Astrology is a collection of belief systems that assert that there is a connection between astrological phenomena and events or personality traits in the human world. The scientific community has dismissed astrology as having no explanatory power for describing the universe. Scientific testing has discovered no evidence to back up the astrological traditions’ premises or alleged effects.
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Is astrology based on science?
Is astrology accurate? Reading horoscopes is a popular pastime, but is there any scientific evidence that they are accurate?
When you’re enticed by a familiar interruption and your willpower weakens, problems can occur.
Every day, up to 70 million Americans consult their horoscopes. At least, that’s what the American Federation of Astrologers claims. According to a Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life poll conducted twenty years ago, 25% of Americans believe that the positions of the stars and planets have an impact on our daily life. In 2012, the General Social Survey indicated that 34% of Americans think astrology is “extremely” or “kind of scientific,” with the percentage of individuals who think astrology is “not at all scientific” dropping from two-thirds to about half.
Astrology is the concept that astronomical phenomena, such as the stars over your head when you were born or the fact that Mercury is retrograde, have the potential to influence our daily lives and personality traits. Of course, this is distinct from astronomy, which is the scientific study of celestial objects, space, and the physics of the cosmos.
A particular facet of astrology, the foretelling of a person’s future or the provision of daily counsel via horoscopes, is gaining in popularity. The Cut, for example, recorded a 150 percent rise in horoscope page views in 2017 compared to 2016.
Clearly, a lot of people are trying to figure out how to read the stars for guidance. Understanding the positions of the stars is the foundation of astrology, which appears to be a scientific discipline in and of itself. Is there any scientific evidence that astrology has an impact on our personalities and lives?
But, since I still have five minutes of this six-minute podcast to fill, let’s take a look at how astrology has been put to the test.
What was Jesus’ take on astrology?
I believe that God created astrology as a tool for us to better understand ourselves and to use as a spiritual tool. Numerous bible texts, in my opinion, support astrology. As a Christian, I try to remember what Jesus said. “There shall be signs in the sun, moon, and stars,” Christ predicted in Luke 21:25, referring to the importance of astrology. He explains the value of astrology with his pupils, as well as how it might be used as a sign of his return. Why would Jesus provide us this critical knowledge if we are not intended to understand the energies of the planets and signs, and if he was actually against it? Just as the three wise men knew Jesus would be born under the star in the sky that led them to him lying in the manger, Jesus warned us that when he returns, there will be signals in the sky.
What’s the difference between astronomy and astrology, and how do you tell the two apart?
Despite the fact that astrology and astronomy have similar origins, there is a significant difference between the two nowadays. Outside of Earth’s atmosphere, astronomy is the study of the cosmos and its contents. Astronomers study celestial objects’ locations, movements, and attributes. Astrology is the study of how the locations, movements, and qualities of the planets affect individuals and events on Earth. One of the key reasons for astronomical observations and theories for millennia has been to enhance astrological forecasts.
Is it true that many believe in astrology?
Christine Smallwood’s fascinating piece, “Astrology in the Age of Uncertainty:
Astrology is currently experiencing widespread popular acceptability that has not been seen since the 1970s. The transition began with the introduction of the personal computer, was expedited by the Internet, and has now reached new levels of speed thanks to social media. According to a Pew Research Center poll from 2017, about a third of Americans believe in astrology.
Astrology, like psychoanalysis before it, has infiltrated our collective vernacular. At a party in the 1950s, you could have heard someone talk about the id, ego, or superego; now, it’s normal to hear someone explain herself using the sun, moon, and rising signs. It isn’t just that you are aware of it. It’s who’s saying it: folks who aren’t kooks or deniers of climate change, who don’t find a conflict between utilizing astrology and believing in science…
I ran a short Google search and discovered the following Pew report from October 2018:
The religion breakdown was the only thing that surprised me about this table.
I had the impression that mainline Protestants were the rational ones, but they believe in astrology at the same rate as the overall population.
But, hey, I guess they’re ordinary Americans, so they have average American ideas.
Only 3% of atheists believe in astrology, which is also unexpected.
This makes sense, yet it seemed reasonable to me that someone may not believe in God but believe in other supernatural things: in fact, I could see astrology as a type of replacement for a traditional religious system.
But it appears that is not the case.
Brian Wansink has been compared to an astrologer who can make astute observations about the world based on a combination of persuasiveness and qualitative understanding, and then attributes his success to tarot cards or tea leaves rather than a more practical ability to synthesize ideas and tell good stories.
Does Brian Wansink, on the other hand, believe in astrology?
What about Marc Hauser, Ed Wegman, Susan Fiske, and the rest of the bunch who call their detractors “second-string, replication police, methodological terrorists, Stasi, and so on?”
I doubt they believe in astrology because it symbolizes a rival belief system: it’s a business that, in some ways, competes with rah-rah Ted-talk science.
I wouldn’t be shocked if famous ESP researchers believe in astrology, but I get the impression that mainstream junk-science supporters in academia and the news media feel uncomfortable discussing ESP since its research methods are so similar to their own.
They don’t want to be associated with ESP researchers because it would devalue their own study, but they also don’t want to put them under the bus because they are fellow Ivy League academics, so the safest plan is to remain quiet about it.
The greater point, however, is not astrology believing in and of itself, but the mental state that allows individuals to believe in something so contrary to our scientific understanding of the world.
(OK, I apologize to the 29% of you who don’t agree with me on this.)
When I return to writing on statistical graphics, model verification, Bayesian computation, Jamaican beef patties, and other topics, you can rejoin the fold.)
It’s not that astrology couldn’t be correct a priori:
We can come up with credible hypotheses under which astrology is real and amazing, just as we can with embodied cognition, beauty and sex ratio, ovulation and voting, air rage, ages ending in 9, and all the other Psychological Science / PNAS classics.
It’s just that nothing has come up after years of rigorous research.
And the existing theories aren’t particularly convincing: they’re speculative world models that may be good if the purpose was to describe a real and enduring occurrence, but they’re less so without actual data.
Anyway, if 30% of Americans are willing to believe such nonsense, it’s no surprise that a significant number of influential American psychology professors will have the kind of attitude toward scientific theory and evidence that leads them to have strong beliefs in weak theories with no supporting evidence.
Indeed, not only support for specific weak theories, but support for the fundamental principle that pseudoscientific views should be treated with respect (although, oddly enough, maybe not for astrology itself).
P.S.In defense of the survey respondents (but not of the psychology professors who support ideas like the “critical positivity ratio,” which makes astrology appear positively sane in comparison), belief in astrology (or, for that matter, belief in heaven, gravity, or the square-cube law) is essentially free.
Why not believe these things, or not believe them?
Belief or denial in evolution, climate change, or unconscious bias, on the other hand, can have social or political consequences.
Some opinions are purely personal, while others have a direct impact on policy.
I have less patience for famous academic and media elites who aggressively support junk science by not just expressing their trust in speculative notions supported by no real data, but also attacking those who point out these emperors’ nudity. Furthermore, even a hypothetical tolerant, open-minded supporter of junk sciencethe type of person who might believe in critical positivity ratio but actively support the publication of criticisms of that workcan still cause some harm by contaminating scientific journals and the news media with bad science, and by promoting sloppy work that takes up space that could be used for more careful research.
You know how they say science corrects itself, but only because individuals are willing to correct themselves?
Gresham’s law is also true, but only when people are willing to distribute counterfeit notes or money they think is counterfeit while keeping their lips shut until they can get rid of their wads of worthless stock.
P.P.S.Just to be clear:I don’t think astrology is a waste of time, and it’s possible that Marc Hauser was onto something real, even while faking data (according to the US government, as mentioned on Wikipedia), and the critical positivity ratio, ovulation, voting, and all the rest…
Just because there isn’t enough evidence to support a theory doesn’t mean it’s untrue.
I’m not trying to disprove any of these assertions.
All of it should be published someplace, along with all of the criticism.
My issue with junk science proponents isn’t simply that they advocate science that I and others perceive to be rubbish; they can also be wrong!
However, they consistently avoid, deny, and oppose valid open criticism.
P.P.P.S.Remember that #notallpsychologists.
Of course, the problem of junk research isn’t limited to psychology in any way.
Professors of political science, economics, sociology, and history, to the extent that they believe in astrology, spoon bending, or whatever (that is, belief in “scientific paranormalism as describing some true thing about the natural world, not just a “anthropological recognition that paranormal beliefs can affect the world because people believe in it), this could also sabotage their research.
I suppose it’s not such a big problem if a physicist or chemist believes in these things.
I’m not attempting to shut down study into astrology, embodied cognition, ESP, beauty-and-sex-ratio, endless soup bowls, spoon bending, the Bible Code, air anger, ovulation and voting, subliminal smiley faces, or anything else.
Allow for the blooming of a thousand blooms!
Given that a sizable portion of the populace is willing to believe in scientific-sounding notions that aren’t backed by any good scientific theory or evidence, it should come as no surprise that many professional scientists hold this viewpoint.
The repercussions are especially evident in psychology, which is a vital field of study where theories can be hazy and where there is a long legacy of belief and action based on flimsy data.
That isn’t to say that psychologists are awful people; they’re merely working on difficult challenges in a field with a long history of failures.
This isn’t a critique; it’s just the way things are. Of course, there is a lot of excellent work being done in the field of psychology. You’ll have to work with what you’ve got.
Is astrology a true science or a hoax?
Astrology is a fascinating subject. It has fled to the one area that protects it from rational criticism after enduring decades of scientific probing: mysticism. It may surprise us to hear that a technique of divination devised thousands of years ago in the Levant is still alive and well in this day of genetic sequencing and powerful telescopes. Astrologers are reporting better business than normal in the middle of our pandemic. Whether or whether it is true, it is unquestionably beneficial, and many current astrology users agree. They profess to be unconcerned about whether it is scientific or not, and many even state that they do not believe in it. They simply find it beneficial.
This astrology is a difficult universe to grasp your head around. I’m sure I’ve only seen a sliver of it throughout my studies. Astrology is built on a basic premise: what happens above, happens below. Astrologers claim that the positions of various celestial bodies (planets, moons, and asteroids) at the time of our birth reveal profound truths about who we are and what will happen to us. Some think that these celestial bodies actually cause events on Earth through some unknown mechanism; others, particularly in our modern age, reject this notion and instead perceive the sky as a reflection. They claim that through understanding astrology’s language, we can see a reflection of who we are and what our future may hold.
Before we go into the sort of incontrovertible “secular theology” that astrology has evolved into, let’s take a look at the scientific wringer it’s been through since the 1950s. Indeed, a plethora of studies examining particular event forecasts, Zodiac sign compatibilities and occupational inclinations, and astrologers’ abilities to match astrological profiles to individuals have had disastrous consequences for the profession’s credibility. (This review article and this website have a partial summary.) And, if the heavenly spheres do cause things on Earth, as early astrology proponents believed, no known force could account for the effect due to the distances involved.
After getting over their injured egos, honest scientists confronted with a mountain of evidence against their hypothesis would try to refine it, research it more, and possibly replace it with a better one. However, astrologists have chosen to ignore or dismiss this data. They’ve resorted to hand-waving, saying that they don’t know what it all means yet, but astrology works, and we’ll figure it out one day. Their reaction to a 1990 research perfectly exemplifies their aversion to course corrections. The Indiana Federation of Astrologers worked closely with the researchers to design their study. The Federation even checked the lead researcher’s birth chart, which shows where each celestial body was in the sky at the moment of his birth, to make sure he was a good guy.
The experiment was simple: six astrologers were given 23 birth charts and were asked to match them to 23 people who had images and answers to a lengthy questionnaire created by the Federation. What’s the end result? From zero to three correct matches were produced by each astrologer (the average was one). When confronted with this decision, the Federation twisted itself into a pretzel to explain itself, eventually saying that “astrology may not always produce quantifiable outcomes, but it still works.”
Because of astrologers’ lack of concern, Paul Thagard, a philosopher of science, declared astrology a pseudoscience in 1978. It wasn’t because its origins were illogical: after all, chemistry arose from alchemy. It wasn’t because of a lack of mechanism: continental drift existed long before plate tectonics was established as a possible explanation. It was because its residents had largely refused to confront the consequences of their actions. Over a lengthy period of time, it had made less development than rival theories such as psychology. It may have begun as a protoscience (a “science in the making”), but it quickly devolved into an unpromising endeavor before earning the label of pseudoscience.
For many modern astrology enthusiasts, though, all of this is a pointless debate. They claim that astrology has no scientific pretensions. It’s a tool for self-reflection. However, there are issues there as well.
My birth chart was created for free using a popular astrology program (I know, it’s not the same as consulting an astrologer). Some of the sections were spot-on, while others were ludicrously inappropriate, and the over 5,000-word article was riddled with inconsistencies. I was both an intense traditionalist and a natural rebel, a clever academic with a serious demeanor and an intuitive psychic with a strong believe in the unknown.
Barnum statements are named after P.T. Barnum, the creator of the Barnum & Bailey Circus, who is famed for purportedly declaring “there’s a sucker born every minute.” These Barnum assertions work like a charm! I’ve provided the identical bogus astrological personality description to high school kids who thought they were getting a horoscope based on their Zodiac sign on several occasions, and almost every single one of them raised their hand when I asked if they recognized themselves in the text. When I told them to check out their neighbors’ horoscopes, they found they had all received the same SMS, it was chaos.
I can see how modern-day astrology appeals to people. It has become associated with the ever-popular self-help movement by emphasizing on self-reflection. It gives a sense of community to the social beings that make up its fandom, and it can seem empowering for minority who have been repressed by long-standing institutions. In reality, evidence suggests that people who are drawn to astrology are religiously inclined but not associated with a major denomination. An esoteric, decentralized system like astrology can readily satisfy the craving for spirituality and significance. And, before we condemn all of its adherents as scientifically uneducated, surveys suggest that astrology is most appealing to persons with a basic understanding of science. Indeed, astrology shares many of the characteristics of science: it makes predictions, does calculations, and works with systems and structures.
When astrology provides good descriptions of oneself, even those who are dubious of it may begin to warm up to it. Our brain’s inherent wiring for perceiving patterns and agents even when there are none reinforces this attractiveness for pseudoscience. The forecasts of astrology can give the illusion of control in times of extreme stress. For some people, not knowing what the future contains is unbearable. Even if astrology forecasts poor events, it provides a solid foundation on which to build.
However, there are less imaginative approaches to dealing with ambiguity. Professor Kate Sweeny of the University of California, Riverside’s Department of Psychology researches this phenomena and sent me two recommendations via email. “We’ve discovered evidence for the effectiveness of mindfulness practice in managing with uncertainty,” she says. Meditating or doing something like gardening that requires us to focus on the present now can help to relieve stress caused by worrying about the future. Similarly, being “in the zone” might be advantageous if we engage in an enjoyable, demanding activity that allows us to track our progress toward a goal. This experience is created with the help of video games. The illusion of control that comes with astrological reading can be relatively harmless, but it is not always so. If you pass up a fantastic opportunity because of something your horoscope stated that day, or if you pursue a risky possibility because of it, your life may be steered in the wrong path. Unfortunately, I can picture someone deferring life-saving surgery due to a gloomy reading from the stars.
If we are to reject the allure of magical thinking, we must submit ourselves to “not knowing,” a crucial scientific lesson that some of us may be better suited to grasp. “I don’t know what will happen, and that’s OK,” you can say. It stifles irrational thoughts. Of course, astrology enthusiasts may not consider “as above, so below” to be an excessive viewpoint. Carl Sagan is best known for popularizing the phrase “extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.” The problem comes when a pseudoscience retreats to the wishy-washy world of unknowable mysticism after being poked and prodded by scientific fingers. There are no unusual claims in that cosmos, where planets have been endowed with an underlying mythology by some odd divine force. It is possible to achieve anything.
Message to take home:
– Astrology is a pseudoscience since it has made no progress and refuses to acknowledge a substantial amount of important scientific research.
– Many modern astrology aficionados regard it as a tool for introspection rather than a science, in part because its forecasts might offer them a false sense of control during times of stress.
– Mindfulness meditation and engaging in things that put you “in the zone” are more grounded ways of dealing with uncertainty.