Britain is today obsessed with the coronation of Charles III.
Robur Carolinum, “Charles’s oak,” was a constellation in this southern region, as shown in our Map of the Starry Sky. It was invented by Halley in 1679, to commemorate the oak in which Charles II hid after the last battle of the civil wars, in 1651. Charles II was restored to the throne in 1660, but the constellation became disused after fifty years.
That Charles was an interesting character, who liked to believe he had survived the adventures of his escape by being able to pass as an ordinary guy, and did not like to leave all the power of governing to parliament. Charles III is an interesting character, who will have trouble keeping quiet about his environmentalism, his charities, his views on architecture. One can almost forgive him for owning 18 castles, palaces, and other residences – he might consider giving some of them for public use. They would be better than the disused barracks, prisons, cruise ships, barges, and oil-drilling platforms that the government has proposed for housing asylum seekers who are waiting for their claims to be processed.
“Appalling” is Charles’s word for the Illegal Migration Bill, which the prime minister and home secretary are trying to push through parliament, and which is itself illegal under international law. By it, refugees who cross the Channel in small boats, because no safe and legal way is allowed to them, would be arrested, forbidden ever to enter Britain again, and deported to Rwanda. My comment on this follows immediat
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This weblog maintains its right to be about astronomy or anything under the sun.
Guy, thanks for this post with the chart of part of the southern sky ~ I have several disconnected comments:
(1) I received your Astronomical Calendar 1975 a few weeks ago and enjoyed your cover drawing of the spring evening sky from Mexico, along with your discussion of Crux and the “false cross” which is partially taken up by Halley’s constellation, both of which I have only seen completely on one occasion (in Panama 1990);
(2) A minor point about astronomical names, which you have covered in several AstCal issues as well as the Companion, is the lack of standardization: so in this case, the Wikipedia entry on the constellation refers to it as Robur Carolinum, not Carolium ~ I assume that both were cited in various sources at some point? Also, you labeled the star iota Carinae as “Scutulum” whereas other charts I’ve seen label it as “Aspidiske”? Scutulum calls the word “Scutum”, or shield, to mind, which would fit better as a royal reference; although hiding in an oak tree is not quite as heroic as fending off an Ottoman army;
(3) My view of history has evolved to the point where I don’t think the type of government (monarchy versus democracy) is necessarily the most important thing, but rather does the system of government protect the 99.9% of the population against exploitation by the 0.01% (the oligarchs / billionaires). They can buy control of the monarch / despot or they can buy control of the system that “elects” democratic governments, the result is the same in both cases. The oligarchy is working hard to restore feudalism (“you will own nothing, and you’ll be happy”);
(4) Instigating wars in third world countries that result in mass chaos, destruction, privation, exploitation, and finally migration is a wonderful tactic of the oligopoly to achieve the societal destabilization in the third and first world countries affected by it that helps them attain their goals (further wealth transfer to themselves and thus the mechanisms of control). That interference and exploitation would be the most important thing to stop if we want to help current and future refugees.
You caught a typo: my “Robur Carolium” should be “Robur Carolinum”.
Our views converge. The ethics of the oligarchs are roughly opposite to “The greatest happiness of the greaetest number” and “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.”
Do sovereign countries have a “right” to exist and — if so — to exercise control over over their borders on behalf of their native born / naturalized citizens* and to establish laws regulating who may or may not live there and under what specific conditions non-citizens may apply to reside or settle there? In short, should countries be able to exercise sovereignty over their own territory, including their borders, and what ought they do with foreign individuals / groups who wish to reside there?
*And, indeed, to discriminate in any way in favor of their own citizens as opposed to people who merely happen to be in that particular place? Likewise, does the concept of “citizenship” mean anything? SHOULD it mean anything?
Even today (the World Economic Forum and the Biden Administration to the contrary), most people would probably agree that countries DO have a right to exist as sovereign, independent national entities**, and that they have some right to say who can and cannot live there and under what circumstances.
**The Ukrainians, for example, would seem to believe so.
At the same time, our moral sense — and I do not believe that we are wrong in this — tells us that any individual who aspires to escape poverty, persecution, and the lack of opportunity to thrive does indeed have some kind of God-given imperative to try to improve their lot and to seek a better life. But what if they are NOT being persecuted and just want to move to improve their economic situation? Or they just think that it would be “nice” to live in another country? And who is to say that they shouldn’t?
If this is accepted, then there is, sadly, a fundamental conflict between this understanding of what being a nation means and the idea that ANY individual, for ANY reason, can assert “rights” that entitle them to settle in a foreign country without any reservation or restraint, completely obviating the concept of borders and the meaning of nationhood and citizenship.
How do we reconcile these different points of view, and how far — cf, the case of Sweden — ought countries to go before a wave of hard to assimilate immigrants begins to change the very culture of that country? Do nations, including England, have the “right” to try to maintain their own native cultures? If not, why, then, are wars fought? Again, look at Ukraine. The answer is that wars are waged to protect exactly such things as borders, territory, and culture, and this is why the Allied Nations opposed the Nazis and the Japanese Warlords in World War !!. (Those damned racist Brits refused to allow those nice Germans to just walk in an take over the British Isles. Likewise, the Americans wanted to keep Hawaii and the Pacific Coast within the American cultural sphere. How could these countries be so insensitive and cruel to the nice people who simply wanted to occupy them and change their cultures?!)
Suppose, per Guy’s perspective, that millions of Russians simply walked into Ukraine territory and declared that they were seeking asylum there. The Ukrainian government would have no “right” to tell them that they couldn’t stay there, even if these “refugees” completely overwhelmed the native Ukrainian population in some provinces, which would, in effect, become Russian cultural enclaves. Is this sort of war by migration “OK”?
So, at one extreme we have the reprehensible example of England, sending legitimate asylum seekers to Rwanda as though this is somehow a decent and honorable thing to do. On the other extreme we have the example of the United States under the Biden Administration in which ANYONE can walk across our southern border and become a de facto “resident” of this country with essentially no questions asked.
Is either of these approaches a sane solution to this problem?
Thank you.
Perhaps, this write-up including the crowning alignment with Canis Venatici interests you:
https://sabineshares.files.wordpress.com/2023/05/gmail-new-post-hidden-treasure-underneath-a-darkened-heart.pdf
Coronations don’t happen too often, so don’t blame the Commonwealth nations for reveling. After 70 years it’s a time for celebration and reflection.
Hope you’re not serious about the Crown giving up histoic palaces and castles to give undeserved reward to foreigners illegally invading the island. If that’s the prevailing view, no wonder the sun is now seen to be setting on the Commonwealth.
He pretends to be an environmentalist but is quick enough to churn out titles for the environmentally unfriendly.One of the last people he knighted on his mothers behalf was racing car driver , Sir Lewis Hamilton,I can’t think of a more environmentally unfriendly activity dressed up as a sport.Of course his supporters will say that the Government put these people forward but as Sir Ronald Reagan said in the 1980s ,’just say no!’