She no longer eyes him like a pisces when he is weak

Posted on January 14, 2011 by Michael

Ten points if you can guess what the title to this post is referencing before reading on.

I’ve been seeing a disconcerting amount of astrology bullshit on my Facebook feed today. I guess some arbitrary assholes decided to arbitrarily change things up.

Astronomers have restored the original Babylonian zodiac by recalculating the dates that correspond with each sign to accommodate millennia of subtle shifts in the Earth’s axis. Prepare to have your minds blown, all you people with easily blowable minds.

Here is the zodiac as the ancient Babylonians intended it—with the dates corresponding to the times of the year that the sun is actually in each constellation’s “house”—according to the Minnesota Planetarium Society’s Parke Kunkle:

Capricorn: Jan. 20-Feb. 16.
Aquarius: Feb. 16-March 11.
Pisces: March 11-April 18.
Aries: April 18-May 13.
Taurus: May 13-June 21.
Gemini: June 21-July 20.
Cancer: July 20-Aug. 10.
Leo: Aug. 10-Sept. 16.
Virgo: Sept. 16-Oct. 30.
Libra: Oct. 30-Nov. 23.
Scorpio: Nov. 23-29.
Ophiuchus:* Nov. 29-Dec. 17.
Sagittarius: Dec. 17-Jan. 20.

* Discarded by the Babylonians because they wanted 12 signs per year.

This explains why my post of Bill Nye explaining the arbitrariness of astrology has been getting a few more hits than usual.

I find this all so depressing. No, not that my made-up, bullshit sign has changed (actually, it hasn’t). No, what I find depressing is that after all the efforts of Carl Sagan, we still hold a prominent place for astrology in our society. It undermines science. Knock it off.

Besides that, the changing of all this arbitrary bullshit really puts an asterisk on a pretty great song.


(Did you get the 10 points?)

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