Enjoy great flexibility when preparing your astrology graphs(2)

Enjoy great flexibility when preparing your astrology graphs(2):

Simultaneous Aspects

At the bottom left of the "OMNIGRAPH" menu, there are several options which may appear as marked when you select an aspect file. We will have a look at all of the possible combinations, to see their influence on the results of the graph. And in the course of our explanation, you will also see what we mean by "factors", "types", and "groups"...

1) TYPES. OMNICYCLES treats aspects as being of one of three different types:

a) Type "a". These are the "harmonious" aspects: trines, sextiles, the novile series, or conjunctions
    between certain planets. These aspects are given points which contribute to the formation of the blue
    line on a standard* OMNIGRAPH.

b) Type "b". These are the "tense" aspects: oppositions, squares, semi/sesquisquares, or difficult
    conjunctions; the points given these aspects form the red line on an OMNIGRAPH.

c) Type "c". These aspects represent a mixture of types "a" and "b": both positive as well as negative
    points are given (in different proportions, of course, depending on the aspect).

* We say "standard" since it is also possible to create aspect files in which the blue and red lines do NOT refer to harmonious or tense aspects; for example, a file could be created in which the blue line represents septiles, and the red one quintiles; as a matter of fact, the colors of the lines themselves can be determined by the user when creating his/her own aspect files.

2) FACTORS. A "factor" is a number by which the total number of points for two or more simultaneous aspects is multiplied when those aspects are both of the same type.

3) GROUPS. We use this term when a single planet in transit forms aspects of a type to more than one natal planet, or else when a single natal planet receives more than one aspect of a type. For example, if the natal Sun receives an opposition from Jupiter, and a square from Venus, then the "group" would be:

Jupiter opposition Sun; Venus square Sun.

If transit Mars, for instance, is forming a trine to the natal Moon, a sextile to natal Saturn, and a novile to natal Pluto, the group would be:

Mars trine Moon; Mars sextile Saturn; Mars novile Pluto.

When the third option is marked, the "group" concept is used together with factors to augment the number of points for such groups of aspects.

For the sake of a clear explanation, a simple example. On July 19, 2002, four harmonious aspects (type "a") were in effect between the transits and my natal positions: Mars/Venus, Jupiter/Moon, Jupiter/Mars, Saturn/Venus. Now, since all four aspects are of type "a" (harmonious), the points will be added together.
Some astrological graph programs might stop here, and use this number to plot the relevant point in time on the graph's blue line. Well, OMNICYCLES can also do things this simply....

1) No options marked.

If you choose an aspect file in which none of the options are marked (such files may be prepared by the user, following the instructions in the manual), the total number of positive points (as explained in the preceding paragraph) will be the simple sum of the points for each aspect in effect; variations due to orb will not be taken into account. In our example, the graph will look like this:

2) The first option marked.

Perhaps you feel (as most astrologers do) that the strength of an aspect varies, depending on the orb. In this case, the number of points should also vary, and this is what will happen if you mark the first option. Within the maximum allowed orb, the larger the orb, the fewer the points given. In this case, our sample graph will look like this:

3) The first two options marked.

Here, "factors" are taken into account, in the following way: after the points are added together for the four aspects, their respective "factors" are added together. These are numbers which have been assigned to the various combinations of planets in the .APS (aspect) files, and which are added together in cases like this one, where there are two or more aspects of a single type present. In this case, since there are four "type a" aspects present, the factor for each of these aspects is:

a) modified, according to the orb of the aspect, and then
b) added to the other aspects' factors.
After that, this "final factor" is used to multiply the total number of points. To put it very simply: when the factors are used, the resulting number of final points will be MUCH higher than if the points for each aspect were simply added together. This is an option for those astrologers who feel that the total strength of (for example) four simultaneous aspects is greater than the simple sum of the aspects' points. In the resulting OMNIGRAPH, you will note that this procedure increases the number of points so much, that a different scale had to be chosen to represent the blue line (4000% instead of 1000%, as used in the preceding graphs):

Perhaps you're wondering why the results in the graphs are represented in percentages, and not in points. Well, OMNICYCLES does allow you to view the results in points, but in order to be able to better judge their significance, it´s preferable to use the "percent" option: this shows how high (or low) the total number of points are in relation to the "mean". The mean is determined by calculating a large number of transits over a period of many years, and is the best way possible to see whether the transits during a certain time are stronger or weaker than average. (Click HERE to read more about the "mean".)

4) All three options marked.

This is a variant of the above, and employs the concept of "groups". Here, the factors are also used; not for all of the aspects of one type, but ONLY...
a) when a single natal planet receives more than one transit, or else
b) when a single planet in transit forms more than one aspect to natal planets.

This option is, in theory, really quite sound. Suppose, for example, you have Sun trine Jupiter in your natal chart. On a certain date, transit Venus forms a trine to BOTH your Sun, AND to your Jupiter. In this case, the sum of the points of these two individual aspects (VE trine SU, VE trine JU) will be multiplied by their respective factors, resulting in many more points. On the other hand, if at the same time there is a trine from (for example) transit Mars to your Moon, and neither transit Mars nor Natal Moon are involved in other "harmonious" aspect combinations, this aspect will only be assigned its normal number of points; no factor will be applied to it. (Whereas if only the first two options had been marked, as described in 3), above, the factor for this aspect would have been added to the factors of the other two harmonious aspects, and the sum of the points of all three aspects would have been multiplied by the final factor). Here´s the resulting graph when all three options are marked; note that though the scale is the same as above (4000%), the blue line does not rise as much as in the last graph:

5) Two more options.

Two more options are available; these are variants of "1) No options marked", above. In these cases, the orb is NOT used to modify the points (i.e., an aspect will always receive its maximum number of points, regardless of orb), yet the "factors" of the aspects ARE used. This results in an extremely high number of points (and resulting exaggerated curves on the graph) when there are several simultaneous aspects. Fun to play around with, but not really recommendable (though if someone comes up with accurate results using these options, we´d love to hear the details!) Which brings us to the question....

	Which combination of options do we recommend? Well, for quite a while, I experimented using both factors as well as groups (all three options marked). This seemed to work well, yet then I began to experience some difficulties. I found a case of someone who had three simultaneous "tense" aspects, all of them major transits: Pluto square Sun, Uranus square Moon, and Saturn square Mars. The problem was that since no single planet (transit or natal) was involved in more than one aspect, the "group" principle didn´t work: the graph line didn´t go much higher than average, even though the individual who had these constellations had said that it had been "the worst two months of his life"! When only the factors were used (that is, with the first two marked, but not the third), it was easily apparent: the red line on the graph shot up to a great height. Because of the occasional occurence of cases such as these, I tend to prefer to use either a) only the first option marked, which modifies the points according to orb, but with no factors/groups. or else b) the first two options marked, thus using the "factors" for all of the aspects of a certain type (group). Nonetheless, the "group" concept does work exceptionally well in some cases: don´t hesitate to let us know which combination of options gives the best results for you and your clients!

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