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Home » Back Issues » Volume Details
Culture and Cosmos Vol 01 no 1 (1997) Spring/Summer 1997

Click here to read a PDF of the Editorial

 Robin Heath
‘An Astronomical Basis of the Myth of the Solar Hero’.
pp. 3-9.
No abstract available

Norriss S. Hetherington
‘Early Greek Cosmology: A Historiographical Review’.
pp. 10-33.
No abstract available

Alan Weber
‘Changes in Celestial Journey Literature, 1400-1650’.
pp. 34-50.
No abstract available

Ken Negus (trans.)
‘Kepler’s Tertius Interveniens’.
pp. 51-4.
Introduction (i.e., translation to Theses 64-9).
The Tertius Interveniens, written in 1610, is one of Kepler's most powerful and passionate treatises on astrology, written as a defence of the subject against extremists on both sides, on the one hand those who would condemn astrology altogether, and on the other those who accepted everything said and done in its name, no matter how preposterous. Hence he is the ‘third party intervening’, as indicated by the title.  
    The following extract is near the centre of the book, and is otherwise ‘central’ as an expression of the main tenets of Kepler's thought on astrology. In this short passage, he comments incisively on the following topics: the non-material, ‘spiritual’ nature of astrology; geometry as the all-embracing archetype through which the messages of the sky are communicated to earth; the horoscope as indelible ‘imprint’ on the soul of the infant being born; astrology as ‘music’; the rationale of progressions and directions (symbolic measures used in prediction); astrological genetics; transits and mundane (political and historical) astrology.
    Not to be forgotten when reading Kepler’s arguments concerning astrology is his major role in the history of science. Although he is remembered primarily as an astronomer he also had much to say about biology, geology, meteorology, medicine and many other areas. His philosophical thinking also suggests much that is far ahead of his time, including prefigurations of Jungian psychology (archetypes and the collective unconscious). But let him, in slightly abridged form, speak for himself:

Martin Bauer and John Durant
‘Belief in Astrology: a social-psychological analysis’.
pp. 55-67.
Abstract
Social scientists have suggested several different hypotheses to account for the prevalence of belief in astrology among certain sections of the public in modern times. It has been proposed: (1) that as an elaborate and systematic belief system, astrology is attractive to people with intermediate levels of scientific knowledge [the superficial knowledge hypothesis]; (2) that belief in astrology reflects a kind of ‘metaphysical unrest’ that is to be found amongst those with a religious orientation but little or no integration into the structures of organized religion, perhaps as a result of ‘social disintegration’ consequent upon the collapse of community or upon social mobility [the metaphysical unrest hypothesis]; and (3) that belief in astrology is prevalent amongst those with an ‘authoritarian character’ [authoritarian personality hypothesis].
    The paper tests these hypotheses against the results of British survey data from 1988. The evidence appears to support variants of hypotheses (1) and (2), but not hypothesis (3). It is proposed that serious interest or involvement in astrology is not primarily the result of a lack of scientific knowledge or understanding; rather, it is a compensatory activity with considerable attractions to segments of the population whose social world is labile or transitional; belief in astrology may be an indicator of the disintegration of community and its concomitant uncertainties and anxieties. Paradoxical as it may appear, astrology may be part and parcel of late modernity.

 host @ 06:53 Wednesday 09 ,July ,2008  Category :: Back Issues