Methodology
Calculation vs. interpretation: what astrology can and cannot claim
ASTRUM first calculates positions and relationships in a chart, then explains their symbolic meaning. The calculation can be checked; the interpretation remains material for reflection.
Brief explanations help you read without specialist knowledge. Astrological terms describe a symbolic method, not scientifically established personality traits.
This project keeps two very different kinds of statement clearly apart, and it is worth stating the distinction plainly rather than leaving it implicit.
The first kind is calculation. Given a birth date, time, and place, the position of the Sun, Moon, and planets along the ecliptic, the signs they occupy, the houses they fall in (when the birth time is known), and the angular aspects between them are all quantities computed by established methods of celestial mechanics and spherical astronomy — the same methods published in standard references such as Jean Meeus's Astronomical Algorithms and used, independently, by agencies such as NASA/JPL for their own Horizons ephemeris service. Two independent, correctly implemented calculators given the same birth data will agree on these numbers. That is what makes them facts rather than opinions: they do not depend on which astrologer, or which software, produced them.
The second kind is interpretation. What a given planet, sign, house, or aspect is traditionally said to mean for a person's character, relationships, or life events is a body of symbolic association built up over centuries of astrological practice. It is not derived from, or validated by, the calculation above — a chart's Mars in a given sign is a fact; what Mars in that sign is said to reveal about someone is a narrative applied to that fact. This distinction matters because the two are frequently blurred in casual writing about astrology, and because it is directly testable: when astrology's predictive and descriptive claims have been examined under controlled, blinded scientific conditions — most notably in Carlson's 1985 double-blind study published in Nature — the claims that natal charts allow accurate, verifiable prediction of personality were not supported.
None of this means the interpretive layer is worthless as a reflective or narrative tool — many people find real value in it — only that it should never be presented, sold, or read as a scientific measurement, a medical or financial prediction, or a guarantee about the future. This project's own reports keep every technical claim traceable back to its calculated source (see, for example, how each fact reference in a report can be traced to an exact chart position) and keep every interpretive statement clearly labeled as such, rather than mixing the two into a single undifferentiated claim.
The first kind is calculation. Given a birth date, time, and place, the position of the Sun, Moon, and planets along the ecliptic, the signs they occupy, the houses they fall in (when the birth time is known), and the angular aspects between them are all quantities computed by established methods of celestial mechanics and spherical astronomy — the same methods published in standard references such as Jean Meeus's Astronomical Algorithms and used, independently, by agencies such as NASA/JPL for their own Horizons ephemeris service. Two independent, correctly implemented calculators given the same birth data will agree on these numbers. That is what makes them facts rather than opinions: they do not depend on which astrologer, or which software, produced them.
The second kind is interpretation. What a given planet, sign, house, or aspect is traditionally said to mean for a person's character, relationships, or life events is a body of symbolic association built up over centuries of astrological practice. It is not derived from, or validated by, the calculation above — a chart's Mars in a given sign is a fact; what Mars in that sign is said to reveal about someone is a narrative applied to that fact. This distinction matters because the two are frequently blurred in casual writing about astrology, and because it is directly testable: when astrology's predictive and descriptive claims have been examined under controlled, blinded scientific conditions — most notably in Carlson's 1985 double-blind study published in Nature — the claims that natal charts allow accurate, verifiable prediction of personality were not supported.
None of this means the interpretive layer is worthless as a reflective or narrative tool — many people find real value in it — only that it should never be presented, sold, or read as a scientific measurement, a medical or financial prediction, or a guarantee about the future. This project's own reports keep every technical claim traceable back to its calculated source (see, for example, how each fact reference in a report can be traced to an exact chart position) and keep every interpretive statement clearly labeled as such, rather than mixing the two into a single undifferentiated claim.