June 16, 2020 (astrobutterfly.com)

Unless you’ve been hiding under a rock… or you don’t read the news, you know that the world is in turmoil at the moment.

Why is that?

Let’s put this into context.

Astrologers have been warning everyone for years about the Capricorn stellium which peaked last March.

We haven’t had 4 slow-moving planets (Pluto, Saturn, Jupiter, South Node) in the same sign since the Renaissance/Reformation. The Renaissance/Reformation were preceded by the Black Death.

One of the effects of the Black Death is that it shifted the balance of power and wealth in European societies, which in turn brought dominance to several city-states in Italy, where the Renaissance first began.

History shows us, again and again, this simple truth: no crisis, no change.

Beyond the Capricorn planetary activity, there are several astrological alignments that are specifically “responsible” with the latest developments. As I was writing in the June forecast, these are, 1). the planetary retrogrades, and 2). the eclipse season.

Venus, Mercury And Mars Retrograde

Let’s start with the retrogrades. In June we have 6 retrograde planets – which is quite a lot – but what makes this retrograde season especially disrupting is that 2 of these retrograde planets are personal planets: Venus and Mercury.

Slow-moving planets are retrograde for almost 50% of the time, so it’s not unusual to have Saturn, Neptune, or Pluto retrograde.

However, personal planets – Mercury, Mars and Venus – go retrograde less frequently – for only 19%, 9% of 7% of the time. Mercury is only retrograde for 3 weeks at a time (unlike Pluto, which is retrograde for 5 months). Venus and Mars go retrograde only once every 2 years.

Astrology is all about probabilities and frequency. If a particular transit occurs rather frequently (for example, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune or Pluto retrograde), it will not bring big changes. However, if a transit occurs infrequently, you can bet it comes with big changes.

Mercury, Venus and Mars Retrograde ARE important, and they DO come with big changes. In 2020 all these planets go retrograde. Venus is still retrograde (until June 25, 2020), Mercury goes retrograde on June 18th, 2020, and Mars goes retrograde on September 9th, 2020. That’s one retrograde after another.

Mercury and Venus retrograde cycles coincide with the beginning of a new cycle. During the middle of the retrograde, Venus and Mercury align with the Sun and transform from evening stars into morning stars.

Mercury is how we make sense of the world with our mind. Venus is how we make sense of the world with our hearts. While Mercury is our objective experience of the world, Venus is our subjective experience. Mercury is our thinking process, Venus, our values.

In the last couple of weeks, while Venus descended into the “underworld”, transforming from an evening star into a morning star, we’ve been witnessing a reset of values, mainly through the anti-racist movement.

Now that Mercury prepares to go retrograde, it’s our thinking process that is experiencing a reset.

In September 2020 it’s Mars’ turn to go retrograde. Mars retrograde is a little bit different.

If Mercury and Venus retrograde coincide with the beginning of a new cycle, so they are in their “New Moon” phases – Mars retrograde is opposite the Sun (not conjunct) so it is in its Full Moon phase; that’s why the keyword for Mars retrograde is “culmination”, not “reset”.

A warning – this particular Mars retrograde (that’s September-October 2020) won’t be pretty.

Mars will be engaged in a tense cardinal T-square with the planets in Libra and the planets in Capricorn. The Capricorn story that peaked in March is not over.

Until Mars goes retrograde, June and July are by no means less intense, because in June and July we are also in the middle of the Eclipse season.

June/July 2020 – The Eclipse Season

Eclipses are when big things happen. We have a New Moon and a Full Moon every month – but it is only twice a year that the Sun, the Moon and the Earth align to create the Eclipses.

Again, transit frequency is key. Eclipses are not regular New Moons and Full Moons. They are ‘special’ New Moons and Full Moons.

At the Eclipses, we are given a unique opportunity to connect with the Source and get access to information we wouldn’t normally have access to.

Eclipses are a re-calibration of fate and free will. During the eclipse season, your individual path re-aligns with the universal path. An eclipse points to what you need to change, so you can reconnect with your purpose.

There are two types of eclipses – depending on which side of the Lunar Node axis they occur: North Node Eclipses and South Node Eclipses.

North Node Eclipses point us forward to what we need to learn or do to move in the direction of our purpose. They come with opportunities and new beginnings, but they also ask you to adjust to new circumstances.

South Node eclipses are connected with our past and with our deep-rooted patterns of behavior. They come with outcomes, releases of energy, and achievements, depending on your particular karmic load. At a South Node eclipse, it is payback time.

The Lunar Eclipse on June 5th, 2020 was a South Node Eclipse. The Solar Eclipse on June 21st (at the Solstice) is a North Node eclipse. A time for BOLD new beginnings.

In 2020, history will be written in front of our eyes. And what we’ve witnessed so far is just the beginning.

The 2nd half of June and the 1st half of July will be at least as intense as the first months of the year.

The next intensity peak is in September-October.

2020 is not for the faint of the heart.

But what history tells us is that new eras are always preceded by big changes.

Whatever happens, however disrupting, it is part of a process of renewal. A new world is around the corner.

–Astro Butterfly

“To this day God is the name by which I designate all things which cross my willful path violently and recklessly, all things which upset my subjective views, plans and intentions and change the course of my life for better or worse.”

—Good Housekeeping Magazine, a few days before Jung’s death in 1961

The Denial of Death

by Ernest Becker, Sam Keen (Goodreads Author) (Foreword), Daniel Goleman (Goodreads Author) (Foreword) 

Winner of the Pulitzer prize in 1974 and the culmination of a life’s work, The Denial of Death is Ernest Becker’s brilliant and impassioned answer to the “why” of human existence. In bold contrast to the predominant Freudian school of thought, Becker tackles the problem of the vital lie — man’s refusal to acknowledge his own mortality. In doing so, he sheds new light on the nature of humanity and issues a call to life and its living that still resonates more than twenty years after its writing.

(Goodreads.com)

By Adam Kochanski June 15, 2020 (SFChronicle.com) Comments Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Oakland, shown at a 2018 news conference, has drafted legislation to create a national Truth and Reconciliation Commission on racial injustice.Photo: Bill Clark / CQ-Roll Call 2018

The extraordinary Black Lives Matter protests against police brutality and racial injustice in more than 100 U.S. cities come on the heels of the 25th anniversary of South Africa’s historic Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

That commission was the pillar of South African Prime Minister Nelson Mandela’s approach to healing a deeply divided nation after apartheid. Now, prompted by these protests as well as centuries of inequality for African American communities, some U.S. lawmakers are seeking the establishment of a truth commission here.

Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Oakland, has drafted legislation for a U.S. Commission on Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation. Lee’s legislation is ambitious and shows considerable promise. The commission would explore “the effects of slavery, institutional racism, and discrimination against people of color, and how (U.S.) history impacts laws and policies today.”

Does the U.S. need a commission? If so, what lessons can it learn from other countries’ experiences?

Truth commissions are temporary investigative bodies that attempt to uncover the facts about a pattern of past human rights abuse and its causes. They’re usually created by the government to signal a break from the past and a message of “never again.” More than 60 truth commissions have been established worldwide, mostly in countries transitioning from armed conflict or dictatorship, but also in democracies such as Canada.

The U.S. has actually had several similar commissions. Congress established the Commission on Wartime Relocation and Internment of Civilians in 1980, which resulted in an official government apology and reparations to the survivors of Japanese Americans who were interned during World War II.

There have also been state-level truth commissions in Maine and Maryland (the latter investigating racial terror lynchings). There have been several local efforts to address racial injustice, including community-based truth commissions in Greensboro, N.C., and Charlottesville, Va., to investigate racially motivated incidents involving the Ku Klux Klan.

Given these historical precedents, it appears the U.S. is ripe for a national truth commission about the dark legacy of slavery and the past 400 years of racial inequality.

There are three important lessons about what such a process might look like.

First, the South Africa model is but one approach. Many types of truth commissions have been set up over the years, and not all have emphasized forgiveness and reconciliation. In fact, many truth commissions, such as those in Latin America, have prioritized other aims ranging from institutional reforms, to reparations, to supporting criminal cases, to clarifying the historical sources of violence.

The U.S. should consider the full range of options.

Second, if a truth commission is to be effective, it can’t be imposed from above.

The commission must be designed to center the needs and priorities of survivors and their affected communities, or the entire process risks disappointing or even retraumatizing participants.

This is especially true if the commission’s final recommendations are ignored or acted on slowly — a criticism that has befallen many commissions including South Africa’s.

If a U.S. truth commission is to be meaningful, it must begin by listening. It requires engaging African American civil society at the design stage and throughout the entire process. It needs to hear the demands of today’s activists. It means being open to the possibility that a truly victim-centered approach might yield a very different model including reparations for descendants of slavery, or reforms to key institutions such as the police, rather than reconciliation.

Finally, political will matters.

The record of truth commissions is imperfect. They’ve been used instrumentally by governments of all stripes for political gain rather than to promote meaningful change.

Given the way the Trump administration has inflamed protests over the past few weeks, it’s unimaginable that it can lead a reconciliation process that would not become politicized. Given this reality, it’s plausible the truth should not come in the form of a national-level commission, but rather through grassroots, activist-led truth commissions that seek the change they want themselves. Another approach would be to work through congressional channels until the political will is there at the executive level.

Truth commissions are imperfect, but they can be an important beginning. It’s time for the U.S. to begin the slow process of reckoning with its past and acknowledging how historical injustices continue to fuel structural and everyday violence today.

Adam Kochanski is a research fellow at Stanford University’s Center for Human Rights and International Justice and a postdoctoral fellow at McGill University’s Centre for International Peace and Security Studies in Montreal.

©2020 Hearst

JUNE 13, 2020 (moc.media)

“The work of art must be harmoniously integrated into the [Tuileries] garden and take into account [any] site constraints”

The Tuileries Gardens near the Louvre. Source: Kris Atomic/The Art Newspaper.

The French government announced plans to create a memorial to victims of slavery in the Tuileries Gardens close to the Louvre Museum. The Paris-based black advocacy group, the Representative council of France’s Black Associations (CRAN) welcomed the move. Louis-Georges Tin, the association’s honourary president, said that “the artist chosen must be of African descent”, the Art Newspaper reports.

In 2016, then president François Hollande said a slavery memorial and museum would be created in Paris. The construction of the museum is not discussed now, but plans for the monument are going to be implemented.

On April 27, 2018, the 170th anniversary of the abolition of slavery in French colonies, president Emmanuel Macron said in a statement: “The [proposed] foundation will put slavery back into the long history of France, from the first French colonial empire to the present day.” In May last year, Macron confirmed that a slavery memorial would be built in Paris.

The Louvre officials will be responsible for the project management. A steering committee will comprise figures “in the field of slavery commemoration… and also in contemporary art and the conservation of historical monuments”, as well as City of Paris representatives. The work will be owned by the state and will be added to the national collection.

CRAN has prepared a report calling to create a new museum. The report will be submitted to Paris’s new mayor after the coming election (the second round is scheduled for June 28).

France’s Ministry of Culture says that “the work of art must be harmoniously integrated into the garden and take into account [any] site constraints”. The winning artist will be announced early 2021 with the work scheduled for completion by the end of next year. The application deadline is September 1.

By Charles Q. Choi – Live Science Contributor – June, 12, 2020 (livescience.com)

 Comments (1)The velocity-distribution data for gaseous rubidium atoms which confirmed the discovery of the Bose–Einstein condensate in 1995.(Image: © NIST/JILA/CU-Boulder)

Scientists have generated an exotic form of matter in the unique microgravity environment aboard the International Space Station and are using it to explore the quantum world, a new study finds.

There are four states of matter common in everyday life — gases, liquids, solids, and plasmas. However, there is also a fifth state of matter — Bose-Einstein condensates (BECs), which scientists first created in the lab 25 years ago. When a group of atoms is cooled to near absolute zero, the atoms begin to clump together, behaving as if they were one big “super-atom.”

Bose-Einstein condensates straddle the boundary between the everyday world, governed by classical physics, and the microscopic world, which follows the rules of quantum mechanics. In the world of quantum mechanics, a particle can behave as if it were spinning in two opposite directions at the same time, or as if it existed in two or more locations simultaneously. Because they follow some of these quantum behaviors, Bose-Einstein condensates may offer scientists key clues into the workings of quantum mechanics, potentially helping to solve mysteries such as how to create a “theory of everything” that could explain the workings of the cosmos from the smallest to largest scales.

Scientists now routinely create Bose-Einstein condensates in hundreds of labs across the world. However, one limitation that stands in the way of this research is gravity. These “super-atoms” are extraordinarily fragile and the setups used to create them are incredibly delicate, so the pull of gravity felt on Earth can disrupt both, making it challenging to learn much about them.

As such, researchers developed the Cold Atom Lab, which can generate Bose-Einstein condensates in the microgravity found in orbit aboard the space station. Launched in 2018, the Cold Atom Lab is small  and requires only a relatively small amount of energy so it meets the specific constraints aboard the space station. While the equipment originally needed to create Bose-Einstein condensates on Earth can take up an entire lab, the Cold Atom Lab takes up only about 14 cubic feet (0.4 cubic meters) and altogether requires an average of 510 watts of power.

Using the Cold Atom Lab, researchers in a new study found that they could increase the amount of time they can analyze these condensates after the traps confining the material is switched off to more than one second. In comparison, on Earth, scientists would only have hundredths of a single second for the same task.

In addition, in microgravity, the scientists found that they needed weaker forces to trap the condensates. This, in turn, means that they could create the condensates at lower temperatures. And, at these temperatures, exotic quantum effects would become increasingly pronounced.

So far with this study, the researchers have created Bose-Einstein condensates using rubidium atoms. Eventually, they also aim to add potassium atoms to investigate what happens when two condensates mix, the study’s senior author Robert Thompson, a physicist at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, told Space.com. Additionally, scientists now seek to use the Cold Atom Lab to create spherical Bose-Einstein condensates, which can only be created in space, Thompson added.

“In the past, our major insights into the inner workings of nature have come from particle accelerators and astronomical observatories; in the future, I believe precision measurements using cold atoms will play an increasingly important role,” Thompson said.

The scientists detailed  in the June 11 issue of the journal Nature.

• The Universe: Big Bang to Now in 10 Easy Steps
• NASA Created a Rare, Exotic State of Matter in Space
• States of Matter: Bose-Einstein Condensate

Follow Charles Q. Choi on Twitter @cqchoi. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.

(Contributed by Suzanne Deakins, H.W., M.)

CROWDED GALAXY

They say there “should be around 36 active civilizations in our Galaxy.”

VICTOR TANGERMANN – JUNE 15TH 2020 (futurism.com)

According to a new study in The Astrophysical Journal, there could be dozens of intelligent alien civilizations hiding in our galaxy, all capable of communicating.

“There should be at least a few dozen active civilizations in our Galaxy under the assumption that it takes 5 billion years for intelligent life to form on other planets, as on Earth,” Christopher Conselice, Professor of Astrophysics at the University of Nottingham and lead author of the study, said in a statement.

“The idea is looking at evolution, but on a cosmic scale,” he added.

The researchers say the numbers suggest there are a number of technological civilizations in the Milky Way galaxy.

“In the strong criteria, whereby a metal content equal to that of the Sun is needed (the Sun is relatively speaking quite metal rich), we calculate that there should be around 36 active civilizations in our Galaxy,” Tom Westby, first author and assistant professor at the University of Nottingham, said in the statement.

Previous estimations have been based on educated guesses and opinions — something that can cause numbers to “vary quite substantially,” according to Westby. But the astronomers say their estimation takes the latest research into account.

“Our new study simplifies these assumptions using new data, giving us a solid estimate of the number of civilizations in our Galaxy,” Westby added.

Hidden in the cool research is a major bummer: the average alien civilization would be 17,000 light-years away. It’s also possible that all other intelligent civilizations already kicked the bucket a long time ago.

But finding them could give us important clues about our own humanity as well.

“If we find that intelligent life is common then this would reveal that our civilization could exist for much longer than a few hundred years, alternatively if we find that there are no active civilizations in our Galaxy it is a bad sign for our own long-term existence,” Conselice said.

“By searching for extraterrestrial intelligent life — even if we find nothing — we are discovering our own future and fate,” he added.

READ MORE: Research sheds new light on intelligent life existing across the galaxy [University of Nottingham]

More on alien life: Harvard Prof: Deep Space Signal May Be From Alien Civilization

Pixabay MENTAL HEALTH

IT’S NOT JUST YOU.

BY DAN ROBITZSKI / June 14, 2020 (futurism.com)

As we enter another week of pandemic lockdown, scientists are working to understand the toll extended isolation takes on our minds and bodies.

The medical effects of loneliness are difficult to measure — especially because loneliness is a subjective experience that varies wildly from person to person. But semantics aside, a clear trend is emerging, CNET reports, and it’s not great.

Extended loneliness can have serious psychological impacts, like exacerbated depression, anxiety, and increased irritability, according to 2018 research posted in the journal The Lancet. But the impacts extend far beyond psychological health.

“It’s very distressing when we are not a part of a group,” Brigham Young University psychologist and neuroscientist Julianne Holt-Lundstad told CNET. “We have to deal with our environment entirely on our own, without the help of others, which puts our brain in a state of alert, but that also signals the rest of our body to be in a state of alert.”

Loneliness has been linked to all sorts of medical problems, like cognitive decline in old age, cancer, and heart disease, CNET reports. Though the causal relationship between loneliness and disease is poorly understood, there seems to be a genetic mechanism, potentially triggered by prolonged loneliness, that increases the risk of those diseases.

“The subjective experience has to be translated somehow in the brain into biology, and so that’s [what] we’re looking at now,” Turhan Canli, an integrative neuroscientist at Stony Brook University, told CNET.