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    Re: Immutable firmament?
    From: John Huth
    Date: 2011 Jan 15, 08:30 -0500
    Why, Rasalhague of course.   I met a professional astrologer (no, I didn't pay him anything) for lunch and he patiently explained for me the myriad house systems.    He mentioned the precession and we talked about my sign.   He reassured me I had nothing to worry about (I'm in the middle of Pisces and am thusfar unaffected).     

    The most amusing moment was when he described Ptolemy's method for figuring out how long someone lived.   It had to do with the ascension of the Sun the day after someone's birth.   I asked him if this was a tradition.   He said "No, I think Ptolemy just made it up."

    J

    On Sat, Jan 15, 2011 at 12:23 AM, Frank Reed <FrankReed@historicalatlas.com> wrote:

    I wrote a few minutes ago:


    "Indeed, it appears he was really just repeating a story that was run by space.com in late December. My condolences to the author of that earlier article..."

    I've found a really nice analysis by M. Alex Johnson of the origin and growth of this latest social silliness news story:
    http://technolog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/01/14/5841166-the-twitter-snowball-effect-the-zodiac-and-npr

    You'll note that it's traced, not to some guy in Minnesota, but rather to an article on livescience.com which is indeed space.com (they're the same reporters, the same editors, etc., just branded a bit differently for broader science topics). They also point out that this "Ophiuchus" story been around for decades.

    By the way, one of my favorite things to ask people in planetarium shows years ago (for laughs) was "which star name do you prefer: the navigator's 'Rasalhague' or the astronomer's 'Alpha Ophiuchi'?" Both are strange, to say the least.

    -FER


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