in not giving them knowledge that means something to their lives? B: Madam, the cosmos doesn't revolve around human affairs as you seem to believe. Venus is a barren, rocky sphere surrounded by boiling sulphuric acid vapour - it isn't a love-goddess! Wake up to the real world, will you? H: (Image of the Venus-orbit appears on a wall) Of all the planets, only the Venus-orbit displays perfect harmony and beauty in relation to Earth. You astronomers don't value sufficiently the geocentric perspective. For example, it is far from coincidental that the Sun and Moon appear as exactly the same size in the sky. This universe is alive in ways your instruments will never tell you, Mr Bok.
B: Our instruments finally detected the rotation-period of Venus, as let me see now 243 days, slower than any other planet in the solar system. Radar had to peer right through its cloud-cover to detect that. No-one knows why the inner planets Venus and Mercury should revolve so much more slowly than the giant plants which whirl round in ten hours or so, but they do. Now that is real knowledge, something humanity had never known before. H: The fifth power of three, hmm that's interesting. Where have I heard that number before? … yes, 243 is the number of years in which the transits of Venus repeat … A corner of the Venus-pentagram crosses the node of Venus every 243 years so that a transit is seen across the Sun. A day-for-a-year correspondence is going on here7. B: You've lost me here I'm afraid, I'm not really into numerology. H: Listen, Mr Bok, take a solar conjunction of Venus, then four years before or after, it will again be in conjunction with the Sun, on the same date and at the same degree of zodiac longitude. This shows Venus' deep connection with the Earth's year. Also, your rotation-period of Venus on its axis is exactly two-thirds of an Earth-year. These are the harmonies of heaven, this is the music of the spheres! B: Resonance, Hypatia, takes place throughout the solar system - for example, the moons of Jupiter Io, Europa and Ganymede have become locked into a 1:2:4 ratio in their orbit-periods. This can appear as spin-orbit coupling, to which you allude. ... You seem to be advocating a return to vitalism and animism, which are prescientific attitudes. I'm proud of having organised 'Objections to Astrology' back in 1975, signed by a hundred and eighty top scientists8. It was reported all round the world you know (Puts a copy on the table). H: It was the biggest-scale attack ever launched upon astrology. B: Yes - the editor told me he sent out well over a thousand copies to influential newspapers and journals. It was a big moment in my life, my attack on illusionism in science. Nothing else ever brought me so much publicity. H: Allow me to congratulate you on its timing. B: What do you mean, timing? H: On September 1st, 1975, when your attack was launched9, there was an exact opposition of Mars to Neptune. Can you see that this perfectly expresses the combating of illusion? B: Ah, you astrologers are always wise after the event. I believe that aspect appears every couple of years! H: Two of the brightest zodiac stars are Antares and Aldebaran, long associated with war and conflict. Glowing red, lying in the Heart of the Scorpion and the Bull's Eye, they flash fire at each other from opposite ends of the zodiac. B: There is nothing surprising about red stars being associated with war in the primitive mind; and, it is mere chance which makes these two first-magnitude stars, both close to the ecliptic, lie just opposite each other within arcminutes of longitude. H: The Mars-Neptune opposition was aligned to this stellar axis within less than a degree of orb. That only happens once in many centuries. For the launch of an attack on stellar matters, your timing was perfect. B: Hmm... H: Also, why was it you in particular who orchestrated this attack? That Mars was then transiting your natal Jupiter - again, to less than a degree of orb. B: Are you saying that I've got Jupiter conjunct Aldebaran? H: Precisely - and what a fine aspect that is for an astronomer, especially one like you good at organising events and being at the hub of things! You're in good company, as Kepler had his Moon conjunct Aldebaran. B: But, I still maintain the viewpoint which I published then: (opens Objection to Astrology declaration) 'Neither is it true that the position of distant heavenly bodies makes certain days or periods more favourable to particular kinds of action.' H: There is no more conclusive refutation of this view, than the timing of the launch of that very document! It is a textbook example, a wondrous validation of what I have been saying. THE THIRD DAY B: Hypatia, I'm disturbed by what you told me yesterday. It worries me that people are increasingly putting their faith in astrology, despite it having no verified scientific basis. This was why we launched the Objections. H: Well I'm not a scientist but it seems to me that the work of Michel and Francoise Gauquelin did really establish a link between planets and human destiny. Your Humanist critique shamefully glossed over this issue. B: But, did anyone ever manage to replicate his work? Science is a communal activity, but Gauquelin carried on as if he personally owned his discovery. I admit that his 'Mars effect' does seem hard to explain and our statisticians are still working on it. There might turn out to be a small residual effect - though I doubt it9 - but even so this won't validate the chart-reading. H: It was more than just Mars: the two Gauquelins found Mars for the top athletes and soldiers, but also that dreamy poets and imaginative writers came under the Moon, as sternly Saturnine doctors and scientists were under Saturn, Jovial actors under Jupiter and sensitive musicians and artists under Venus. These effects were consistent right across Europe - and, please note, they are totally in accord with tradition. B: Wait a minute, Gauquelin's 'key positions' in the diurnal circle correspond to the twelfth and ninth houses, which your tradition views as the least likely to show such effects. This has refuted the traditional view of houses.10 In my view, science works by rational deduction. It was scientists, not astrologers, who predicted the new planets such as Neptune and Pluto. Once they had been found, the astrologers dreamed up their supposed attributes without any attempt at scientific testing. H: You keep using this word 'rational'. It derives from ratio, a concept which springs from the Pythagoreans of old. They viewed certain harmonic angles and proportions as being rational, in part from notions of musical harmony. This 'rationality' is the very essence of what we understand by a celestial aspects. The real meaning of the word 'rational' has nothing to do with your ideas of mechanism. In the quantum theory of the atom, in the curves of sea-shells, and in the celestial aspects, such defined ratios will manifest. B: You're quite mystical. Maybe my wife would have related to what you're saying. You know we explored the structure of Milky Way together. But I fear that you have little concern for the real, physical universe. Neptune, as I was saying, was found by rigorous scientific deduction. H: Yes, and isn't it interesting that within a couple of weeks of Neptune's discovery, anaesthetics were being used in a Boston hospital not far from here. B: That's got nothing to do with it!
H: O yes it has. Neptune was discovered in 1846 as it came into conjunction with Saturn. A week later, Charles Morton purified ether, making a sample safe enough for use as an anaesthetic, and sent himself into unconsciousness. The chart for the first hospital operation using anaesthetics was full of Neptune aspects. Preparing this safe ether for use in hospitals, was a physical expression of that Neptune-Saturn conjunction. Morton's own chart was likewise heavily aspected by the new planet. This really demonstrates the power of Neptune. B: Surely there must have been attempts at using anaesthetics prior to Neptune's appearance? H: Maybe one or two, but they didn't get anywhere and were abandoned. Poor Mr Morton spent the rest of his life in a miasma of confusion trying vainly to establish his priority claim over rivals. These things are symbolically appropriate for Neptune. B: Symbolism is a subjective affair, fine for poets and artists, but don't confuse it with reality. Le Verrier who discovered Neptune wouldn't have believed a word of this stuff. He was one of the two persons who independently predicted its position at the same time. Both predictions were spot-on. H: The wonderful sea-blue hue of this new planet hadn't been seen by any astronomer, when Le Verrier decided to name it Neptune, was it? B: no telescope at that time could see its colour, it just appeared as a tiny disc of light in the depths of space. H: The two people who predicted Neptune's existence, in France and England, had a close Neptune-conjunct-Saturn synastry, between their two natal charts. The one who may rather vaguely have first predicted it, John Couch Adams, had a chart brimming over with Neptune-aspects, and he couldn't get any astronomer to take him seriously. B: I agree that Britain's Royal Greenwich Observatory failed to check out the prediction of the brilliant young astronomer Adams, and has regretted it ever since. But, how on earth could this be connected with the date of his birth? We seem to have radically different ideas about cause and effect!11 H: Also, I gather that all of the documents and letters concerning the debates over its discovery were collected together by Britain's Royal Observatory, and that this 'Neptune file' has mysteriously gone missing for the last twenty years12. No-one knows where it is! This mysterious vanishing of the evidence, like the odd synchrony of two persons arriving at the same predictions, is fully in accord with the being of Neptune. After its discovery the British proposed the name Oceanus, which for some reason they preferred to Neptune. Can't you see how symbolically appropriate this all was? ... I heard that the surface of Neptune is like a clear, emerald ocean, with small white clouds scudding across. Could we take a look at it sometime? B: Why certainly, there should be some viewing time on the telescope in a couple of weeks. H: And I also heard that Neptune has one large moon, Titan, that is covered with pink snow, with white geyser-fountains that erupt periodically. B: (laughs) We'll have to look and see! H: ... and that Neptune has a deep sea of liquid water that makes up the bulk of the planet's interior? B: Yes, that is the current theory. H: Why, that is so wonderful! B: These are mere scientific facts. FOURTH DAY B: As I was saying, the planet Neptune just happened to be named after the sea-god, just as Pluto was named after the underworld god - or was it a Disney dog? But it's mere superstition to suppose that planets really have such characters. H: I agree. Superstition means, 'that which stands above', and we are here talking about the archetypal realities, above the transient world of appearance. Pluto was discovered just at its node, a maximum power-point, which is why it had such a huge and rather dire impact on the twentieth-century. Its appearance heralded the splitting of the atom and ushered in the rise of fascism in Germany. B: Clyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto, thanks to the excellent predictions of its position by Perceval Lowell. He predicted its position within five degrees, and even the perihelion of its orbit within three degrees! He also predicted a steep inclination of its path to the ecliptic, though not quite as steep as was actually found. H: Yes indeed, Lowell's exact predictions will stand forever as a testimony to the power of psychic intuition. After its discovery, Pluto's estimated size just kept shrinking, until it is now far too small for any of his supposed deductions to be relevant. B: A curious business, I'll admit. Had Pluto not been crossing its node just then, Lowell's telescope in Arizona would never have found it. Also, it's orbit is so elliptical that it is even now entering within Neptune's orbit. H: Indeed, and how distressing is the dread of annihilation that seems to be gripping our society, as if Pluto's metal plutonium were acquiring a life of its own, its movements always hidden. We keep hearing about the missiles in their underground silos and how they threaten to emerge into the light of day. As the underworld god, Pluto's emergence into daylight had dire consequences. B: My dear lady, Pluto is four billion miles away. Even our most powerful telescopes can hardly see it. How could it possibly have such effects? H: There has never before been a situation in which the outermost known planet enters within the orbit of the next one, and this produces a very strained condition. But, once Pluto passes its perihelion position in 1989 and starts to recede, my guess is that things will ease off, and this shadow of annihilation will recede in people's consciousness. B: It happened that the new, man-made metal was named plutonium after the new planet, discovered ten years earlier. That doesn't make it 'Pluto's metal' - they don't belong together! H: Look, the two charts, for finding Pluto and for starting the creation-process of plutonium, have the same ascendent-degree13.
B: Clyde Tombaugh happened to see Pluto in the early hours of the morning at Flagstaff, Arizona, then later on, erm let me see now, Glen Seaborg switched on his apparatus in the great cyclotron at Berkeley. I remember well these great American moments of scientific progress - but, those times had no connection. H: I can't believe you view these events, so central to the whole twentieth-century, as merely accidental in their timing. But further, the Plutonium chart had Pluto rising14. So in that ten years Pluto moved down to the ascendent of its own discovery-moment, for the birth of that terrible new element to be initiated. As a scientist, you're supposed to like precision. So Pluto was within half a degree of both ascendents, for both Pluto-creation and plutonium-genesis, when Glen Seaborg switched his equipment on. If that isn't concrete proof for astrology I don't know what is! B: Hmm, I'll have to look into that. Pluto's moon has just recently been discovered. It has been called 'Charon', and, remarkably, it's no less than half of Pluto's diameter. Thereby the planet and its moon form a unique biune system, forever facing each other. H: That is interesting. Does that mean that what we have been calling Pluto's position is actually nothing but empty space? Is it just a void, around which the two spheres revolve? B: Yes indeed, planet and moon jointly orbit their baricentre. It is that centre which an ephemeris specifies as Pluto's position. H: Why, a centre of nothingness, that is so deeply appropriate for what Pluto means... B: Lady, it doesn't mean anything, it merely is!
H: (gets up, walks about) Mr Bok, Tell me about your exploration of the Milky Way. B: The problem was, that dark dust-clouds were blocking out any view of the galaxy's centre. Only through using radio telescopes were we able to penetrate these. Thereby we could discern the majestic spiral structure of our galaxy. It was thousands of light-years across! Radio astronomy really gave the twentieth-century picture, taking us beyond the visible. H: When did this new perspective open up? B: It started in 1932, when a US radio engineer named Karl Jansky in New Jersey noticed some interference that was coming from outer space. A few years later the first parabolic radio receptor was built. H: Do you notice anything special about the timing of these events? B: Why yes, it was while a trans-Atlantic radio-telephone was being installed... H: No, no, I have in mind the appearance of the new planet Pluto just at this time. The shift of astronomy away from visible light a year or two after its discovery is quite a coincidence, don't you think? Pluto as the underworld deity wore a helmet of invisibility, do you catch my drift? B: Not entirely, madam. Whenever I try to explain something about the nature of space, you reply with a strange comment concerning time. H: In these discussions, I sometimes wonder what your wife's viewpoint would have been. I am so inspired by the way you two explored the Milky Way together - yours was a marriage made in heaven. B: Ah, my beloved wife Priscilla, how I miss her! We were so happy together, for nigh on half a century. H: I'm not surprised, considering that her Moon was conjunct your Sun - the classic marriage-synastry combination. Also, I notice that her Venus was on your Ascendent-line - she was just the one for you15. B: Dear Priscilla, near her death she used to say she would be waiting for me at Eta Carina! That's a picturesque nebula in the Southern hemisphere. It was her favourite part of the galaxy. H: Well, for the deep studies of the galaxy which you two explored together, Pluto in her birthchart was...
B: Excuse me, I appreciated our debates about the planet Pluto, but talking about it in my wife's birthchart is too much. Why, it hadn't even been discovered when she was born! H: Earlier we discussed Aldebaran, the Bull's Eye, next to the Milky Way. It is conjunct your Jupiter, but also her Pluto within a degree ... She must have been a big support for you when your attack upon astrology was launched in '77, as Mars went over that lot! B: Are you saying that Pluto at her birth was conjunct Jupiter at mine, aligned with the stars Antares-Aldebaran? H: Exactly - so that when Mars and Neptune in the sky were aligning with those two fixed stars, they were also touching the two planets linking together your natal charts. B: You seem very sure of your views Madame, but have we made any progress? What meeting-ground can there be between our viewpoints? H: Perhaps futurity will find ways to resolve the abyss between the two camps. There was a quote from Coleridge that seemed to express what I was trying to say: References
1) D.H.Levy, The Man Who Sold the Milky Way, a Biography of Bart Bok U.Arizona Press, 1993, p.161. Bok lived 1906-83. The original dialogue (here updated) was performed on 25th Sept 1995 at the Astrological Lodge of London, as Jupiter conjuncted Antares to 10'. Sue Rose and Richard Moxon spoke the parts, and helped to bring the text into shape. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
