posted January 17, 2006 12:59 PM              

While Rev. Alice is correct in saying that LMT corrections need to be made in Astrodienst, these corrections are automatically made by Astrodienst. Selecting "LMT" for the time zone of your birth chart will result in an incorrect chart. Attached is a response from Astrodienst on this matter.

Explaining,

Tim

> Quoting Alois Treindl <alois@astro.ch>:
> > Tim Wilson wrote:
> >> Dear sir or madam,
> >>
> >> I have recently been told that, in order to get accurate charts, the
> >> "LMT" selection needs to be made for ALL charts (even 20th century
> >> US charts)...

The only reason to set manual timezone to 'LMT' is when you enter
birth date from before the introduction of timezones, e.g. from before
1880 (exact data depends on country).

Even then, our system knows when timezones were started in each country,
and does this automatically anyway.

Therefore there is no reason EVER, except for experiments, to set the
manual timezone mode.

Unless you prefer false charts.

There is no room for opinion in the area of calculations.

posted January 17, 2006 06:03 PM              

Time zones were created by the railroads for the convenience of travelers. That have nothing to do with astrology and will produce only approximate charts that can be off +/- 30 minutes and as much as 15 degrees on the Ascendant.

Check:
Larousse Encyclopedia of Astrology
and
The Only Way to Learn About Astrology: Volume II

posted January 17, 2006 07:33 PM              

What I was trying to say was that Astrodienst does MORE than simply look at time zones. It ALSO makes the exact time adjustments you are talking about...automatically. Putting in "LMT" STOPS Astrodienst from making the necessary time adjustments and creates an incorrect chart.

Desperately trying to explain,

posted January 17, 2006 08:17 PM              

Or provide any other example which we can go in and compare to see what happens.

So eager to know! Thanks.

posted January 18, 2006 12:08 PM              

An easy way to test out this theory is to create two LMT charts for the same time and time zone which are hundreds of miles apart from each other and compare: the Asendant of the two charts SHOULD be significantly different. Comparing:

August 20, 1996
12:00 PM LMT
Chicago, IL

with

August 20, 1996
12:00 PM LMT
Pierre, South Dakota

We see:
Chicago Ascendant - 16 degrees 14 minutes Scorpio
Pierre Ascendant - 15 degrees 8 minutes Scorpio

If we do NOT use LMT:
August 20, 1996
12:00 PM
Chicago, IL

with

August 20, 1996
12:00 PM
Pierre, South Dakota

We see:
Chicago Ascendant - 6 degrees 25 minutes Scorpio
Pierre Ascendant - 25 degrees 54 minutes Libra

which seems a more reasonable result given the ENORMOUS distance between the two cities. This shows what the web master of Astrodienst said was correct: using LMT in 20th century charts produces false charts.

The ONLY reason I am obsessing about this is because I know there are many beginners on this site and they may be VERY confused in being told that one of the most popular web-charting sites in the world creates false charts...especially when it isn't true.

Trying to get at the truth of the matter,

posted January 18, 2006 02:14 PM              

>Hello - I find your service valuable, >however I'm just wondering about Local >Mean Time - I have a book with a >conversion of longitude to time, and also >my chart program converts. I've found that >there can be a big difference between the >time indicated by Time Zone and the LMT - >creating big changes in the Rising Sign. >Does your online program do this >adjustment by longitude, or go by the Time >Zone alone? For example, I entered Kiev >Ukraine, which is at appr. 30E or 2 hours >from GMT - but saw the adjusted time was 4 >hours (DST + 2?) and the longitude per >time zone was about 38E. I guess what I'm >asking is, I learned to use LMT... is it >not more accurate?
>Thanks for your help!
>Light,
>Danielle

>Alois adds: Local mean time is out of use >since the late 1800s, when standard time >zones were introduced. It has no practical >purpose anymore and is not required for >any astrological calculation. Some >astrology teachers are a bit slow to adapt >their teaching, mostly because they never >understood themselves how to compute a >horoscope. When you don't understand the >recipe, you don't dare to change it, >afraid the horoscope might blow up. Please >give them another century to learn.

>Two kinds of time calculation are needed >for a horoscope:

>a) From the given clock time of a birth, >the difference between this clock time >recording and Greenwich time (now called >Universal time, or UT) must be known and >UT computed. Then the planetary positions >can be computed.

>b) From UT and a tabulated value >called 'sidereal time at Greenwich at >midnight' the local sidereal time is >computed, by adding the longitude of the >birth place (converted to a time angle by >dividing the degrees of longitude by 15), >plus a correction of 10 seconds for every >hour of UT (236 seconds for 24 hours, to >be precise). With this local sidereal >time, and the latitude of the birth place, >the houses are computed. The local >sidereal time is also called RAMC, recta >ascensio medii coeli.
>RAMC = UT (hour:min:sec) + lon / 15
>(Hour:min:sec) + UT/24 * 236 (sec)

>As you see, the concept of LMT does not >come in. Only in ancient times, when >instead of standard time zones local time >was recorded in LMT or even in LAT (local >apparent time, as read from a sun-dial), >it was more complicated to compute UT from >the given clock time.

Didn't post or mention it in this forum at that time because I felt that I didn't know enough about astrology/astrologers and their practice...

posted January 18, 2006 05:44 PM              

I am glad you took the time to find out about this. It just reconfirms that there is NO reason to use LMT in 20th century charts. I'm just sorry you had to do all that research only to find out that Astrodienst was right all along!

Trying to keep astrology simple,

posted January 19, 2006 05:52 PM              

It's all about learning, as well as teaching ... rewording from different folks helps some us more dense in the brain. It doesn't come so easily to some of us, but it doesn't mean we don't LOVE astrology, learning about it, teaching about it.

Rev. Alice -

You explained yourself very well and I learned a few things from this thread. Do you have any comments regarding this thing we're all trying to figure out?

Thanks.

posted January 20, 2006 06:45 AM              

For another explanation regarding LMT which is perhaps a little easier to understand than the formulae given by Treindl above, here's a link in which the matter is discussed, found it in the Google cache:

http://64.233.183.104/search?q=cache:yFnUsLAr8 HgJ:www.nodeorama.com/viewthread.php%3Ftid%3D2125+%22time+zones%22+nodeorama&hl=de

Hope this helps!

P.S. Rev. Alice, I would like to hear your thoughts on this, too.