>I just checked my copy of Starry Night Pro. Make sure you check out September 1 if the weather permits. On that evening, they are side by side in the sky.
>Right off hand I'm too lazy to convert the amounts to decimal format, but it is closer on the 1st than the 2nd. In fact they are slightly closer on the 31st of August than Sept 2nd. ...
Well, that is quite possible: Himmelsjahr (a book) indicates that the planets pass each other on the second, at ca. 12:00 UTC; they have to be watched either the evening before, or the evening after. Also, the passing isn't necessarily the moment of closest approximation; I think they note the moment when they are in a North-South allignment or something similar.
1 degree 13' would be about 1.2 degrees.
Difference in opinions hath cost many millions of lives: for instance, whether flesh be bread, or bread be flesh; whether whistling be a vice or a virtue; whether it be better to kiss a post, or throw it into the fire... (from Gulliver's Travels)