Suppose someone tells me what constellation the Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn were in when they were born, and the information is astronomically accurate (ie, not astrological signs).
Could I use this information to estimate their date of birth (including year) to a reasonable approximation? My thoughts:
12 constellations, 7 planets (incl Sun/Moon) yields 35,831,808 possibilities, and we know the moon changes constellations daily. If the planets were in purely random constellations every day, it would take 98104 years for all possible combinations. Using this, and additional information that the person was born in the last 200 years, it would seem easy to find their birth date.
Of course, planets aren't in random constellations. Additionally, the birthday paradox suggests there will be many repeats despite the 35,831,808 combinations.
However, it still seems like you could do a fairly good job of approximating someone's birthday with this information?
