- cross-posted to:
- nonpolitical_memes@lemmy.ml
- cross-posted to:
- nonpolitical_memes@lemmy.ml
- Honytawk ( @Honytawk@lemmy.zip ) 12•8 months ago
I usually say “Ophiuchus”
Which is the official 13th zodiac sign that was removed because 13 is a “bad” number
- starman ( @starman@programming.dev ) English4•8 months ago
Actually it was not removed. It just wasn’t on the ecliptic plane before standardisation in 1930.
Constellations on sky change from time to time thanks to axial precession.
- flamingo_pinyata ( @flamingo_pinyata@sopuli.xyz ) 12•8 months ago
While most zodiac signs are inspired by real animals, wtf is an “aquarius”?
- joranvar ( @joranvar@feddit.nl ) 9•8 months ago
In Dutch we don’t use the Latin names for zodiac signs (and we call them “sterrenbeelden”, which means “star images” or maybe “star statues”). Aquarius is “waterman”, which I guess would translate to (surprise) “water man”.
Why? Not sure, but it might be because of Simon Stevin who insisted we use Dutch words for mathematical concepts, and thought up some words like “evenwijdig” (“same distancey”) for “parallel” and “wiskunde” (“certainty knowledge”) for mathematics.
- ExLisper ( @ExLisper@linux.community ) English8•8 months ago
Gemini, Virgo, Libra and Sagittarius also are not animals. Almost half of them isn’t. But you’re technically correct that ‘most’ is. Which is the best kind of correct.
- Perfide ( @Perfide@reddthat.com ) 5•8 months ago
Only half of the Zodiacs are inspired from real animals. Gemini is two humans, Virgo is a virgin woman, Libra is a Weighing Scale, Sagittarius is a Centaur with a bow, Capricorn is a Sea Goat, and Aquarius is… a cup of water, I guess?
- pseudo ( @pseudo@jlai.lu ) Français9•8 months ago
Actually they do. The zodiac
signconstellation of a day correspond to the constellation over which the sun while be at noon. So you do have a zodiacsignconstellation associated to your day of bird. But depending on how your culture group stars in constellations you might be from a different zodiac. If you want to follow a classical westerner map of the sky, they will be 13 of them.Also, note that the zodiac signs won’t cut the year in equal parts. Some constellations are just bigger than other and the sun path across the sky changes more or less quickly from a day to another depending on the time of the year.
Edit : typo
- DragonTypeWyvern ( @DragonTypeWyvern@literature.cafe ) 4•8 months ago
He made up the sign and constellation Dinosaur.
- Farid ( @abfarid@startrek.website ) 2•8 months ago
Yeah, I also didn’t like the wording of the meme. It’s like saying “Santa Claus doesn’t exist”. He does exist, he’s just not a real person, but he exists as a concept and influences millions of people.
- Ludrol ( @Ludrol@szmer.info ) 4•8 months ago
He did exist but the time distorted his image and lost any resamblance to an actual person
- Farid ( @abfarid@startrek.website ) 2•8 months ago
I’m aware that he’s the basis of the modern Santa Claus (I’ve actually been to Demre), but I would argue that the modern Claus is a separate entity/concept at this point.
- pseudo ( @pseudo@jlai.lu ) English2•8 months ago
I would go even further : Santa Claus is presented as a actual person that we all know does not exist even though the concept exists. But noone ever pretended that Zodiac are a physical thing, it’s a concept and concepts can’t get more real that being conceptualized.
- lars ( @lars@lemmy.sdf.org ) 1•8 months ago
Whoa — 13 signs that are not each 1/13 years long??
- pseudo ( @pseudo@jlai.lu ) English3•8 months ago
Check out wikipedia. There is two pages each time one for the zodiac sign and one for the constellation.
And if you go to the french version, the dates at which the sun cross the constellation are each time in the introduction. It’s the date of the first paragraph. The ones the second paragraph is the dates is in astrology, for disambiguation. The comparaison are harder with the english articles.
- Swallowtail ( @Swallowtail@beehaw.org ) 8•8 months ago
The actual signs exist (get yourself a planisphere or a stargazing app, find some dark skies, and discover them for yourself!), it’s just all the magic personality nonsense associated with them is bullshit.
- dudinax ( @dudinax@programming.dev ) 10•8 months ago
The signs don’t exist. It’s just a random collection of stars.
- ZephrC ( @zephr_c@lemm.ee ) 4•8 months ago
Stars don’t exist, it’s just a random collection of hydrogen.
- beardown ( @beardown@lemm.ee ) 3•8 months ago
It’s one thing to say that constellations of stars don’t exist. It’s another thing to say that the constellation “Leo” doesn’t exist because it isn’t a lion and our perception of the spatial relationship of those stars has nothing to do with lions, or with mystical astrological significance.
Those stars are present in space in a certain way. And we can perceive them in our sky in a certain way. But whether those stars are “connected” in any meaningful way, or whether they contain any inherent Lion relevance is purely a creation of human imagination derived from real observable objective phenomena. We could just as easily have said that Leo was Orion, and Orion was Leo, and have been equally correct. It’s subjective. Which doesn’t mean it’s meaningless for us, otherwise art would be meaningless. But it does mean that it isn’t “real” in the same way that gravity or the sun are real. Anything whose continued existence is conditioned on belief isn’t “real” in an objective sense.
Belief can certainly will unreal things into meaningful reality though. But, absent that belief, those things will not exist.
Really this is a discussion centered around the inadequacy of the English word “real.” Perhaps other languages have specific words that would more clearly demonstrate this distinction. Because clearly gravity and Pisces are not both “real” in the same way. The former is objectively real and the latter is subjectively real. And we’re talking past each other by not simply having seperate words that distinguish between those concepts
- ZephrC ( @zephr_c@lemm.ee ) 1•8 months ago
Except there really isn’t anything more “objective” about all the stars in a direction vs all the hydrogen lumped together in a hot spot. I agree that the dense place fusion is happening is far more interesting and important than a direction of sky that got named after a pretty picture someone imagined a long time ago. That’s a purely subjective distinction though. That direction from Earth, and everything in it, exists without us just as much as a star does. Words just describe the groupings we think are interesting enough to want to communicate about regularly. Sometimes other people like to talk about things we think are silly. That doesn’t make us more “objective” though.
- hexortor ( @hexortor@lemmy.zip ) 2•8 months ago
This reminds me of that vsauce video where he says that trogs exist and they’re composed of a tree and whichever dog happens to be closest to it
- Waraugh ( @Waraugh@lemmy.dbzer0.com ) 2•8 months ago
It makes me feel really dumb when I watch this stuff. The entire time I try to be open minded. I’m left being impressed with the individuals ability to research and articulate an obviously very thoroughly studied topic. They are obviously intelligent, I guess more so than I can relate, because all I am left with from the content is how pointless of a topic it is. No kidding words that we created are a method of communicating within the environment we exist. It’s like the stupid boat example, most generally when referring to the boat people are referring to the one registered, just as he said in the video. The others made from the scraps are boats made from the removed components of that registered vessel. None of this stuff seems complicated to me. He and others even seem aware of the pointless ridiculousness of it when he discusses the eyelash in the fridge example. So I’m left feeling that I’m obviously too stupid to understand the value, or objective, in such a pointless pursuit where everyone already recognizes conditions to words apply to communication while somehow finding value in beating the horse to death and picking it to death, for what I imagine is some goal I just can’t understand.
- JackbyDev ( @JackbyDev@programming.dev ) English1•8 months ago
That’s like saying people don’t exist and they’re just random collections of particles.
- beardown ( @beardown@lemm.ee ) 3•8 months ago
No it’s like saying a person-shaped cloud doesn’t exist.
To describe it as person-shaped is subjective and another viewer may describe the same cloud as butterfly-shaped. Because it’s a subjective interpretation of a static objective object. Like abstract art.
People/animals exist and are “real” in that all of us have agency and a sense of self that is not conditionally dependent on the identical perception of others.
A person-shaped cloud is only “person-shaped” if viewers claim it is. An arrangement of viewable disparate stars is only “Orion” because the Greeks, and now us, decided it was. But I am me and you are you regardless of what anyone else thinks, and always will be.
We aren’t a collection of particles, we are more than the sum of our parts. We have agency and a mind and self-identity. A cloud or a star constellation has none of those things. They are inanimate unfeeling objects that only gain meaning, (astrological, imaginative, or otherwise) when humans/sentient beings ascribe that meaning to them. Human beings, and all living things, have inherent meaning because of their sentience and inherent uniqueness. Which is why genocide is a greater loss than the destruction of a rock - it’s the permanent death of unique living beings.
- JackbyDev ( @JackbyDev@programming.dev ) English1•8 months ago
Such a romantic~
- ℛ𝒶𝓋ℯ𝓃 ( @name_NULL111653@pawb.social ) 1•8 months ago
Smiley faces don’t exist, they’re just a random collection of polygons (that are interpreted by the human brain as being analogous to a specific thing and thus have meaning through comparison…)
- cerement ( @cerement@slrpnk.net ) 5•8 months ago
Ophiuchus
- flathead ( @flathead@lemm.ee ) 4•8 months ago
That’s Capricorn is it? https://piped.video/watch?v=WIjBO26qjYM (Life of Brian - 3 wise men)
- Kedly ( @Kedly@lemm.ee ) 1•8 months ago
Primal Zodiac (Which combines Western Zodiac with Eastern Animal Years) doesnt have the Dinosaur… but it DOES have the Unicorn