Astrology and Pluto

News ArticlesAstrologers undaunted by Pluto's demotion
Friday, August 25, 2006By L.A. Johnson, Pittsburgh Post-GazettePlanet, schmanet.Astrologers are unfazed by news that the world's foremost astronomers yesterday kicked Pluto out of the planet club. (And presumably won't allow Pluto to play in any celestial object games.)"What people call something has very little to do with what it is," said Rob Hand, a leading U.S. astrologer from Reston, Va., who teaches the history of astrology at Kepler College, an online college based near Seattle. "What anybody chooses to call something is irrelevant; it's what sort of effect and use it has."The 2,500 astronomers from 75 countries gathered in Prague for a meeting of the International Astronomical Union yesterday demoted Pluto from planet to dwarf planet.Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune remain the classical eight planets. Pluto and two other objects that were under consideration as planets -- Ceres and 2003 UB313, an icy object a little bigger than Pluto that's nicknamed "Xena" -- will be dwarf planets, The Associated Press reported."Most of us are going to keep looking at Pluto and talking about its correspondence on charts," said Madalyn Hillis-Dineen, chairwoman of the National Council for Geocosmic Research, a group of astrologers dedicated to education and research of cosmic phenomena. "Astrologers, 90 percent of them, just use the nine planets and will probably continue to use nine."A small percentage of astrologers also investigate quasars, black holes and comets."Pluto is still good with me and I'm not ready to throw it out of my solar system," said Ms. Hillis-Dineen, of Cape Cod, Mass., who also is marketing director for Astrolabe Inc., a company that creates the software astrologers use to do people's charts."They're confused more than anything," said Dave Roell, an astrologer firmly in the Pluto-is-a-planet camp and owner of the Astrology Center of America, an astrological book store in Bel Air, Md. "Science without philosophy is really just a pile of observations without meaning."Astrologers have accepted Pluto as fact since the 1950s, he said."Astronomers have a different set of criteria and I respect that, but I think the amount of energy they're putting into this is bordering on the absurd," Mr. Hand said. "What's a planet? Whatever you choose to call a planet. They chose not to call Pluto a planet? Fine."
Pluto still a high-flyer for astrologers
Thu Aug 24, 2006 4:23pm ET177Science NewsAstronomers strip Pluto of its status as a planetNASA begins countdown for space shuttle launchPluto becomes one less planet to memorizeMore Science News...Email This Article Print This Article Reprints[-] Text [+]By Martin RobertsTORONTO (Reuters) - Scientists may have demoted Pluto to the rank of a "dwarf planet" on Thursday but astrologers foretell no major changes in the way they read the heavens because of the move.Russell Grant, a British astrologer and best-selling author, said Pluto's planetary demotion was not a surprise after years of discussion and he would not change the charts he uses for his clients or millions of visitors to his Web site."I personally am shaken not stirred," Grant said in a telephone interview from Britain. "It's very interesting that Pluto's been downgraded in a planetary sense because he could never be downgraded in a mythological sense."I will continue to use Pluto because he gives me the ability to look into people's charts and see where they're coming from psychologically," he said.Grant noted that astrologers had long used non-planets, such as Earth's moon. He also charts several asteroids, which are inside the solar system but much smaller than planets.Astrology, the belief that the relative position of celestial bodies can help in the understanding of human affairs and earthly events, arose several millenniums ago. Although hugely popular, it is quite separate from the modern scientific study of astronomy."Astronomers have had several cases in the past where they've made changes in the objects used by astrologers," said Lee Lehman, academic dean of Kepler College in Seattle, the only institute in the Western Hemisphere to award degrees in astrological studies.Lehman said it took several decades for astrologers to reach a consensus on the relevance of Pluto after its discovery in 1930. Continued... One of the reasons astronomers unseated Pluto was that technological advances made them aware it was actually smaller than a body discovered in 2003 and nicknamed Xena, after the warrior princess in the television show."There is now quite a bit of interest now in the astrological community about Xena," Lehman said, without being able to predict whether the body would have a significant impact on astrology.Grant said Xena had limited use as its position meant it would currently only affect people whose sun signs were in Pisces and Aries, just two of 12 constellations in the zodiac, a celestial band observed by astrologers.© Reuters 2006. All Rights Reserved.
Pluto Facts
.Pluto• The icy world was discovered Feb. 18, 1930, by astronomer Clyde Tombaugh.• Pluto has an eccentric orbit that is highly inclined, with respect to the other planets. From 1979 to 1999, it was closer to the sun than Neptune.• Named after the Roman god of the underworld, Pluto incorporates the initials of Percival Lowell, an astronomer who predicted a planet would be found beyond Neptune.• Pluto initially was thought to be the size of Neptune, but -- with the help of the Hubble Space Telescope -- it has been found to be about two-thirds the size of Earth's moon.• Pluto has a thin atmosphere made up of nitrogen, methane and carbon monoxide.• Pluto has three known moons -- Charon, Nix and Hydra -- though Charon is very close in size to Pluto and many astronomers believe it is a double-planet system.• On Jan. 19, NASA launched its "New Horizons" spacecraft, destined to be the first probe to approach Pluto. It is expected to arrive July 14, 2015.• Pluto is believed to be 378 degrees below zero.• A day on Pluto is 6.4 Earth days and a year is almost 248 Earth years.Sharing a name with a demoted planet• Pluto, the Disney dog, has been the pet of Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and Goofy, himself a dog. The cartoon Pluto was created in 1930 and named after the planet, which had been discovered that year.• Plutonium, the radioactive 94th atomic element, was discovered in 1940, 10 years after Pluto. It was named for Pluto because the two elements just before it on the periodic table were named for planets -- uranium for Uranus and neptunium for Neptune.• Plutocracy, a form of government where all the state's decisions are centralized in a wealthy class of citizens, existed long before Pluto's discovery. It is derived from the ancient Greek word ploutos, meaning wealth.• Plutonic refers to rocks formed by the solidification of magma deep within the earth.• Operation PLUTO -- Pipe-Lines Under The Ocean -- was a World War II operation by British scientists, oil companies and armed forces to build undersea oil pipelines between England and France.• Pluto Airlines is based in Sharjah, United Arab Emirates.• Pluto Water is the name of a laxative popular in the early 1900s.• Mapquest.com will map both Pluto, Miss., and Pluto, W.Va., but the U.S. Census does not have data on either.Now-obsolete planetary mnemonics• My (Mercury) Very (Venus) Excellent (Earth) Mother (Mars) Just (Jupiter) Served (Saturn) Us (Uranus) Nine (Neptune) Pizzas (Pluto)• My Very Eager Mother Just Sewed Us New Pajamas• Mary's Violet Eyes Make John Stay Up Nights Period• My Very Educated Mother Just Showed Us Nine Planets• My Very Expensive Machine Just Smashed Up Near Pluto• Mother Very Easily Made Jane Stop Using Nail Polish• My Very Enormous Monster Just Sucked Up Nine Planets• Or, as was made popular by the sitcom "Saved by the Bell," it can be turned into an acronym -- Mvemjsunp -- pronounced Mm-vhem-shnupSource: Tribune-Review research happy reading and learning! =)