What's your horoscope?

Still think there's something to astrology (see yesterday's post)?

Here are the horoscopes for Friday, January 14 from Cafe Astrology - a popular astrology website.  Problem is, I mixed them up and blocked out identifying information (names of signs, the Moon, Sun, and planets in the chart).  Read each and decide which best describes you today:

1. Work is beneficial today, and you are likely to find that others tend to go along with your plans, if not outright support you. While smooth energy is with you now, it is better not to rest on your laurels. Instead, keep the momentum going by really applying yourself to various work projects. Pats on the back can occur today, but even if they don`t, you are bound to feel good about your level of productivity.

2. You may be able to get away virtually unnoticed today, which may not sound like a good thing, but it's likely to be a desire now, dear ###. You are quite happy to escape pressuring situations and people, as the need for time to recoup is strong. You need a space to call your own, both physically and mentally. Intuition runs high right now.

3. You can make pretty much anything you want with this day, dear ###. The ### is in your sign and largely free of major influences, allowing you more flexibility, save for a harmonious aspect to the Sun, which only serves to support your endeavors. You quite easily take the lead or do your own thing, and others either follow or stand out of your way.

4. This should prove to be a pleasurable day, dear ###. With an unusual emphasis on your sign and the ### occupying fellow ### sign, ###, the power is in your hands to make what you want out of the day. You are more able to voice your ideas and thoughts, and the reception is positive. Others are listening. Not only that, they're supporting you. Creatively speaking, you are in good form.

5. Communication should be a breeze today, dear ###, particularly when it's one on one, so do what you can to take advantage of this positive energy. It's not the time to rock the boat, however. It's better not to bring up deeply provocative issues due to today's ### Moon's dislike for complications, but with a gracious, easy manner, you will be able to push the envelope a tad, and you'll be better off for it. Keep things light but meaningful.

6.  A strong day for all things practical, and especially for managing your finances and moving your career forward, is in store, ###. You are feeling emotionally grounded, and any activities that keep your feet on the ground will help you to take advantage of this solid feeling. You're also likely to find that others are supportive or, at the very least, cooperative.

7. You'll find easy energy today for social interactions, dear ###. The ### in harmony with the ### is an extra special aspect for you because the ### is your ruler and finds support in the magnificent ###. You might receive ego boosts today. What you do and what you feel are in harmony, and this allows you more clarity. It is also a good day for personal relationships.

8. You need to clear out some of the dead wood in your life right now, dear ###, and today is an excellent time for doing so. Holding on to grudges can be toxic in the long term (and even in the short term!), and it would be wise to figure out how you can finally let go of resentment that is preventing you from how to move forward. Today, you are more likely to be able to see into yourself with increased clarity.

9. An easygoing, non-competitive day is in order for you now, dear ###. Do what you can to conserve your energy for busier days to come. Yes, you are allowed to be "lazy" today! As your mind is always busy even when you are not energetically active, turn your thoughts to long-term plans, as this is a good time for applying strategy to your thinking

10. ### is now moving through your sector of values, personal finances, security, and possessions, and will continue to do so until ###. This brings very reasonable, logical, and practical energy to your life. It's an excellent period for going over your finances, as well as for taking better care of prized personal possessions. You are valuing simplicity in your communications now too, and if you can find practical use for what you study or learn during this cycle, you'll be all the more interested. It's a good time to truly absorb information.

11. Your social and communication sectors are highlighted today, with easy energy flowing between them, dear ###. This suggests good energy for working with others or simply enjoying their company. You are open to new ideas and are likely to find socializing an excellent channel for discovering new ones today. If you are in need of a team member or companion, it's a great day for rallying support.

12. Smooth energy is with you today with an emphasis on fellow ### signs, ### and ###. This subtly enhances your energy levels as well as likability, as others are tuning in to the types of qualities that you most naturally express when you are simply being yourself. This makes it a good day for asking for what you want, or for more effectively pursuing your desires - others tend to support you or at the very least stand out of your way without question. Express yourself creatively without inhibition.

So, can you find your sign?  Or are these "predictions" just so general and vague that several might apply to you today?  If you're interested, I placed the answers in the comments below.

Duh!

Glanced at Yahoo! News today and saw this article:

Earth’s ‘wobble’ means your zodiac sign may be wrong

The Yahoo! News article starts out stating: "A Minnesota astronomer confirms what many have suspected: Your horoscope is quite possibly wrong."  A phrase comes to mind - "No shit, Sherlock" since astrology is a bunch of hokum but their point, however, was that the wobble of the Earth's axis means your supposed horoscope sign doesn't correspond to the positions of the astronomical constellations anymore.

Let's throw a little science into this discussion (something news articles never do since they assume everyone's a flaming idiot).  What does it mean to say your sign is Aries anyway?  Well, it started with the ancient Mesopotamian cultures around 3,000 BC who observed the sky each night (easy to do without light pollution and TV in a clear-sky desert climate) and noticed that the Sun, Moon, and planets follow a path through the sky which today we call the ecliptic.  It's the plane of the solar system (they assumed everything orbited the Earth back then while today we know it's the plane in which everything orbits the Sun - except, of course, for our moon).
 

They then developed 12 constellations roughly evenly spaced on the path of the ecliptic (I say "developed" because there's nothing special about the constellations, they're just random patterns of stars we choose to see as related).  From the perspective of us here on Earth, as the year progresses (as we orbit the Sun) we see the Sun passing through each of the 12 constellations each month.  That's why your horoscope sign is called your Sun sign.  Supposedly, if you're an Aries, the Sun was in the constellation of Aries - in other words, from the Earth's surface, the Sun is in line with the stars which make up the constellation of Aries.

Gravitational forces between the Earth, Sun, and Moon cause the Earth's axis to wobble like a slowing top.  This induces an approximately 26,000 year cycle called the precession.  Since the time the ancient cultures of Mesopotamia developed the ideas of astrology thousands of years ago until today, the dates that the Sun enters each of the zodiacal constellations has shifted.

I was born on April 17 and therefore an Aries according to traditional astrology (March 20 or vernal equinox date to April 20).  But if I use a planetarium program like Stellarium, I see that on April 17, 2011 the Sun is squarely in the constellation of Pisces.

 

Here's an easy to read explanation if you want a bit more detail (What's your sign? The science behind the zodiac).

As you trace this article back from Yahoo! News (credited to Liz Goodwin), to Time NewsFeed (credited to Megan Friedman), to the Minneapolis Star-Tribune (credited to Bill Ward), you actually see that the original story wasn't that bad.  It was a Minnesota Planetarium Society board member Parke Kunkle talking to a reporter about astrology on what was likely a slow news day.  No problem.  By the time the story went through Time and got to Yahoo! News, it was treated like a new discovery.  The Time NewsFeed article breathlessly claims:

"The field of astrology, which is concerned with horoscopes and the like, felt a major disruption from astronomers, who are concerned with actual stars and planets. The astronomers from the Minnesota Planetarium Society found that because of the moon's gravitational pull on Earth, the alignment of the stars was pushed by about a month."

Problem is, astronomers have known about precession since the time of the ancient Greeks - Hipparchus knew about it around 140 BC!  This is not anything new and certainly no "finding" of the Minnesota Planetarium Society (nor would they claim that!).  It's just sloppy journalism.

So why don't astronomers believe in astrology?  Not because of the precession (although it is good evidence that astrology is bullshit).  Simply because it makes absolutely no sense given our modern knowledge about the universe.  Let's look at the constellation of Aries, the ram.
 

From left to right, the stars that make up the main part of this constellation are Bharani or 41-Arietis, Hamal or a-Arietis, Sheratan or b-Arietis, and Mesarthim or g1-Arietis.  They are, respectively, about 160, 66, 60, and 204 light years away from Earth.  They are not related to each other in any way.  How the hell could those disparate stars affect us at the moment of our birth just because they're in the same direction as our Sun (and millions of times further away)?  And why our birth date - what if you were a preemie?  Isn't the date of conception more significant?  It just makes no sense.

According to a November-December, 2009 Harris poll, 26% of U.S. adults surveyed believe in astrology (not the 31% incorrectly reported in the Minneapolis Star-Tribute article!).  Not surprising since a 1999 Gallup poll showed that 18% of Americans believe the Sun orbits the Earth (science settled that one about 500 years ago).  A certain percentage of people are completely ignorate of modern science, it's that simple.

It does annoy me, however, that newspapers carry astrology columns every day but rarely write anything about real science (and, when they do, it's usually bullshit like the Yahoo! News article that started me off on this topic today).

Password Security

OK, maybe I'm missing something that IT professionals know about but this article was very interesting:

The Usability of Passwords

Instead of forcing people to use passwords like S4fr#db&, which will be written on a piece of paper, a password like Weasel monkey Steve would be essentially secure forever and pretty hard to forget. Brute-force attacks would take thousands of years or longer to guess such passwords and I can't imagine anyone wants to get into my accounts that badly.

What really bugs me as well as the forcing of overly-complex passwords, is that I have dozens of accounts each with usernames and passwords and each with different conventions for passwords making it impossible to use the same for each (e.g one wants 8-10 characters, one wants 8 or less, one wants special characters, one doesn't recognize special characters, etc.).  And I really hate the sites (including my job) that make me change my password every few months.

Solution?  I have an Excel file I have to keep on multiple computers which has a list of all the passwords - I just looked, there are 38 listings right now.  That file is, of course password protected but guess that single password and you have everything about me.

Seems like there could be an easier way.

We cut the cord

We finally did it.  Every night, we'd turn on the TV, more out of habit than anything else, and see nothing on worth watching.  Since money's also been tight lately, we were wondering why we were paying over $130 / month to Time Warner Cable (includes cable, phone, and internet).  So today we killed cable TV and are only keeping digital phone and internet).  At some point, we may switch to VOIP phone through another provider as well to save even more money (unfortunately, we have very spotty cell phone service in our rural area).

The problem with cable TV is that it's bundled.  I didn't want 90% of the channels we had - we never, ever watched them.  There were other channels we wanted but would have had to pay extra to get.  What pushed us over the edge was the gift of a Roku for Christmas.  It allows us to watch Netflix movies (and other stuff) streaming on the TV very easily.

There's also a lot we can watch via the computer (we plan on buying a TV soon that will accept computer input) including news, entire episodes of certain TV shows, etc.  We not missing much - as long as I don't lose my Internet which I'm completely addicted to now.