Thank you, Steve.
For the sake of a little more scientific rigor, I want to make a few comments about this. I think you're giving this thread too much credit for some things.
1. This thread doesn't at all "prove the 12-30 degree equal divisions of the Sidereal zodiac." That
proof is from something entirely different (mentioned below). I'm being picky here, because I take the word "proof" pretty seriously, and monitor myself on using it inappropriately
2. I do think, though, that this thread is a
lesser demonstration of the high likelihood of the 12/30 structure. At the very least, it is a
demonstration (not a proof) that the Capsolar and Cansolar are meticulously timed which - if these are, in fact, charts for Sun's entrance into Capricorn and Cancer, rather than Sun's conjunction and opposition to some other completely undetected point that has been free of proper motion for 3,000 years
- would then show both (1) the start of Capricorn and (2) that the start of Cancer is (to the second of arc) 180° later. While this doesn't address the other 10 signs, it does (as a demonstration, an inference) tip the scales pretty heavily to the idea that Sidereal sign-divisions are (to the second) 30° even segments.
3. While the above does probably serve as a good (even compelling) set of examples of how well these Quotidians behave, the purpose is actually different. It's poorer than other lists I've compiled of Q behavior because it is utterly cherry-picked. In other lists, the purpose would be to show the full range of Q activity (including those times it doesn't seem to work so well), as I've done throughout
SMA (and dedicated an appendix to listing in early editions - not removed because it was a pain to keep current). This particular list, though, was selected to pick those times the Q's were absolutely clearly working in order to
audit the parameters of the zodiac. I wanted as many cases as I could get where we were sure beyond reasonable question that a planet placement was an astrological expression of the event (no borderline or fuzzy cases) to see if the data ended up requiring an adjustment in the zodiac boundaries. I'm happy to say that it did not require this - that the data (so far as this particular data set can take us) seems to confirm the boundaries within 0°00'01". (Also, since any correction it suggests is to
increase by 1", this could be entirely an artifact of "always round up" logic when measuring to the nearest second. I would have taken the 1" shift more seriously if it had been -1" instead of +1" due to rounding considerations.)
4. Yes, the whole of
SMA gives powerful, powerful confirmation of the exact boundaries of the Sidereal zodiac - down to the second of arc, it seems! -
unless a highly unlikely thing is true,
viz., that there is some single point in space, completely undetected and having no proper motion at all over nearly 3,000 years (since I've tested the SVP against fairly ancient events), and that it
just happens to be so close to (what we call) 0° Capricorn that it could be mistaken for it. It's possible - conceivable, but very, very unlikely - that such a point could exist and that all the phenomena of Sidereal mundane astrology is based on Sun and Moon conjunctions, oppositions, and squares with this point. I acknowledge this simply as a point of intellectual honesty. On the other hand, the odds of all the above facts being true (especially of a completely undetected
single celestial factor that has NO proper motion
at all is essentially zero.
5. What is it that really proves the model of 12 signs of exactly 30° each? It's the "30 possible zodiacs" studies, first undertaken in
Profession & Birth Date and later replicated nearly 50 times. (The title "30 possible zodiacs" doesn't really suggest 30 possible zodiacs, it's just a convenient name for the method.) It's too complicated to explain in detail here, but here's the crux:
Premises to be tested: There is a zodiac something like we have historically been told,
I.e., it has 12 signs of 30° each and (here is an important premise of the test) each sign has more or less homogenous meaning throughout the whole sign. That is, Leo is essentially Leo from beginning to end. Notice that these are not postulates, they are theories or premises to be tested. The task is to create a test that will confirm or reject these premises.
So we construct the test as follows:
If Leo (for example) is more or less homogenous in its character from beginning to end (part of what we are testing), then the best Leo results would be if we measured
exactly the area 000'00" to 30°00'00" Leo. This would give us better "Leo-ness" that if we tried to find it in the zone 2°00'00" Leo to 2°00'00" Virgo (for example), and a lot better than if (for example) we measured 23°00'00" Cancer to 23°00'00" Leo.
Notice that we don't need to know what "Leo-ness" is. This test isn't about content and meaning, it's about structure of things. We only need to have selected a quality data set (e.g., the 2,492 eminent clergymen Bradley used in P&BD) that has
some astrological significance for
some sign.
We use Chi-squares for the study because we don't care if it's a positive or negative effect - e.g., we're equally happy to measure the pro-clergymen traits (whatever they are) for Sidereal Leo (which is the most common sign in the set) as we are for Sidereal Gemini (which has the fewest). The nature of Chi-square is that the plus of Leo and the minus of Gemini will just show as variability from the norm, and we don't (for this test) care whether that variability is pro or con. We can also include every other sign that has negligible or inextant connection to the distinctive characteristics of the data set (
e.g., are neither pro- nor con- on clergymen - they don't tip the odds either way as to whether someone will become an eminent clergyman).
Here's what we measure:
For the 360° of the zodiac, calculate how many times the Sun appears in
a 30° zone beginning with that degree. Calculate the chi-square score that shows the variance of how many times the Sun appears compared to the
expected number of times it appears.
After doing that, fold the zodiac over on itself 12 times, i.e., so that 1° Aries is atop 1° Taurus, 1° Gemini, etc. We aren't studying individual signs, we're assessing the architecture of the zodiac itself. Whatever effects, large or small, are measured in any part of all of the signs, these become overlapped with all the other signs. If a sign is highly significant for the data set (pro or con), it adds lots of points; if it is indifferent to what we are studying, it adds more or less nothing to the score.
We end up with a 30-point graph.
If the "12-signs of 30° each" premise is correct, we should see (roughly, allowing for a little data roughness) a single peak and a single trough. The peak should be for the degree that begins the
actual first degree of the signs. That is, the
shape of the curve will confirm whether such a zodiac exists, and the particular degree that has the highest score will tell us where (in a 30° range) a new sign actually begins.
This was done in the clergyman study. The right shape of graph was produced, showing that a zodiac of 12 30° signs seems to exist. However, the data showed that the effect began not at Tropical 0° but at Tropical 23° (for people born mostly in the 19th and early 20th centuries). It "just so happens" that this is where the Sidereal signs begin!
This first test has been replicated many times - Gary Duncan told me that they had about 50 studies completed - and the biggest ones were summarized in one of the last articles Garth Allen ever wrote. The effect is solid. There
is a zodiac of 12 segments of 30° each, and its boundaries (to the nearest degree) are exactly where Siderealists say they are.
Now, getting it better than the nearest degree... That's where SMA came in!
