Shakespeare is In Us

The topic of the interconnectedness of planets in Astrology led me to a memory. I remember reading that energy cannot be created or destroyed so that Shakespeare's atoms have dispersed throughout our planet and we have atoms of Shakespeare in us - all of us. I found this Scientific American  article:  Is energy always conserved, even in the case of the expanding universe? It turns out to be the case. This metaphor of our connectedness to Shakespeare is charming and real.  Here's the article that estimates the number of Shakespeare's atoms in a living human being.  "If you live to 75 years, some 500 trillion of his atoms enter you during your life." The interconnectedness also shows up for me when I take photos of urban grunge.  These are pictures of decay of various surfaces - e.g. paint on wood or metal, on asphalt, rust patterns.  The patterns and shapes of their decay are consistent with the patterns and shapes in organic materials in nature. This is a picture of decaying metal on a rail car at Strasburg last year.  Black paint in crackling with red paint underneath.  Most viewers see something in the range of a volcano's lava flow.  Isn't it remarkable for this quality?

Was Nancy Reagan a Lunatic?

The Globe and Mail's moment in history yesterday was about Nancy Reagan telling the press that she was guided by astrology and horoscopes. Wouldn't we call this an alignment of the stars?  I hadn't known of the coincidence of the topic. What about alignments with the stars?  We've heard the expression 'It must be a full moon'.  We call madness 'lunacy', so this has been an association for hundreds of years.  Lunacy was most popular in the late 1800's. But think of Shakespeare “It is the very error of the moon. She comes more near the earth than she was wont. And makes men mad.” —William Shakespeare, Othello It turns out that the moon is NOT necessarily closer to the earth for a full moon. The Moon can be full and close – supermoon. Or it can be full but farther away – minimoon. Scientificamerica.com asks why the urban legend is so widespread.  The article suggests it can be attributed to 'illusory correlations'.  This is our mind's propensity to attend to and recall most events better than nonevents.  When there's a full moon and something decidedly odd happens, we notice it, tell others about it and remember it. The psychiatrist Charles L. Raison poses the explanation that it is a 'cultural fossil' from the long-bygone era when we slept outdoors and the full-moon was linked to psychological conditions, such as bipolar disorder and most observable then. Our picture today is the back garden, packed with plants that will go off to the Grimsby Garden Club plant sale on Friday.

What is your horoscope today?

When I do date searches on iGoogle, how is it that horoscopes show in the top three searches>? They seem to have passed into disrepute compared to a few decades ago when there was more interest in them.   However, centuries ago, there was significant attention to astrology.  Astrology was closely related to astronomy in 1600.  It was a scholarly tradition until the 17th century, and it helped drive the development of astronomy. An article by Ryan J. Stark  says that: "Except for the Bible, no body of documents had a larger circulation in seventeenth-century England than astrological almanacs. "  It was in the 1700's that astrology declined. Here we are today with newspapers and magazines in our time including the daily horoscope, and somehow persisting. I found the answers in an article in the Smithsonian "How are Horoscopes Still a Thing?"  The newspaper horoscope is accredited to R.H. Naylor, a prominent British astrologer of the first half of the 20th century.  He did the horoscope for the recently born Princess Margaret in 1930, and it somehow was a tipping point for the popular consumption of horoscopes. Naylor did some predicting that seemed to come true, so he started a weekly column. And why do horoscopes continue to run so many decades later?  Readers like them.  There seems to be little scientific proof that astrology is an accurate predictor of personality traits, future destinies, love lives, or anything else. And for many people they go online to find out what their horoscope says for today.  Is it your birthday?