More on Harmonics
Zip Dobyns with personal comm. from John Addey
Introduction by Zip Dobyns, but mostly from the Master Pioneer—John Addey in a personal communication.
During the past two to three years, as indicated in an article in our first issue of The Mutable Dilemma, we have been sporadically involved in an exploration of some of the new ideas stemming from John Addey of England. One of our projects involved a harmonic analysis of the Sun and Moon positions of about 1200 untimed, chronic, male alcoholics. The Sun was analyzed by getting a frequency distribution of individual degrees occupied; the Moon in 10-degree sections of the zodiac since lack of birth time makes its position too uncertain to attempt individual degrees. An initial look at results suggested that the ninth harmonic might be important, but the following communication from John Addey points out that amplitude is actually less important than phase angle, and that 10 of the first 60 harmonics show substantial agreement in phase and relatively high amplitude. Remember our sample was divided into two parts so that they could be compared with each other for possible significance.
John writes:
“The harmonic analysis of the alcoholics is really quite stunning—most remarkable. I don’t think I have ever seen such a close similarity between two sets of this kind. For example, taking the first 60 harmonics, I set out below the 16 highest mean amplitudes (of the two sets) and the 14 closest phase differences, and the two things agree in 10 cases. Since the harmonic analysis is simply describing the distribution, this must mean that the two sets are extraordinarily similar.
Table: 1st 60 harmonics in 1200 alcoholics
|
Harmonic |
16 highest mean amplitudes |
14 closest phase differences |
|
>2 |
10.4 |
20 |
|
>4 |
10.3 |
23 |
|
>6 |
9.0 |
25 |
|
>7 |
15.2 |
24 |
|
9 |
12.3 |
(55) |
|
>12 |
8.8 |
22 |
|
13 |
10.7 |
(66) |
|
>14 |
9.4 |
5 |
|
19 |
(7.0) |
4 |
|
20 |
(7.8) |
15 |
|
>27 |
9.1 |
14 |
|
30 |
(7.5) |
25 |
|
32 |
9.2 |
(32) |
|
>41 |
8.7 |
24 |
|
>42 |
12.6 |
24 |
|
45 |
11.0 |
(125) |
|
48 |
(7.1) |
23 |
|
54 |
9.1 |
(26) |
|
56 |
9.5 |
(170) |
|
>60 |
9.0 |
10 |
Lower amplitudes and larger differences in phase angles are indicated by parentheses. The ten harmonics with both relatively high amplitude and close phase angles are indicated by arrows.
“What is very striking is that out of the low harmonics 2 to 14, in all but two, the phase agreement is better than chance, and usually much better. The agreement of phase is really more important than the amplitude. Of two sets which agree as to phase, it does not matter very much if one does not have a very strong amplitude since they are telling the same story. Whereas two high amplitudes which are opposite each other in phase will cancel each other out.
“Alcoholism, like all other ailments, must come about because of the coincidence of a number of factors which therefore make a particular type. I know nothing about alcoholism, but, for example, suppose it arose because of:
1. Emotional sensitivity plus,
2. Tendency to get into emotionally frustrating situations plus,
3. Not all people would lack the power to fight back so, 3, lack of ‘fight-back,’ plus
4. Tendency to seek refuge in some kind of comfort or self-indulgence plus
5. Tendency to drink (water signs?) rather than say, over-eat (earth) or smoke (fire) etc.
“This is the kind of thing I mean and we haven’t even started on the special physical characteristics of the type. If each harmonic describes some particular factor or tendency, then we can say that it is because of a certain combination of harmonics / tendencies that alcoholism tends to occur.
“So far as phase agreement goes, if we represent the phase in one set by a radial ‘pointer’ thus:
then the chances of the phase in the other set being in the same half of the circle is “even.” In the same third of the circle, it is 2 to 1 against; in the same quarter, 3 to 1; and within 25 degrees, 6 to 1 against. So you see that the odds against the degree of phase agreement in the harmonics 2 to 14 is quite astronomical, since only 2 (3rd and 8th) are more than 90 degrees apart.
“Of course, we are only dealing with the Sun. Probably aspects and mundane positions would be even more important.” John Addey