MAY 2, 2011 - Reform of the Astrological Chart offers up an alternative astrological representational system, a new way of looking at familiar things like planets and signs and houses. I know that for many, this will seem like a solution in search of a problem. But there are others for whom the realization that the planets we use are often not in the houses we use can come as something of a shock. We're used to thinking of the Sun, Moon and planets as if they were actually right on the ecliptic (the zodiacal circle), when in fact (except for the Sun) they seldom are. Our software (and before that, our ephemerides) projects actual planet positions onto the ecliptic, reducing ecliptic latitude (distances north or south of the ecliptic plane) to nothing - which is totally unrealistic. What this means is that we're looking at horoscopes that don't really represent the true sky - only an abstraction. Is Mercury really above the ascendant, or below? Your horoscope may show you one thing for a given time, and yet your eyes will see something quite different at that very instant. Which is the truth, and which is the illusion? Patrice Guinard illustrates and explains it, and then offers some solutions. The problem is that commercial astrological software can't provide these solutions for us - with only one exception at present, ZET from Ukranian programmer Anatoly Zaytsev. Does this mean we all need to rush out and buy ZET, at $210-$230 a pop (depending on whether you want a download or a CD)? Well in the first place, we don't have to: their website allows you to try their software online, so you can see what it offers. (There's also a free download trial version, to see how the software works on your particular system - which had better be Windows, because that's all ZET supports.) And in the second place, if you've been driving a car that consistently tries to steer to the left, you've probably adapted over time to correct for it. If somebody goes and fixes the steering, you'll probably drive that car into the ditch the first time you take it out for a spin . . . but once you get a feel for straight and true, imagine what you can do! In the last analysis, I cannot be sure that ZET is the answer, and I can't even find out what its calculation date range is (e.g., 10,000 years etc.). But I do think I'll be looking into it . . .
