A lot of scientist will say that astrology does not ‘work’. But believers in astrology will tell you that it is real and that it does work. The real answer is that it depends what you mean by the word ‘work’.
Both answers and groups of people are technically right, depending on their definition of ‘work’. So, what is astrology? It is defined as the belief that the alignment of the stars and planets in the night sky have an effect on every single person’s mood, actions and even the environment that they inhabit.
All of this depending on when they were born, and which stars and planets were in specific points in the sky at this time.
Astrology finds itself in the horoscopes of magazines and even on sites online. They are always personalized by your birth date and you can easily find your horoscope provided you know your birth date (hopefully you know that by now!)
Horoscopes can make predictions in peoples’ lives as well as telling them specifically how they should act in certain situations like work, relationship, finance. It also tells people what they should do in given circumstances like their health, love and friendships. All of this is according to the position of the stars and planets.
It was recently found that a whopping 26% of all Americans believe in astrology. And that is potentially not including the people who read their horoscopes but profess to not believe in astrology.
So, in order to answer the question of how astrology works we really need to address it two parts. The first being whether the position of astronomical bodies will actually affect a person’s life, and the second being whether horoscopes can make people feel any better. interestingly, both of these can actually be determined scientifically.
The first question is: Does the positioning of astronomical bodies affect a person’s life?
The answer is categorically no. Although the position of one particular astronomical body, the sun, does cause changes in our weather as well as the seasons, these do not actually affect the life of a person in the way that astrology suggests.
But if someone is sweeping a mound of leaves from their lawn in autumn when they would much rather be sunning themselves in the summer sun, then they will tell you that astronomical bodies definitely affect their lives. However, this is not the astrological way that we are talking about.
Some of the other was that astronomical bodies can cause our lives to change are solar flares causing electromagnetic disruptions on earth. These can cause disruptions to satellites and also blackouts on earth. Another example is that the moon, another astronomical body, can alter the tide due to its gravitational pull.
If you rely on the tide for your profession, this could have a significant effect on your job. But all of these examples fall under basic weather, yes, they are caused by astronomical bodies like the question suggests, but they are still only changing the weather.
Astrology suggests that astronomical bodies further out in space have an effect on earth’s inhabitants. They believe that this is an effect that goes beyond basic weather effects.
And all of this depends on your birth date. Not only is this claim false, it is scientifically proven that there is no correlation between birth date and the way that someone behaves or the level of their intelligence. There was also a study that had astrologers themselves try to predict things based on the astronomical bodies that they rely on.
The experiment found, however, that their predictions were no closer to what random chance would produce. This, therefore, proves that astrology is not scientific and that there is no solid evidence of it working.
If we talk about hard science now, there are four fundamental forces in the universe. Gravity, electromagnetism, the strong nuclear force and the weak nuclear force. For an object to affect a person on earth, it must interact with that person by exerting one of these four fundamental forces on them.
A graphic example of this is that when your skin feels like it is burning from acid, what is happening is that the electromagnetic fields in the acid are pulling enough on your skin to rip the molecules in your skin apart. This is an example of a fundamental force working on you and affecting you.
You will fall from a building because of gravity and potential energy. But all of these fundamental forces will die off in distance. This means that the astronomical bodies that astrology relies on are too far away for any of the fundamental forces to work.
So, the gravitational pull from the North star on a person would actually be weaker than that of the gravitational pull of your body to a small fly that is flying around you. This means that if these astronomical bodies did actually have an effect on humans on earth, then the flies would also have an effect.
And that just does not make any sense. Not only that, but you are not going to find the love of your life simply because some stars line up or some planets align. This is mainly because that is very unlikely to happen in space, but also because astronomical bodies have absolutely no effect on us.
That leads us to the second question: Can horoscopes and astrology make people feel any better?
Just like people can put faith in a religion because it makes them feel safe and better that there is a greater being in charge, horoscopes and astrology have the same effect. That is not to compare religion and astrology or paint them with the same brush, but the similarities speak for themselves.
Horoscopes can make people feel better, yes. But that does not mean that they are right. Just like people put their faith in religion, people put their faith in astrology, even if they do not fully understand it or have proof. This is the same as people believing in fate or anything that takes their own actions and lives out of their own hands.
For this reason, it is the act of believing in astrology and horoscopes that makes people feel better. This is a sort of placebo effect. And the placebo effect is something that can actually be scientifically proven, unlike astrology.
When people read their horoscope when they want advice, the horoscope makes them feel better, because their life is out of their hands. This can also be dangerous if people blame their negative actions on their star sign.
This is something that we see in mainstream media today: people instantly judge others based on their star sign, or even blame toxic behavior on their horoscope. But believing astrology and horoscopes will not make them true. If you are wanting a form of self-care that will give you the same peace that astrology once gave you, try meditating.
This is following the same spiritual lines but has scientifically proven methods of calming you down and allowing you to make rational decisions, all without having to read your horoscope in a cheap magazine.
