I’m sure by now everyone has heard a 10th planet has been discovered. Actually, there is a dispute over if this really is a planet or a Kuiper Belt Object (KBO). Personally I think it makes more sense to call it a KBO, Pluto too, but what do I know? (I’m sure The Bad Astronomer has an opinion.) It is being tentatively called a planet, though:
The planet's temporary name is 2003 UB313. A permanent name has been proposed by the discoverers to the International Astronomical Union, and they are awaiting the decision of this body before announcing the name.
Of course, the obvious question is: how does this effect astrology? (It doesn’t – it’s still crap. Bear with me.)
For an idea of what we might expect to hear from astrologers, we should look to what happened after the KBO Sedna was discovered last year. From karmastrology.com we learn that Sedna, because it is named after an Inuit sea goddess, “is the Goddess of the Victim”. The detailed interpretation of what this means in your horoscope ends with:
So the rule of thumb is the affairs of the house in which natal Sedna is located are where a person either suffers victimization, or simply does not allow victimization if that lesson has been learned in this or a previous life.
Get that? Because Sedna was arbitrarily named after a mythical Goddess of the victim, its placement on your chart determines your real-life experiences regarding your own victimhood (or lack thereof).
Alternatively, Astrology.co.uk states that Sedna might manifest family rifts:
Another possible manifestation of Sedna is tragic family rifts (especially father/daughter) over marriage.
The common theme is that the meaning of this KBO in your horoscope is tied to the name it was given.
Just think about that for a minute. Sedna was named in 2004 by the California Institute of Technology scientists who discovered it. They thought it “was appropriate to give a frozen planet a name from people who inhabit the Arctic Circle”. But this is pretty arbitrary. All KBOs (including this new “planet”) could fit this description; it just happens Sedna was discovered before the latest one and before the rest of the estimated 35,000 other Kuiper objects. Plus, I’m sure there are many other “Arctic” names available. So it was basically random. And the object wasn’t given this name until 2004. And yet the name this object was assigned in 2004, according to these astrologers, affected your horoscope and therefore your personality at the time you were born: 20 years ago, 30 years ago, 80 years ago, whenever. Your personality, formed at the time of your birth, was affected by the name this lump of rock and ice was randomly given many years later. And presumably this is true of the horoscopes of all people born throughout history. For example, Newton’s horoscope and personality were affected at his birth in 1642 by a name assigned over 360 years later. If you ever needed proof that astrology was a bunch of made-up nonsense, this must be it.
Anyway, what does this mean for this new KBO / planet? Well, “2003 UB313 in the seventh” house clearly doesn’t inspire much in the way of mysticism. Its discoverer Michael Brown has named it “Xena” after the TV heroine. This clearly tells us more about Brown than it does about either astrology or the new planet, but that hasn’t stopped astrologers from speculating what it means:
But one conclusion may certainly be drawn right away. If the name Xena sticks, then this new planet will represent the female archetype of sacred warrior. Chiron represents the male archetype of sacred warrior. Both archetypes are now discovered in the cosmos and are available to each person on this planet. This would be a call to each of us to balance the yin and yang, male and female within. The era of matriarchal or patriarchal dominance is over. We enter a period where both are celebrated together, and not one at the expense of the other.
Because of her slow orbit, everyone alive today has Xena in either Pisces or Aries. Thus her house placement rather than sign placement will be the significant factor in determining Xena's meaning in a natal chart. In addition I expect any aspecting between Xena and Chiron will be significant, although it may be generational rather than individual.
Of course, the name may change, in which case presumably all our horoscopes (and our personalities and fortunes), will change too (backdated to our time of birth, of course). Not that this will make any difference: one arbitrarily made-up set of rules will just be replaced with another arbitrarily made-up set of rules. It’ll be equally accurate (ie it’ll still be crap). But whatever it is eventually arbitrarily named, you can expect astrologers to blather excitedly about how important and exciting its name is. I just hope they call it something uninspiring like Bob. I’d like to see the astrologers make something of that.
My house placement is a significant factor.
I think they would reduce "Bob" to a set of mystical numbers using numerology and use that. Maybe the Kaballa would give it a different interpretation, which is cool then you could have at least 2 versions to pick from.
Posted by: Zeilfroid from Algorg | August 22, 2005 at 02:07 AM
Applying logic is a common mistake when dealing with astrologers. They'll always have a nonsensical way out of causal paradoxes like this. In this case it will no doubt be something like: the mystical powers of Bob/Xena have subconsciously influenced the IAU committee to pick a name that is exactly in keeping with past and present personality types who were born at (whatever time of year). You can't win by reasoning with these people.
Posted by: Alastair | August 22, 2005 at 03:02 AM
Did "Crap", and "Bear", come together accidently? I wish they would find a planet which would mean that I will be wealthy, and soon.
Posted by: latibulum | August 22, 2005 at 03:18 PM
I do not know about astrology in much detail (pretty much because it is silly, the gravitational pull of the planets don't have much influence on my life... and the names even less so). It seems a bit bizarre that they would put much emphasis in the names.
It also seems that if any weight were given to the names of the planets and their sattelites... what about JUPITER?!!?? (Jupiter being the Romanized name of the Zeus). From:
http://www.nineplanets.org/jupiter.html...
"Jupiter's satellites are named for other figures in the life of Zeus (mostly his numerous lovers)."
Ganymede: http://www.pantheon.org/articles/g/ganymede.html
Io:
http://www.pantheon.org/articles/i/io.html
Europa:
http://www.pantheon.org/articles/e/europa.html
AND there is a Leda (who can forget the poem "Leda and the Swan" by Yeats?... well not the poor journalism student who I convinced to recite it a college class wearing a T-shirt depicting that very subject. The professor was not amused):
http://www.nineplanets.org/jupouter.html#leda
By the way, I learned about the naming of Jupiter's moons while helping a 1st grade class project on the Solar System. It was in the _My First Book of the Planet Jupiter_ book.
Posted by: HCN | August 22, 2005 at 09:33 PM
Actually the Xena rumor turned out to not be true. Besides, the name is already taken. The name will depend on whether this new "object" is considered a planet or a KBO.
According to the wiki article, if it's a KBO it has to be named after a creation deity, if it's a planet it has to follow with the greek names like the other planets.
Posted by: Matthew | August 23, 2005 at 09:55 AM
"According to the wiki article, if it's a KBO it has to be named after a creation deity, if it's a planet it has to follow with the greek names like the other planets."
I was always wondering why they called it "Sedna" instead of a Greek deity.
Posted by: BronzeDog | August 23, 2005 at 10:56 AM
The planets are mostly given Romanized names for Greek myths. Like Jupiter instead of Zeus, Mars instead of Ares, Venus instead of Aphrodite and Neptune instead of Poseiden. The moons seem to be Greed though. They seem to be using both Roman and Greek mythologies... and more recently some Inuit mythology.
The cool website where I looked it up:
http://www.nineplanets.org/ ... from his page on Sedna is a link to the page of one of the guys who found it with an explanation on the name:
http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~mbrown/sedna/ where he says: "Our newly discovered object is the coldest most distant place known in the solar system, so we feel it is appropriate to name it in honor of Sedna, the Inuit goddess of the sea, who is thought to live at the bottom of the frigid arctic ocean. We will furthermore suggest to the IAU that newly discoverd objects in this inner Oort cloud all be named after entities in arctic mythologies. "
Posted by: HN | August 23, 2005 at 03:07 PM
"The planets are mostly given Romanized names for Greek myths."
Oops. I said Greek. *baps self with rolled-up newspaper.*
Posted by: BronzeDog | August 23, 2005 at 05:59 PM
It's okay... I just noticed my typo!
Greed indeed!
Clarification: the moons seem to have Greek myth names, and the astrologers have the actual GREED!
(do you think the spelling police will come after me in a couple of months?)
Posted by: HN | August 23, 2005 at 09:06 PM
BOB??!!?? Holy crap, if Bob is in the 7th house that means we are ALL MARRYING BOB. ;)
Or at least, we all like Bob. Which certainly doesn't apply to me.
I'm just sayin'...... ;)
Today, they discovered one of Saturn poles is very hot - flaming even. Astronomers are stumped by this. If astrology is to believed (and no I am NOT saying it is) that would be karmic justice I would think. Since Saturn, they say, heeps all the shit onto us, no wonder it's poles are screwy and it's burning where it's not supposed to.
I'm just sayin' that too.... lol
Posted by: Carrie | August 30, 2005 at 09:21 PM
This post doesn't make alot of sense. I think it's an embarassment to the rest of the site.
Astrology was not formed in this type of way. And respected astrologers will not start interpreting or predicting w/ this object right away. But you're clearly just looking for something to ridiclue astrology more than actually make a logical argument.
One can see the logic of the conclusion here is correct, but the premise is not. The fault lies in the term 'astrology.' You guys do not know what to include and what to leave out.
Posted by: Bobby | June 16, 2006 at 08:40 AM
Bobby:
Perhaps you should take up your criticisms with the astrologers I cited in the post who were speculating about what the discoveries of these new planets mean for astrology.
Or perhaps you would like to explain how the ancient people figured out all those detailed rules and charts they use if my premise is wrong and if astrology "was not formed in this type of way".
Posted by: Skeptico | June 16, 2006 at 08:59 AM
Reminds me of some posts,
"Why don't you try making fun of the REAL psychics?!"
"Why don't you try making fun of the SERIOUS Creationist arguments?!"
Of course, it's pretty much all the same to us: They're all bunk. Some bunk is just slightly more Time Cube than others.
Posted by: Bronze Dog | June 16, 2006 at 09:12 AM
Good point Bronze Dog. Believers in astrology, such as Bobby, criticize my posts saying “Astrology was not formed in this type of way” and “You guys do not know what to include and what to leave out”, but then he can’t himself say how astrology was formed or what should be included or excluded. The truth is, astrology was made up in exactly the way I described in this post – using arbitrarily allocated names to allocate supposed characteristics to different heavenly bodies. As I wrote in The Astrology Challenge, rules made up in this fairy-tale way are very unlikely to be true.
I am closing this post to comments. Anyone who thinks they know how the ancients worked out all those detailed astrological rules, and who can show their work, should post it to the comments of The Astrology Challenge. Post answers only please, no more whining about how I’ve got it all wrong, how astrology doesn’t work the way Skeptico says, blah blah. Answer The Astrology Challenge or shut up.
Posted by: Skeptico | June 19, 2006 at 03:39 PM