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From: sunny@sun.uucp (Ms. Sunny Kirsten)
Newsgroups: net.astro
Subject: Re: astrological software
Message-ID: <2524@sun.uucp>
Date: Tue, 30-Jul-85 20:32:06 EDT
Article-I.D.: sun.2524
Posted: Tue Jul 30 20:32:06 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 2-Aug-85 05:46:33 EDT
References: <1967GMS@psuvm> <303@ttrdc.UUCP>
Organization: Sun Microsystems, Inc.
Lines: 70

> GMS@psuvm.BITNET in <1967GMS@psuvm> sez:
>      
> >Might I suggest instead that astrology software be posted to a newsgroup
> >named net.astro.superstition ?
> >     
> >Gerry Santoro
> >Penn State University
> >. . . !psuvax1!santoro
> >. . . !psuvax1!psuvm.bitnet!gms
> >     
> 
> No, no.  Post it to net.sources.games.
> -- 

Astrology is NOT a game, bozo.  Allow me to make an analogy.

Before the invention of the geiger counter or photographic film,
I could have told you that I believed in a mystical and magical force
known as "nuclear radiation", and that if you weren't careful, it could
make you sick and die.  And you could have laughed in my face and made
fun of me, because I wouldn't have been able to prove its existance to
you in your "scientific" laboratory.  But, years later, with the help of
a piece of electronics which you *do* believe in, I can prove to you that
some chemicals have this mystical force.  If you didn't believe in electronic
instruments, or understand how they worked, even the geiger counter would be
insufficient to "make" you believe in nuclear radiation.

Just because I hadn't invented some instrument which *you* could believe in,
you could scoff and "scientifically" claim I was a fraud and that such forces
as "nuclear radiation" existed only in my imagination.

So it is with every other type of force in the universe for which we have not
yet invented measuring instruments.  Without the microscope, you wouldn't
believe in DNA.  Without the telescope you wouldn't believe in the existance
of the planet Pluto.  

Without an instrument to measure other things I can't prove their existance
to you.  That does not mean they don't exist, or that they exert no influence
over your daily life.

Astrology is easy to malign if you look at it only to the depth of reading you
"horoscope" in your daily newspaper, because it only examines the position of
the Sun, and only breaks the population down into 12 groups... so the gross
stereotypes associated with your "Sun sign" are easily "disproved".  If you
can truly say that you've investigated Astrology in depth, plotted all the
planets and constellations and fully delineated their influences on you, and
still find them lacking, then you might try one of the *other* branches of
astrology, of which there are no less than three.  Horarary, Siderial, etc.

So it is with all paranormal and psychic and spiritual factors in life...
the only measuring instruments we have for them are our own minds.  Just as
some people have 20/20 vision and can see a tiger charging them from far
enough away to avoid death, while others would have died by now without the
advantage of the scientific assist of glass lenses, some people have better
psychic vision than others.  If you don't personally experience psychic
phenomena, that doesn't mean others don't.  So when somebody with better
eyesight than you says "Run, there's a tiger chasing us", it might behoove
you to not be a disbeliever.  Just because you don't find astrology relavent
to your lifestyle, doesn't mean it has no signifigance to others around you.

So get off your pedestal of scientific self righteousness, and acknowledge
that there may be things which exist despite the fact that *you* don't have
an instrument *you* believe in, in your laboratory.

Lack of proof of existance does *NOT* constitute proof of lack of existance.
Or did your scientific training skip over basic logic?

				Sunny
-- 
{ucbvax,decvax,ihnp4}!sun!sunny (Ms. Sunny Kirsten)