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[NatureDevil]

Any of you guys ever read this book? It is incredible. I learned a few things from it, in only the first 40 pages.

Apparently, Venus traces a perfect pentacle across the ecliptic sky every eight years. Because of this, the ancient Greeks used this to organize their Olympic games. Also, the pentacle almost became the symbol of the Olympics until it was changed at the last minute.

The pentacle is a pre-Christian symbol that relates to the worship of Nature, and has little to do with Satan or anything evil, and was defined by tracing Venus in ancient times. The reason it got its relation to evil was caused by a smear campaign brought forth by the Roman Catholic Church. Damn. Those guys never cease to amaze me.

Poseidon's trident became the devil's pitchfork, the wise crone's pointed hat became the symbol of a witch, and the pentacle a sign of the devil.

I love this frigging book!! I'll post some more stuff when it comes across.

NatureDevil

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

I have not read the book, as it is more of a fictional account based on factual reality...no?

The concept is an interesting one, and good for open discussion. I understand that the book gives clues to the code, and that one can dicipher the code on the book cover. I would be greatly interested in your interpretation of it's contents.

But first question: How can Venus make the pathway trail of the Pentagram along the ecliptic? With it's many right angles...I can't see it. Please to explain.

DiVinci was quite the man, well ahead of his time, with great futuristic ideas and concepts. It is said that the Mona Lisa is really him. They measured the points on the face and transposed his likeness onto hers...and they match. Cool.

What a mind!

[NatureDevil]

Yes, I have read that too, about him being the model for the Mona Lisa. The book goes into great detail about that painting...too much for me to get into.

All of the information in the book is fact - it is the accompanying storyline that is fiction. The "code" in the book is a combination of things from da Vinci and a murder. Many things come up in this book, including the secret society that da Vinci, as well as Isaac Newton and others were members of.

Also, have you ever heard of the number PHI? He brings that up in the book too, which is somethign I have studied as well. The writing isn't the greatest, but the story is pretty good, and the information in here is phenominal. I highly recomend it.

Also, did you know the word "planets" allows 92 other derived words from it?

I would go into detail about the ther things I have gathered from the book, but I would ruin it for anyone who still wants to read it. Maybe when I am done Joe, I'll let you borrow it. Either way, I'll give a book report at our Oct. 9 meeting.

NatureDevil

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

I will be anxious to listen to your take on the contents of the book. It sounds like an interesting thing to discuss. It could be our first "Chicago Astronomer Book Club" selection!

Brian, when would you like to get together to show me your new scope? Let me know.

[starbux]

Chicago said:

But first question: How can Venus make the pathway trail of the Pentagram along the ecliptic? With it's many right angles...I can't see it. Please to explain.

I think I may be able to explain. If you will notice on the image I've posted here, the sides (joined at the points of the Petagram) are considerably less than right angles ...

... Now think of the how you would freely trace the pentagram going from top point and tracing five sides ending at the top point again (the other angles you see are just intersections). I think the pentagram could be a representation of Venus' relative motion as it moves from conjunction to elongations and back again. The five points being the elongations from the sun and near center (pentagon intersection) being the area of conjunctions.

Orbital inclination (Venus rarely actually passes directly across the sun as we all know ) and which direction the sun is travelling along the ecliptic also affect the direction of the "sides" of the pentagram (Venus' apparent motion).

I can't verify myself if this is the case, but someone with the appropriate planetarium software might be able to, in a similar manner that one would plot an analemma.

[NatureDevil]

Thanks for the explanation, Starbux. I was doing some research to find a way to demonstrate it myself, and I was getting frustrated. You helped put it in a better light.

And Joe, I did get your message you left for me a while back, but DeVry registration and the possibility of playing a few outdoor Fall Festivals has been occupying my time. I kept telling Claire "we should go to the lake tonight" and then getting lost in more quagmire of work. Actually, my birthday was the 27th, and I am 25 years old (shuddering). In a desperate attempt to relax, I bought some books for myself (the Da Vinci Code being the first I am reading). I also bought another Astronomy book for myself, which I have already used twice to help me put a name to all those craters on the moon. I'll bring my books to the ScopeStock in October.

I will have a 5 hour class every Sunday for the next 8 SUnday's, and a 5 hour class on Saturdays on Sept 11th, 25th, and Oct. 9th...meaning when I arrive at ScopeStock it will be right after class...I'll be driving directly from Addison where my school is, and I may be a little late. We can talk more about the number PHI, which is a number that appears in nature inumerous times, including the pentacle.

I will try to put a few days aside when I know I can get back by the lake. I need to do some more nighttime swimming again. When I get my new classes situated, I shall give you a call Joe. My scope is cheap and cruddy, but dammit, it does its job, just like me. You'll get a kick out of it.

NatureDevil

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

We can talk more about the number PHI, which is a number that appears in nature inumerous times,

In nature, the odd number reigns...the lobes of a branch, the number of leaves on a plant, etc... it will most likely attain an odd number 3, 5, 7, 9 on so forth. Perhaps this is in relation to the PHI that you refer to.

I'm trying to visualize the pentagram as a baseplate to Venus's travel thru the ecliptic. Now, the only way that this feeble brain can concieve this, is that the pentagram is in a circle representing the orbit of Venus, and the points of the pentagram are just five arbitrary stops on Venus's travel around the sun. Yes, the orbit is not oval, but you get the idea. And again, it's an odd number of points. Is this what the author is referring to?

It looks rather like the symbol the U.S. uses for our AirForce aircraft.

[NatureDevil]

Okay, according to the book, PHI is called the Divine Proportion. PHI is 1.618, which is a number that was derived from the Fibonacci sequence. That sequence is 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 which where each number is the combined value of the two before it. Plants, animals and even human beings all posses dimensional properties that adhere to the ratio of PHI to 1.

If you divide the number of female bees by the number of male bees in any beehive in the world, you will always get PHI.

Sunflower seeds grow in opposing spirals, and the ratio of each roitation's diameter to the next is PHI.

Then of course, you can take measurements of your body and the ratio of your head to your feet and your belly botton to your feet. Shoulder to fingertips ratio to elbow to fingertips. Hip to floor divided by knee to floor. Finger joints, toes, spinal divisions. EVerywhere.

As for the Venus thing, I am still trying to figure that one out.....I think I have an idea but I need to prove it. Gimmie a day or two.

NatureDevil

[NatureDevil]

In trying to find a way to show how the pentacle with Venus works, I can't really find any picture to show it so I will try to explain it.

You know that over time as you observe a planet in the sky at the same time every night amongst the stars, the planets tend to move backwards and up and down and all over the place as opposed to the rest of the stars. This is how the ancients realized something was different about those stars until they concluded they weren't stars at all. They didn't follow the same pattern at all and were also remarkable brighter.

Anyway, if you were to take a picture of Venus in the sky at the same time every day (night...morning...) and impose them all over each other, you would see it slowly making a pentacle, a perfect pentacle, over the time of 8 years.

How the ancients figured this out I have no idea, but from the things they have done in other areas, I don't doubt them. With a rock, some sticks, and a little bit of effort, the ancient astromers did what some of todays computer astronomers could never do.

NatureDevil

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

I did consider the retrograde motion of Venus when scratching my head on this, but still can't fathom it. The five points of the pentagram and the alleged related travel of Venus escapes me. If Venus outlines the five points over time, then so should Mercury...and if viewed from Mars...Earth...and so forth.

The ancients knew much more than we give them credit for...and data only recently "re-discovered". They knew of the helio-centric model, 10 Planets and pretty close in estimating vast distances of celestial bodies etc...

The Mayan calendar ends December ₂₀₀₄. (Correction 2012 - See below).

[starbux]

The Mayan calendar ends December 2004.

Huh? I thought it was 2012. Please explain.

[Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe]

Damn!

Caught sleeping at the eyepiece.

Yes...it's 2012. Gonna max out my cards in 8 years.

Sigh.

[Centaur]

What is being referred to here is the fact that there are five equally spaced points (72 degrees) in Earth's orbit from which we can observe Venus at its conjunctions or greatest elongations. This is not perfect, but is approximately true in the short run. The imagined inscribed pentagram actually rotates by 72 degrees during 243 years. This explains why June transits come in pairs which recur every 243 years. Rougly midway between we have pairs of December transits.