Abstract
By examining how astrologers actually work, this text deconstructs the illusion of stellar causality. Instead, utilizing the analogies of symphonic music scores and algebraic equations, it frames astrology as a highly sophisticated, abstract cognitive technology -—a structural, mathematical metalanguage that functions prior to any semantic interpretation.
1. The Experience of The Sky
Astrology originated in early Babylonian times from actual perceptual experience of the sky. The most obvious difference between this original experience and the Greek horoscopics that is essentially what is practiced today is that the ancient Babylonians did not make “horoscopes” or “snapshots” (charts), the second is that their Astrology used the stars in the night sky as the reference frame, while the Greeks ignored the stars in this respect and used the Sun (solstices, equinoxes) instead. We may assume that there was a gradual shift during the Hellenistic period from the sidereal to the tropical paradigm, one based on the experience of the night sky and belonging to a culture geared toward the external world in which “time” was not the absolute cumulative quantity that is generally imagined today, and where geometric or cinematic models of celestial motion did not exist.
The other characteristic of the Greek intellect and inherited by us, is based on the Sun and upon geometric models and projections. Strictly speaking, tropical measurements of time are not “celestial” in the pure sense, they are based on the Sun exclusively, in the solar interactions with the Earth. The fiducial points of a tropical system are established through geometrical projections, they represent “planes” which are derived from solar phenomena, since only the Sun presents the regularity needed to do this: the Moon and the planets all move like a serpent zigzagging through space. The Greek zodiac represents the seasonal cycle and is related exclusively to the Sun.
When we convert a time-cycle into simultaneous sections of space in the sky, each with different “seasonal qualities”, we are transposing the real experience of time and the physical characteristics of the seasonal cycle into a symbolic matrix in space with which we give qualities to the planets, and which have nothing to do with the seasons. Since the different seasonal characteristics physically speaking apply exclusively to the Sun, any other use is symbolical, and comes as a result of a transposition of time into space, which can be done only through abstraction and symbolization. The same happens in the calendar, where discrete units of time become temporal distances or spatial “cells”, and this reflects a change of consciousness from the “real experience out there” to abstraction and pure mathematics.
This abstraction where time is symbolically represented as a section of space, and time is no longer the real experience of celestial cycles but a spatial symbol in a graph, is the basis of an astrological chart or horoscope. Both Greek and modern astrologers work exclusively with (or “study”) these highly abstract and symbolical charts (e.g. the zodiac, the houses), and never deal with the real experience of the sky, or of celestial cycles or influences as we are able to experience them through time. Nevertheless, it is precisely this that they never actually deal with or study, what most of them believe and proclaim is the focus of their work.
We have two characteristics of Greek Horoscopics (as well as modern Astrology) that would have been unthinkable for an ancient Babylonian: it ignored the night sky as a reference frame to calculate positions and measure celestial motions, choosing instead the abstract reference frame established by the equinoxes, and the totality of the astrologer’s work was based on the numerical and analogical manipulation of abstract snapshots of instants of time called “horoscopes”. Greek Astrology abandoned the real experience of the correspondence between celestial events and earthly events that it had inherited from the Babylonians and which led to the inventions of horoscopes, and concentrated on the study of these horoscopes themselves.
Why is horoscopics so unthinkable for a Babylonian? Because a horoscope is frozen in time, it is a snapshot of an instant that no longer exists, yet the work of the astrologer is focused on it exclusively, no longer on the study or observation or experience of celestial cycles or motions or events. The astrologer has abandoned completely his relationship to natural phenomena, he no longer studies how an individual relates to events that happen in the sky, he is now interested only on the abstractions contained in a snapshot of the instant the person was born. He no longer studies nature or the sky or the cosmos, he studies an abstract graphic simplification and complex symbolization of something that happened a log time ago (the time of birth) that contains within its circular space or circunference absolutely everything there is to know (presumably) of the person to whom it refers. In the simple space of a circumference at the time of birth, everything that happens to the person throughout his or her life is represented, modelled, and given meaning.
In other words, the astrologer studies and interprets charts; that is his work. Greek Horoscopics has lost the experience of time or the organic experience of contemplating celestial motions in the sky which was the essence of Babylonian Astrology, everything including time has been reduced by means of analogies and mathematics to little slices of space in an astrological chart. The chart does not exist in nature, and the only “time” that happens to it is the highly abstract, numerically and analogically manipulated artificial “motion” of the chart itself.
Most astrologers will say that Astrology’s basic principle is the direct correlation, or correspondence, or concordance, or synchronicity, between what happens on earth or in our lives and what happens in the sky. This idea has implicit a sense of harmony or connection with the Universe, and carries the memory of ancient sky watchers, and of an esthetic and spiritual satisfaction. The concordance between the earth and the sky is tied inseparably to the experience of time and of nature. It exists because there is a becoming, it becomes a living experience to us through the observation of celestial movement concomitant to changes on the earth and in our lives. Without this movement or change, the concordance cannot be experienced and can only be imagined.
But with the invention of Horoscopics, the conceptual system began to disentangle itself from perceptual experience and became a purely imaginative, analogical construct based on geometrical abstractions. Astrology was developed by the Greeks into a sophisticated conceptual grid that is a reflection not of nature but of the human mind. This grid or model is made of apriori –mostly binary– classification structures (signs, houses…) that modulate the way experience is dealt with, i.e., the classifications function like mental maps or analytical reference points.
2. The Illusion of Celestial Influence
Astrology is what astrologers do. This simple definition establishes the sine qua non condition of any and all the possible ways in which astrology can be or has been defined or explained: the theory or explanation cannot be contradicted by how astrologers work, how they use their most simple tools, such as an astrological chart. If we ignore astrological practice and its tools, we are no longer talking of Astrology but of an idea of what we want it to be. For a definition or theory of Astrology to be of any practical value, it should account for what astrologers do, or have been doing throughout history. In other words, instead of assuming that astrology deals with or studies the correlations between celestial and terrestrial events, why don’t we examine first how astrologers work?
Astrologers use mathematics and celestial motions to construct structures of superimposing time-space grids (coordinate points, signs, houses, aspects, directions…) and relate them to human life. This link to human life is possible only by means of metaphor. The different components of these mathematical, pseudo-astronomical grids were codified and were given specific qualities and meanings (rulerships, sign, elements and qualities, house and planets meanings…) through symbolical association, binary classification, and analogical reasoning. The astrologer works with this metaphorical grid, not with what is observed in the sky, and the reason is simple: very little of that symbolical grid actually exists –or can exist– in the sky or in the natural world.
When we base our work on a chart, the correspondence between the earth and the sky is completely wiped out because the birth or radix chart artificially stops time. The moment or instant itself for which the chart is made is concordant with the flow of time in nature and in the sky, but in making and studying a chart of this moment astrologers are not just representing the conditions of the sky: they are representing whatever was born at that moment and place. This constitutes a radical jump from the physically real to the imagined, to a system or technology built on metaphor and analogy
NOTE: Writing more than 500 years ago, the Renaissance scholar Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463-1494) presents a remarkably modern understanding of the mathematical and linguistic arquitecture of astrology, exposing astrologers reliance on what he termed “parabolica similitudo” —parabolic similarity or figurative analogy. In Disputationes Adversus Astrologiam Divinatricem“, Book II Chapter 5 (published posthumously in 1496) we read “…quae ex parabolica similitudine potius quam ex physica ratione ducuntur…” (translation: “…which are derived from parabolic similarity rather than from physical reason…”). Pico argued that the foundational tools of horoscopics did not trace real, cosmic cause-and-effect vectors but instead mistook purely poetic metaphors for natural physics. Isolating this reliance on parabolic similarities (analogical reasoning), Pico recognized that astrologers were unconsciously mapping a human linguistic grid onto the stars.
When we peel back the astrological language and audit the actual procedures of horoscopics, we find that every primary tool used by the astrologer is a mathematical fiction and not natural phenomena. Below is a diagnostic inventory of this abstract apparatus, demonstrating how each tool actively severs the connection with the physical sky:
SIGNS. The “Aries point” cannot be “observed” except at the time of the equinox itself, or at the solstices, but there is nothing in the sky like exact 30-degree divisions. The observable sky is that of the fixed stars, and this is why Babylonian Astrology, which was indeed of an observational nature –originally at least– was all sidereal. It never occurred to them such an abstract, invisible point as the Aries point as fiducial. Precession constantly displaces the tropical reference frame with respect to the visible sky, so the aspects in the tropical zodiac between positions separated by a time long enough (e.g. annual revolutions) –assuming that one could “see” through time– happen in the abstract, i.e., when plotted against the background of the observable sky, they will appear displaced, they are not really happening from an “observation of the sky” point of view. The 30-degree signs are only convenient abstractions; they cannot be observed. Likewise, planetary, solar, and lunar ingresses are things that exist only in the minds of astrologers. Even if it is possible to observe the time of equinoxes or solstices (which applies to the Sun only), that is because of declination and applies only to the beginning of cardinal signs. The exact 30-degree signs of the zodiac are not based on observation of the sky but on mathematical manipulations and abstraction.
CHARTS. An astrological chart is an artificial, anti-natural freezing of an instant which in Nature is immediatly substituted by another. This instant is time frozen into paper-space, it cannot be found anywhere in the natural world. Birth charts are based on a principle that is the negation of the experience of the sky, i.e., the freezing of time. They do not “exist” except on paper. They represent a moment of time in the past that is used to chart the flow of time, and are therefore asynchronous with natural phenomena. In an astrological chart, time is modelled by means of an arc or distance in space. Distances and aspects between planets are measured along a circumference without latitude, regardless of the true distance the planets may have in the sky. An astrological “transit” (e.g. returns and ingresses) is absolutely impossible to observe, because birth charts –or any other astrological chart– can exist only on paper. They are nowhere in the sky or in the natural world. They are invisible, abstract, and artificial, yet the whole edifice of astrology is centered on them.
TRANSITS. (ingresses, returns, aspects between planetary coordinates at different times) to the longitudes of the planets at birth are only abstractions. The radix chart is an artefact based on a metaphorical correlation between the planets at birth and the person; since this correlation is impossible to model physically, we are postulating it metaphorically. The metaphors continue when we imagine the longitude at some other time “in aspect with” the longitudes at birth, a longitude in the present in relationship to a longitude in the past. Nothing of this can be observed. Transits are models, purely abstract mathematical constructions that are used as referents of the real. We will never be able to “see” a transit in the same way that we never work with the actual planets in the sky themselves, only with conventional, metaphorical representations of them.
HOUSES. It is obvious that the 12 houses do not exist in the sky and cannot be observed, just like the 12 hours of the day or the night. This is why different methods of arriving at the cusps were developed. Like the signs and the division of the day into 12 hours or the hour into 60 minutes, etc., houses exist only in the imagination and are not visible. Their mathematical modelling, and above all their symbolical attributes are an example of analogical thinking that has little or nothing to do with “observing the sky”.
ASCENDANT. With the exception of very flat and open spaces like the desert or the sea, the astrological ascendant is a mathematical abstraction, like the houses and 30-degree signs of the zodiac. Rising and setting are observational realities, but the actual moment of crossing the mathematical horizon very often differs significantly from what can be inferred from observation, due to topographic irregularities of the horizon which differ from place to place. In some mountainous places the differences are quite large. Astrologers never work with this observed horizon.
PARALLAX. The effect of lunar parallax reaches a maximum of 59′ near the horizon and becomes zero at the zenith. If you add atmospheric refraction, you have variations of 1.5 degrees in the observed position of the Moon in the sky twice during a single day when compared with the geocentric position used by astrologers. Even if we discard refraction, the parallax alone will result in differences of 1 or 2 hours in the exact times of lunations, ingresses, and aspects. Astrologers almost never take or have taken these variations into account because the positions they use are based on computations from tables, not on observations.
DIGNITIES, nodes, parts. There are no rulerships nor dignities nor terms nor arabic parts, nor lunar nodes in the sky. The lunar node is a good example of how much astrology was (is) based on abstraction and not on observation. The lunar node cannot be observed, it is a mathematical quantity, and yet was given planetary status by ancient and medieval astrologers. Although the effects of the node could be perceived at the time of eclipses, it was still invisible, and it was only during eclipses; at any other time the lunar nodes are mere abstractions.
DIRECTIONS. Profections defied the laws of physics by yuxtaposing different time frames. In any prediction technique that applies to an individual, a radix chart is used; this implies using planetary positions at one specific time and space as referent for another time and space. This is a “play of analogies” that exists only in the mind of astrologers. It could never be observed.
ASPECTS. In many horoscopes a planet may appear above the horizon by longitude when physically it is below (or viceversa), and the Moon may appear in a close conjunction with another planet when physically they are widely apart. For example, in 40% of the cases when the Moon is in exact conjunction with Venus by longitude, their true distance in the sky is larger than 4 degrees, or the space covered by 8 full-moon disks.
NOTE: an astrological chart is only a circumference, its positions (celestial longitude) are unidimensional. When the celestial latitude is high (e.g. Venus can reach 8.7 degrees), since it is being ignored in the graphical representation, the result may be that the planet appears on one side of the horizon or the meridian, when inreality it is on the other side. Thus, Venus may be rising in the East right now, but the point on the ecliptic that corresponds to its longitude may rise half-an-hour later, and astrologers work with the second, not with the first. Venus may be in exact conjunction with the Moon in the chart (longitude) but in the sky (because of the latitude) they may be be quite apart and never make the conjunction. I calculated all the Moon/Venus conjunctions from 1900 to 2020, and their true great circle distance (the actual distance in the sky) at the moment the conjunction was exact in longitude: The total number of conjunctions in those 120 years is 1497. The largest distance between Venus and the Moon in the sky at the moment of exact conjunction in longitude was 13,18′ on 25 March 2001 at 16h24m UT:
distance is larger than 10 degrees = 2%
distance is larger than 8 degrees = 5%
distance is larger than 6 degrees = 16%
distance is larger than 5 degrees = 28%
distance is larger than 4 degrees = 40%
distance is larger than 3 degrees = 57%
distance is larger than 2 degrees = 73%
distance is larger than 1 degrees = 87%Look at the Full Moon disk in the sky. Its size is about 1/2 degree. Now imagine the distance covered by 10 FullMoon disks: that would be the observable distance between the Moon and Venus about 30% of the times when they appear in exact conjunction in an astrological chart. Another example: between 1900 and 2020 there are 291 exact conjunctions between Mercury and Venus. The largest distance at the time of exact conjunction in longitude is 10,18′ on 18 Sept 1919 at 3h56m UT:
distance is larger than 10 degrees = 2%
distance is larger than 8 degrees = 8%
distance is larger than 6 degrees = 14%
distance is larger than 5 degrees = 23%
distance is larger than 4 degrees = 34%
distance is larger than 3 degrees = 44%
distance is larger than 2 degrees = 57%
distance is larger than 1 degrees = 76%Look at the phases of Venus in the sky… the apparent disk of Venus can reach about 1 arcminute at its point of maximum brilliance. Now imagine the distance covered by at least 180 Venus disks in the sky: that would be the observable distance between Mercury and Venus 44% of the time when they appear in exact conjunction in the chart. Further differences are caused by the fact that astrologers work with geocentric positions, as they would be observed from the center of the earth, not from one particular spot on its surface. In the case of the Moon the difference (the “parallax” explained above) reaches about 1 degree twice a day as the Moon approaches the horizon. This may cause differences of up to 2 hours in the times of all lunar aspects.
Let’s say that we are going to eliminate from astrology everything that is not visible physically to the naked eye: we have to eliminate the 12 exact 30-degree signs and forget about ingresses, we have to eliminate the 12 houses and forget about rulerships, we have to modify the definition of “ascendant”, we have to eliminate aspects in longitude, we have to forget about geocentric Moon positions, we have to modify the definition of “rising” and “setting” and therefore of parans, we have to eliminate transits-to-radix contacts and returns, progressions, directions, we have to eliminate the tropical zodiac and birth charts. What is left?
3. The Astrological Oracle
What is left is what I do as an astrologer. I am an oracle, I utter meaningful messages or “advice”, I bring out the meaning in the form of words, I see the meaning, grasp it, and then find the words that contain it best. The astrologer “says” or “utters”, he or she is “a sayer”. The act of doing astrology is ultimately a linguistic act, an utterance that contains the answer the soul of the client is looking for (in both horary and natal).
This means that Astrology is essentially an oracle when seen in terms of its practice, so we see astrology partaking of the characteristics of all oracles, but we would still be in the dark about what makes Astrology different from other oracles. What makes it different is the nature of the tools we use (charts, transits, etc.). It is these tools, not our pre-conceptions of what astrology is or should be, what defines Astrology as a field. We are “astrologers” because we use these tools. So understanding how the tools are made and how they work is necessary to understand what Astrology is and how it works, and what is NOT Astrology. From here, it is easy to demonstrate that 90% or more of these tools have nothing to do with natural science, but are social and mathematical constructs used as models through which we analyze and (try to) predict any objective or subjective reality represented in the model.
Astrology works for the same reasons that any other oracle (geomancy, cards, i-ching…) works. But we need to know in what way Astrology is different, and this is where the use of the “celestial apparatus” comes in and differentiates Astrology from other oracles. All oracles are essentially mathematical binary modelling devices. Astrology is a tool, or a “device”, so we could define is it as a “divinatory device”. But “oracle” suggests a conrete act and context characterized by the utterance of words and the construction of contextual meaning through the protocolary manipulation of the symbolic components of the device.
Divinity does not speak directly in an oracle, the utterance requires a translation, an interpretation, performed by someone else or by the person asking the question. This interpretation is never “passive”, and corresponds to the astrologer’s construction of meaning during a reading. The role of the astrologer (or at least one aspect of it) is that of a translator. Probably for the person who practices astrology only for himself or herself, this “utterance” is not a part of it, so “dvinatory art” or something similar may resonate more, but the purpose of all astrology (or more accurately: the work of an astrologer) is to find the linguistic answer, the translated message, the utterance of meaning, “the word”.
The idea is not an oracle in the ancient (or greek) sense, but what an oracle can be for us, understanding that our psychic constitution today is different from that of the past. Instead of passively voicing or channeling something external to the astrologer, there is a conscious or deliberate cooperation between the personalities of the astrologer and the client so that “meaning” finally appears in the form of “a presence” (the light, the deity). Ultimately the weight falls on the linguistic ability of the astrologer´s “oracle” (meaningful voicing… or utterance of the constructed meaning = the interpretation).
There are no longer gods or deities talking to man, that would be today a symptom of mental disturbance, and allowng another entity to talk through us would be a sign of emotional weakness conducive to fragmentation and dissociation. Likewise no sane person today would trust the “utterances” of such perturbed individuals. I see in this not just cultural differences but the evolution of human consciousness: we are today more entrenched in ourselves, more critical and abstract, with a much stronger sense of individuality. Astrologers adapt their astrology to the culture in which they live, they keep what works and discard what doesn’t, as one does with any tool or toolbox. There are cultural adaptations but also individual differences: some are more skilled than others in the use of a specific tool.
Astrology always works at the level of symbol and meaning. A chart is normally drawn that is a complex structure made of grids and coordinate points. The grids are purely mathematical constructs (signs, houses, cusps) and the coordinate points are geometrical projections of the positions of the planets in the sky at that moment upon an abstract unidimensional circumference (the tropical zodiac). The only thing “real” or actually happening in the sky are the planets. Neither the signs nor the houses represent anything really happening in the sky or that could be observed at that moment, they are only “grids”. But the real positions of the planets in the sky are never represented, only the geometrical projection of a unidimensional coordinate (the celestial longitude). The 2nd coordinate (the celestial or ecliptic latitude) may be listed but is not represented in the graph. It can be taken into consideration but it is made discretely, separately.
Astrological charts are designed to be used for the mathematical reduction and simplification of reality. They are made of superimposing semantic and classification structures modelled after the geometry of celestial mechanics, but these structures (signs, planets, houses…) are a reflection not of the heavens but of the analytic structure of the human mind. The standard astrological chart is designed not to represent the heavens but to be used as an analytical tool, and therefore it does not refer back to the heavens but to human experience and the human mind.
“Meaning” normally begins to appear when the astrologer starts to assign every element being charted to its corresponding astrological element in the chart. This process involves a) a reduction of the whole of reality to a limited set of astrological variables, and b) a classification of this reality in terms of astrological categories. This componential analysys is always the first step in the reading or interpretation of any astrological chart. The astrologer must de-compose reality into its constituent factors, and re-compose it again according to the order provided by the chart.
This process is dynamic. Conventional astrological “meaning” begins to appear as result of the dialog between the astrological order and the reality it is ordering. The dialog entails re-processing several times until it is no longer needed, and it is ultimately a linguistic, semantic process of construction and translation. We are astrologers because we use the chart, and understanding this specific celestial apparatus defines the boundaries of our field. Far from a natural science, the chart is a sophisticated mathematical construct used to analyze both objective and subjective realities.
By itself, the complex structure of mathematical constructs, coordinate points, and a priori meanings is just that, it doesn’t “mean” anything yet until it is read or intepreted… or does it?
4. Mathematics and Music
A birth chart is an abstract atemporal mathematical model that functions as an oracular semantic framework. It is not the cosmic environment nor the circumstantial context of the newborn, but the newborn itself, as well as the person that the newborn will be or become.
Essentially what we are doing is reducing life to a series of dynamic space-time coordinate points that play among themselves, reducing it to numbers and tables and calculations and interacting rhythms. This is the primary fascination of astrology: One can hear the person’s music, the pulse of life in this dance of coordinates containing the mysteries of love and death, of grief and joy, agony and dreams, and of the passage of the qualities of time. Whether this has to do with sky, or whether it is “the right chart” is completely irrelevant, what matters is how I use it, and for what.
Symphonic music serves as an ideal analogy. You hear the music, which is essentially a mathematical construct —a structure— and it makes perfect sense to you even though, if asked to translate what it means, the result will be very poor and very subjective. The essence of the music is about subjective emotions, not about mathematics, yet the score itself is pure mathematics. Astrology functions the same way: the score (the astrological chart-ing) makes perfect sense for the musician, but it doesn’t come alive until it is interpreted, and there will be many lousy or poor interpretations.
Astrological practice severed its ties with the physical mechanics of nature a long time ago, but this total retreat from the sky into the graphic space of the chart unmasks astrology’s true utility: it operates not as an objective telescope, but as a subjective cognitive technology. This does not imply that the score, the astrological charting, is a perfect reflection of reality. It is only a model and as such is an approximation. An astrological chart is not a copy or reproduction of reality; it is a reduction and simplification or factorization of it, and this is where its greatest value resides. The rest is a matter of methodology or approach: how to build the model and how to use it in ways that are most effective for what we need.
Mathematician and astrologer Ed Falis explains it like this:
“In mathematics, which is a strictly formal activity, when one would like to use them, one assigns its symbols to some phenomena, then draws conclusions about the phenomena based on the formal mathematical relationships. In astrology we do something similar. The act of assigning a time and place to a phenomena (a person etc) is the most common act of interpretation in the mathematical sense that is used in astrology. It sets the mapping(s) of our charts (models) to what we want to study in the real world.”
Dane Rudhyar defined astrology as “the algebra of life”. This is a simple process of reducing life to a set of mathematical coordinates and is the whole basis of astrology since the invention of Greek Horoscopics. As Marc Edmund Jones directly observed:
“Astrology is a technique for establishing horoscopic or personalized meaning in the relative dependability of the celestial movements of the earth and moon and major planets of the solar system. In this way it has long been able to provide a totally impartial screening and ordering of the human lives and events on earth.” (Ref.: “What is Astrology” in “A Primer of Symbolism”, 1975)
It is not about “applying mathematical principles to astrology.” Astrology is by itself “numbers” or mathematics: space-time coordinates that interact among themselves according to certain rules and are used to model symbolical objects —a nation, a person, a question— for the purpose of analysis. By using astrology’s varied tools (charts, aspects, signs, asteroids), we are already applying mathematics.
The mathematical model in Astrology is not about meaning but about structure, ordering, classification, and relationship. This structure is built according to conventional rules and protocols that function prior to any interpretation or linguistic construction. Reality appears in the form of cultural categories and mathematical coordinates in dynamical inter-relationship, and this structure is given a priori by the chart itself, that operates as an impartial screening matrix. It does not generate meaning inherently; it provides a framework of ordering, classification, and relationship that functions prior to any linguistic interpretation. It is a structural metalanguage.
Because it is a metalanguage, an experienced astrologer can “see” the underlying dynamics of a chart a priori, before any narrative or concrete life details are introduced. Consider for example a conversation between experts: one says “She has the Moon in opposition to Venus”, to which the other replies “Ah!, I see!”. There is a myriad of possibilities in terms of actual circumstances, and different nuances and emphasis depending on each astrologer, but the essence of them all is the same… or more accurately: all the possibilities belong to the same “class” in a componential system. This classification —a common property of all languages— is often deified or mystified by astrologers who think they are dealing with cosmic creative agents instead of simply applying a diagnostic mirror with a broken glass.
If you are Chinese and can read it fluently and know the culture, when you take the page of a book written in Chinese ideograms you don’t have to translate anything, you understand everything because your mind is tuned to the structure of the language, you “think Chinese”. An experienced astrologer is the same: the astrological configuration is like the ideogram: you understand it before any interpretation or translation to everyday language has been made, you know what it means just by looking at it. To translate it correctly, you may need hours of successive approximations, images and metaphors, gestures, etc. But the un-translated message is quite clear from the start.
This un-translated message, written in astrological/celestial coordinates, is made of numbers and conventionalized relationships between them. It is just mathematics, language, and the the cognitive mechanics of interpretation or difficulties of translation. The astrological/mathematical model is not of the narrative but of its structure or dynamics. You can have a thousand different narratives that have exactly the same structure.
Juan Antonio Revilla
San José, Costa Rica
June 20, 2026