zodiac combination,changes slowly due to precession as well When the ancients first thought up this idea, the Sun was in Aries on March 22nd, the vernal equinox (what some people call the first day of spring). → But due to precession it's now in Pisces. That's why your astrological sign doesn't match where the Sun actually is in the sky. 2000 years of precession has changed them. One of the many reasons astrology is silly. It's incredible to think about: The Earth, the Sun, the stars - they allow us to tell the time and time of year just by looking up and paying attention. This is why the stars were so important to ancient humans. The stars were like a clock and a calendar in the sky, long before we had invented either We actually learned a lot about the sky just by looking at it. Of course, some of the stuff I've explained we learned through other means. The Earth is spinning, stars have different intrinsic brightness and so on. → But all of that knowledge and far more got its start by people who went outside and looked up. Later as we applied maths and physics to what we observed we learned even more and could then go back and explain what we saw So don't discount naked eye astronomy; it's all we had for thousands of years In fact, you might argue we lost something when we started using clocks and calendars and moving to cities with bright lights that washed away the stars from the sky. Those folks long ago were tied to the sky. They knew it like you know the streets in your neighbourhood. They could see the Stars rise and set they knew the glory of the Milky way sprawled across the heavens, even if they didn't know exactly what it was; → We do know now, with our knowledge gained over the centuries. But it comes at the cost of losing touch with the sky, not living under it as much as we once did Next episode on Crash Course Astronomy: The Moon Phases
zodiac combination,changes slowly due to precession as well When the ancients first thought up this idea, the Sun was in Aries on March 22nd, the vernal equinox (what some people call the first day of spring). → But due to precession it's now in Pisces. That's why your astrological sign doesn't match where the Sun actually is in the sky. 2000 years of precession has changed them. One of the many reasons astrology is silly. It's incredible to think about: The Earth, the Sun, the stars - they allow us to tell the time and time of year just by looking up and paying attention. This is why the stars were so important to ancient humans. The stars were like a clock and a calendar in the sky, long before we had invented either We actually learned a lot about the sky just by looking at it. Of course, some of the stuff I've explained we learned through other means. The Earth is spinning, stars have different intrinsic brightness and so on. → But all of that knowledge and far more got its start by people who went outside and looked up. Later as we applied maths and physics to what we observed we learned even more and could then go back and explain what we saw So don't discount naked eye astronomy; it's all we had for thousands of years In fact, you might argue we lost something when we started using clocks and calendars and moving to cities with bright lights that washed away the stars from the sky. Those folks long ago were tied to the sky. They knew it like you know the streets in your neighbourhood. They could see the Stars rise and set they knew the glory of the Milky way sprawled across the heavens, even if they didn't know exactly what it was; → We do know now, with our knowledge gained over the centuries. But it comes at the cost of losing touch with the sky, not living under it as much as we once did Next episode on Crash Course Astronomy: The Moon Phases
3_cycles_in_the_sky.docx