Some comments about the research on astrology if you want

October 25, 2006

General comments including suggestions for research

Indian reader: The information you give leaves the reader unclear about why astrology is false. Empirical evidence is not enough to counter the positive experiences of astrologers and their clients. You need to expose the absurdities of astrology. Reply: These absurdities such as its internal conflicts have already been well discussed on this website. But we must be cautious -- remember the folly of arguing that no research was needed to prove the absurdity of stones falling from the sky, of continents moving, of matter being mostly empty space, and of man flying by his own muscle power. Furthermore, critics have been exposing the absurdities of astrology since Roman times but to no avail. Astrology may or may not be a crutch, but hearts are not won by kicking away crutches.

UK reader: I suggest testing the brain states of people with a high incidence of quintile and septile aspects. According to the published findings, such people should find it easier to enter such states than others without the aspects. Reply: The findings are based on a sample of N=14, which hardly justifies research that, for those who are not neuropsychologists, would be impractical anyway. Furthermore a negative result would be immediately discredited by astrologers as yet another example of failing to consider the whole chart.

American reader: Recent studies have found a strong effect of month-of-birth on human lifespan. Reply: The same was found by Huntington in 1928. In any case astrology is not needed to explain the effect.

Australian reader: I would rather find broad evidence for astrology before I dissect its workings. In your research have you seen Leos that act like Leos? Reply: Yes. We have also seen Leos that act like Scorpios, Librans, etc. Here the broad evidence is no evidence at all.

Australian reader: After enrolling in a Kepler course I was given an article that explained why astrology is not currently a science but will be in the future, and how we don't know why it works, it just does. But your website shows how astrology will never be a science, which has saved me much time and money. Do you see astrology as helpful or harmful to society? Reply: It can be both. Astrology can be helpful because it indirectly puts clients in touch with someone they can talk to. It can also be harmful if clients have to believe in untruths. In 1995 a survey of British schoolchildren aged 14-15 found that most saw astrology as harmless fun; nevertheless more than one-third actually believed in it, and a minority had been led to traumatic occult practices. In 1966 in Japan the annual birth rate dropped by 25 percent due to an extra half million abortions; it was the year of the fire-horse, which is extremely unpropritious for girls. In these cases astrology was anything but harmless fun.

UK reader: People at the recent AA conference in York had the feeling that you had an agenda. Some saw you as having a fixed view which says there is no hope for astrology, so you tend to ignore things that show astrology working. Reply: This seems like wishful thinking to offset a lack of evidence, for such a view does not appear on this website. But see next.

UK reader: I have read through your Case For and Against Astrology. It does put the Case For, but the Case Against seems too inflated for anyone to accept the arguments as a whole. Reply: Perhaps there are simply more aguments against than for. Readers are welcome to suggest arguments for astrology not already covered on this website. (That was in August 2003. So far no suggestions have arrived.)

American reader: You do not examine business astrology. Reply: Yes, because as explained under 9.7 in the Phillipson interview, it does not allow clear conclusions. It has in-built practitioners and therefore in-built self-fulfilling prophecies. Thus if it worked, and everyone followed it, it would no longer confer an advantage and would therefore stop working. Two articles on business astrology are online in the link to the business astrologers website.

Argentinian reader: I have doctoral degrees in medicine and psychology and have been in professional practice for 26 years. Astrology is obviously not a science. Its persistence is due to the deep psychological needs of ordinary people that science is obviously not meeting. It uses astronomical concepts as a tool to help people, that is all. But to help people an astrologer must be in contact with the client, so studies that analyse its scientific viability a la Gauquelin are just rubbish. It is not the purpose of astrology to satisfy scientists, but to satisfy the needs of people, so the debate you are pursuing is a complete waste of time. You are trying to establish a new faith where only science is seen as a valid way of approaching the world. Reply: Actually quite the opposite, for example see Phillipson interview of researchers (including the summary in section 20) under Doing Scientific Research, Astrology my passion and Optimum place for astrology under Applied Astrology, and Site philosophy under Adroit Utilities, where we express views similar to your own.

Indian reader: You should be able to find arguments against astrology without referring to experimental results. Thus after many years of reading astrology books and forecasts, I have noted how sun sign forecasts rarely agree when in fact they ought to agree, and how readings have to be general if they are to fit. Also if astrology is to explain differences between time twins, and how thousands of people can die together in a mass disaster, it would have to be so sensitive to microscopic differences in birth time that no recorded birth time would be good enough. So astrology is not useful, a point readily arrived at logically without appeal to empirical tests. Reply: There are many such arguments, but inconsistency does not necessarily mean everything is in error, any more than an inconsistent pizza recipe means that pizzas cannot exist. Empirical tests are still needed if we are to be sure.

American reader: In response to your exchange with Denis Elwell, I suggest you stop badgering astrologers into predicting the future and stop repeating the mantra that astrologers cannot determine which chart belongs to X. Instead you should for once consider a fair test of the validity of astrological principles and techniques. For example a team of astrologers could read a chart using a technique agreed in advance. The chart would be of a person or event picked by a neutral party. The reading would then be judged by neutral parties against nationally accepted standards specified in advance such as those taught by Kepler College. Reply: Nowhere do we badger astrologers into predicting the future. It seems you may have confused this with our concern to avoid after-the-event selection of chart factors, which of course has nothing to do with predicting the future. Furthermore the inability of astrologers to determine which chart belongs to X remains a serious problem. Your suggested test consists of comparing the reading by one technique (the one agreed to in advance) with the reading by another technique (the one taught by Kepler College). This is thus a test of agreement, not a test of validity. But no useful conclusions about validity can be drawn from a test of agreement, in the same way that "yes, we agree that the earth is flat" says nothing about whether the earth is really flat. Furthermore, 28 tests of agreement have already been made, many by astrologers, with negative results, see Case for and against astrology under Adroit Utilities. What is needed is a new type of test, not an old type of test. Back to you. (That was in November 2001. We have waited four years for a response but so far nothing has arrived.)

Comments to which reasoning artifacts are relevant

American reader: I have had astrological readings that were precise, specific, on-target, and highly persuasive. That so many well-informed people are willing to take astrology seriously suggests that science has real problems. It seems driven not by a quest for truth but by a desire to suppress a particular worldview. Reply: Persuasive readings are the everyday experience of astrologers, which is why they say astrology works. But an evaluation based on experience is what psychologists call personal validation and is highly suspect because it encourages the cognitive illusions (reasoning artifacts) that foster false beliefs. Until astrologers become aware of this, astrology is reduced to clouds in which astrologers see faces and pronounce it miraculous. There is nothing here to suggest that science has problems. Nobody is going to take such an astrology seriously as a world-view, although they may well take it seriously as a social phenomenon. If, like astrologers, you find this argument unconvincing, the next three paragraphs may be painful.

The point is, after a brief practice in using these cognitive illusions, any astute person can deliver readings that are precise, specific, on-target, and highly persuasive (see Michael Shermer, Psychic for a Day or How I Learned Tarot Cards, Palm Reading, Astrology and Mediumship in 24 hours, Skeptic 10(1), 48-55, 2003). Shermer is no ordinary fake psychic. He is Director of the Skeptic Society and author of many skeptic books. He agreed to perform live before a TV audience even though this allowed him only 24 hours of practice in cognitive illusions and the five techniques (the fifth was psychic reading).

He was given one subject for each technique, all women unknown to him, with no prior contact before the reading. For the astrology subject he used a birth chart downloaded at random from the Internet (it was wrong by 21.3 years and he hadn't a clue what it meant). Yet his unknowing subjects rated his readings as accurately summarising their life and personality. One subject who had been visiting psychics for ten years rated it as the best single reading she had ever had.

Shermer concludes: "There is not a shred of evidence that any of this [reading by astrology, palmistry, etc] is real, and the fact that I could do it reasonably well with only one day of preparation shows how vulnerable people are to these very effective nostrums. I can only imagine what I could do with considerable experience. Give me six hours a day of practice for a couple of weeks and I have no doubt that I could easily host a successful syndicated television series and increase my current bank balance by several orders of magnitude. There -- if not for the grace of evolved moral sentiments and guilt-laden scruples -- go I. I cannot do this for one simple reason: it is wrong." (p.55)

Same American reader: You say that astrologers ignore other explanations. But do they? For example there can be many reasons for feeling depressed during a Saturn transit, such as overwork or a lack of exercise, and astrologers would not ignore them. Reply: This is not what astrologers are ignoring. They are ignoring the many cognitive illusions (reasoning artifacts) that foster false belief. See previous reply.

UK reader: I think you are misled and misguided when you suggest that astrology is not a mystery (it is). For example reason alone could never hope to provide accurate astrology. Reply: Our point exactly. But reason can assess it, and astrology has been found wanting. Who said cognitive illusions were mysterious?

Comments about astrological forces, white crows

German reader: You seem to not understand the nature of astrological energies. They explain why it is so difficult for astrologers to satisfy the demands of testability. Why couldn't astrology work by time quality? Reply: A century of research has indicated that astrology has no effects beyond those due to non-astrological factors. So it makes no sense to go on about astrological energies, whatever that means, in the same way that it makes no sense to invoke the end of the world to explain a power cut. Astrology has not been shown to work, so appeals to time quality are beside the point. For more on time quality see Theories of astrology under Applied Astrology.

American reader: You cite a test of Leo Knegt in which he was right "ten times out of ten". So here is your white crow, which you then dismiss because "the test had none of the features such as controls that we would consider essential today". Science is less to do with impartial testing than with selecting conditions to support preconceptions. Reply: The Knegt details are so meagre that neither we nor anyone else can be sure that Knegt is a genuine white crow. Think of the Cottingley fairies -- being sure (as Conan Doyle was) did not make them genuine. You imply wrongly that science has stagnated into a set of arbitrary beliefs resistant to change. In fact science has undergone massive changes whereas astrology has remained much the same since Ptolemy. Ironically your anti-science views are not only misguided, they apply even more forcibly to astrology.

UK reader: I see a physical mechanism as the ONLY way that any change is likely to occur in astrological ideas. If no mechanism is found then I fear your website will last till the next millenium. Reply: This problem is echoed in the next comment:

American reader: Is there an astrological force that would make it possible for astrology to work? If the answer to this is no, then the game is over and we can all go home. Reply: Astrology does not need such a force. Cognitive illusions alone are sufficient.

Same American reader: Re your statement in Year Zero about Gauquelin's planetary effects being too tiny to be of the slightest practical value. This is like being a tiny bit pregnant. The existence of an astrological force, no matter how tiny, must be explained. Can it be accounted for by the present basic forces known by science? If not, then it becomes the white crow you seem so eager to deny. Reply: True, but again, no force is necessarily needed. This website (see under Gauquelin) explains why.

Questions from a Swedish radio station

To which Rudolf Smit replied as follows (August 2003). The questions and answers have been abridged.

Q: Why did you start astrology-and-science.com?

A: Simple! There are many hundreds of astrological websites that provide a one-sided and highly gullible view of astrology. There are very few sites that show the real facts, and even fewer that are impartial. To help restore the balance I decided to set up a site that shows the facts as they really are, nothing more, nothing less.

Q: Is it important to show facts about astrology?

A: Yes. People are used to demanding facts about most things, from car repairs to gardening, so why should astrology be excluded? If the facts support the claims, then so be it. But in this case the facts tend not to support the claims.

Q: What kind of reactions have you got from astrologers?

A: They vary from total denial to total hostility. Almost never is there informed debate. We have learnt to accept that astrologers won't listen to informed debate and hence do not wish to see its merit.

Q: How do you look upon astrologers today?

A: Astrologers truly believe in what they are doing. They are generally warm and caring, and have a positive outlook on life. Such virtues are clearly valuable in today's dehumanised society.

Q: What impact do you think the research will have?

A: None whatsoever. Astrology is not a science but a belief system. Believers are not open to evidence that contradicts their beliefs. Astrology will continue to be popular with clients as long as astrologers are good people. Astrology itself does not come into it.

>From www.astrology-and-science.com Click here to return to home page

October 26, 2006

Dear Paulo,

I am not clear as to what do you want to say by sending out this

long mail. I am sure many more are as confused as I am.

Regards,

Krishna

--- paulo mendes <woodwater1000 (AT) clix (DOT) pt> wrote:

> General comments including suggestions for research

>

> Indian reader: The information you give leaves the reader

> unclear about why astrology is false. Empirical evidence is

> not enough to counter the positive experiences of astrologers

> and their clients. You need to expose the absurdities of

> astrology. Reply: These absurdities such as its internal

> conflicts have already been well discussed on this website.

> But we must be cautious -- remember the folly of arguing that

> no research was needed to prove the absurdity of stones

> falling from the sky, of continents moving, of matter being

> mostly empty space, and of man flying by his own muscle power.

> Furthermore, critics have been exposing the absurdities of

> astrology since Roman times but to no avail. Astrology may or

> may not be a crutch, but hearts are not won by kicking away

> crutches.

>

> UK reader: I suggest testing the brain states of people with a

> high incidence of quintile and septile aspects. According to

> the published findings, such people should find it easier to

> enter such states than others without the aspects. Reply: The

> findings are based on a sample of N=14, which hardly justifies

> research that, for those who are not neuropsychologists, would

> be impractical anyway. Furthermore a negative result would be

> immediately discredited by astrologers as yet another example

> of failing to consider the whole chart.

>

> American reader: Recent studies have found a strong effect of

> month-of-birth on human lifespan. Reply: The same was found by

> Huntington in 1928. In any case astrology is not needed to

> explain the effect.

>

> Australian reader: I would rather find broad evidence for

> astrology before I dissect its workings. In your research have

> you seen Leos that act like Leos? Reply: Yes. We have also

> seen Leos that act like Scorpios, Librans, etc. Here the broad

> evidence is no evidence at all.

>

> Australian reader: After enrolling in a Kepler course I was

> given an article that explained why astrology is not currently

> a science but will be in the future, and how we don't know why

> it works, it just does. But your website shows how astrology

> will never be a science, which has saved me much time and

> money. Do you see astrology as helpful or harmful to society?

> Reply: It can be both. Astrology can be helpful because it

> indirectly puts clients in touch with someone they can talk

> to. It can also be harmful if clients have to believe in

> untruths. In 1995 a survey of British schoolchildren aged

> 14-15 found that most saw astrology as harmless fun;

> nevertheless more than one-third actually believed in it, and

> a minority had been led to traumatic occult practices. In 1966

> in Japan the annual birth rate dropped by 25 percent due to an

> extra half million abortions; it was the year of the

> fire-horse, which is extremely unpropritious for girls. In

> these cases astrology was anything but harmless fun.

>

> UK reader: People at the recent AA conference in York had the

> feeling that you had an agenda. Some saw you as having a fixed

> view which says there is no hope for astrology, so you tend to

> ignore things that show astrology working. Reply: This seems

> like wishful thinking to offset a lack of evidence, for such a

> view does not appear on this website. But see next.

>

> UK reader: I have read through your Case For and Against

> Astrology. It does put the Case For, but the Case Against

> seems too inflated for anyone to accept the arguments as a

> whole. Reply: Perhaps there are simply more aguments against

> than for. Readers are welcome to suggest arguments for

> astrology not already covered on this website. (That was in

> August 2003. So far no suggestions have arrived.)

>

> American reader: You do not examine business astrology. Reply:

> Yes, because as explained under 9.7 in the Phillipson

> interview, it does not allow clear conclusions. It has

> in-built practitioners and therefore in-built self-fulfilling

> prophecies. Thus if it worked, and everyone followed it, it

> would no longer confer an advantage and would therefore stop

> working. Two articles on business astrology are online in the

> link to the business astrologers website.

>

> Argentinian reader: I have doctoral degrees in medicine and

> psychology and have been in professional practice for 26

> years. Astrology is obviously not a science. Its persistence

> is due to the deep psychological needs of ordinary people that

> science is obviously not meeting. It uses astronomical

> concepts as a tool to help people, that is all. But to help

> people an astrologer must be in contact with the client, so

> studies that analyse its scientific viability a la Gauquelin

> are just rubbish. It is not the purpose of astrology to

> satisfy scientists, but to satisfy the needs of people, so the

> debate you are pursuing is a complete waste of time. You are

> trying to establish a new faith where only science is seen as

> a valid way of approaching the world. Reply: Actually quite

> the opposite, for example see Phillipson interview of

> researchers (including the summary in section 20) under Doing

> Scientific Research, Astrology my passion and Optimum place

> for astrology under Applied Astrology, and Site philosophy

> under Adroit Utilities, where we express views similar to your

> own.

>

> Indian reader: You should be able to find arguments against

> astrology without referring to experimental results. Thus

> after many years of reading astrology books and forecasts, I

> have noted how sun sign forecasts rarely agree when in fact

> they ought to agree, and how readings have to be general if

> they are to fit. Also if astrology is to explain differences

> between time twins, and how thousands of people can die

> together in a mass disaster, it would have to be so sensitive

> to microscopic differences in birth time that no recorded

> birth time would be good enough. So astrology is not useful, a

> point readily arrived at logically without appeal to empirical

> tests. Reply: There are many such arguments, but inconsistency

> does not necessarily mean everything is in error, any more

> than an inconsistent pizza recipe means that pizzas cannot

> exist. Empirical tests are still needed if we are to be sure.

>

> American reader: In response to your exchange with Denis

> Elwell, I suggest you stop badgering astrologers into

> predicting the future and stop repeating the mantra that

> astrologers cannot determine which chart belongs to X. Instead

> you should for once consider a fair test of the validity of

> astrological principles and techniques. For example a team of

> astrologers could read a chart using a technique agreed in

> advance. The chart would be of a person or event picked by a

> neutral party. The reading would then be judged by neutral

> parties against nationally accepted standards specified in

> advance such as those taught by Kepler College. Reply: Nowhere

> do we badger astrologers into predicting the future. It seems

> you may have confused this with our concern to avoid

> after-the-event selection of chart factors, which of course

> has nothing to do with predicting the future. Furthermore the

> inability of astrologers to determine which chart belongs to X

> remains a serious problem. Your suggested test consists of

> comparing the reading by one technique (the one agreed to in

> advance) with the reading by another technique (the one taught

> by Kepler College). This is thus a test of agreement, not a

> test of validity. But no useful conclusions about validity can

> be drawn from a test of agreement, in the same way that "yes,

> we agree that the earth is flat" says nothing about whether

> the earth is really flat. Furthermore, 28 tests of agreement

> have already been made, many by astrologers, with negative

> results, see Case for and against astrology under Adroit

> Utilities. What is needed is a new type of test, not an old

> type of test. Back to you. (That was in November 2001. We have

> waited four years for a response but so far nothing has

> arrived.)

>

> Comments to which reasoning artifacts are relevant

>

> American reader: I have had astrological readings that were

> precise, specific, on-target, and highly persuasive. That so

> many well-informed people are willing to take astrology

> seriously suggests that science has real problems. It seems

> driven not by a quest for truth but by a desire to suppress a

> particular worldview. Reply: Persuasive readings are the

> everyday experience of astrologers, which is why they say

> astrology works. But an evaluation based on experience is what

> psychologists call personal validation and is highly suspect

> because it encourages the cognitive illusions (reasoning

> artifacts) that foster false beliefs. Until astrologers become

> aware of this, astrology is reduced to clouds in which

> astrologers see faces and pronounce it miraculous. There is

> nothing here to suggest that science has problems. Nobody is

> going to take such an astrology seriously as a world-view,

> although they may well take it seriously as a social

> phenomenon. If, like astrologers, you find this argument

> unconvincing, the next three paragraphs may be painful.

>

> The point is, after a brief practice in using these cognitive

> illusions, any astute person can deliver readings that are

> precise, specific, on-target, and highly persuasive (see

> Michael Shermer, Psychic for a Day or How I Learned Tarot

> Cards, Palm Reading, Astrology and Mediumship in 24 hours,

> Skeptic 10(1), 48-55, 2003). Shermer is no ordinary fake

> psychic. He is Director of the Skeptic Society and author of

> many skeptic books. He agreed to perform live before a TV

> audience even though this allowed him only 24 hours of

> practice in cognitive illusions and the five techniques (the

> fifth was psychic reading).

>

> He was given one subject for each technique, all women unknown

> to him, with no prior contact before the reading. For the

> astrology subject he used a birth chart downloaded at random

> from the Internet (it was wrong by 21.3 years and he hadn't a

> clue what it meant). Yet his unknowing subjects rated his

> readings as accurately summarising their life and personality.

> One subject who had been visiting psychics for ten years rated

> it as the best single reading she had ever had.

>

> Shermer concludes: "There is not a shred of evidence that any

> of this [reading by astrology, palmistry, etc] is real, and

> the fact that I could do it reasonably well with only one day

> of preparation shows how vulnerable people are to these very

> effective nostrums. I can only imagine what I could do with

> considerable experience. Give me six hours a day of practice

> for a couple of weeks and I have no doubt that I could easily

> host a successful syndicated television series and increase my

> current bank balance by several orders of magnitude. There --

> if not for the grace of evolved moral sentiments and

> guilt-laden scruples -- go I. I cannot do this for one simple

> reason: it is wrong." (p.55)

>

=== message truncated ===

Regards,

Krishna

http://astrokrishna.blogspot.com

October 26, 2006

Hi

that is the response by believers to the research by the scientists

paulo

-

Krishnamurthy Seetharama

vedic astrology

Thursday, October 26, 2006 4:28 AM

Re: [vedic astrology] Some comments about the research on astrologyif you want