Astrology - An Antidote to Uncertainity

Disclaimer: I am writing this for a friend - and despite presenting arguments from both sides - my personal take is - I would rather have space for magic in my life than rationalize everything to a drab. We are all pretty equal in how infinitely ignorant we are - why pretend that rationality is an intellectually superior position.

Let's start with the Barnum Effect as described by Encyclopedia Britannica.

Barnum Effect, in psychology, the phenomenon that occurs when individuals believe that personality descriptions apply specifically to them (more so than to other people), despite the fact that the description is actually filled with information that applies to everyone. The effect means that people are gullible because they think the information is about them only when in fact the information is generic. The Barnum Effect came from the phrase often attributed (perhaps falsely) to showman P. T. Barnum that a “sucker” is born every minute. Psychics, horoscopes, magicians, palm readers, and crystal ball gazersmake use of the Barnum Effect when they convince people that their description of them is highly special and unique and could never apply to anyone else.

Now I don't think people should be categorized as suckers - they should not be categorized at all, but that's another essay. There are several studies which completely deride astrology and call it pseudoscience. I don't want to belabor this point - as it is pretty obvious that rationality doesn't apply to astrology.

That begs the question - are we rational beings? We are not. We are irrational beings who love to post rationalize our irrational choices. Advertising works on this key principle - among many others. That's why we pay $150 for Lululemon Joggers - not because it is rationally better, it just appeals more to our emotional irrational idea of who we are and what we deserve.

If we are inherently irrational beings - then does rationality work as a tool to understand this world? Especially the world we have been thrusted into since March 2020. We went from having seeming control over our lives and schedules to none at all in a span of a 2 weeks. We were thrusted into an era of ever increasing uncertainty - with every passing month. When faced with uncertainty this magnanimous - one which our finite framing of the work absolutely cannot grasp - what do we hold on to for solace? Magical Thinking.

Because the antithesis to Magical Thinking is Rational Extrapolating - the latter leads to a pretty bleak outcome - it did in April of 2020, when all the news articles kept talking about the impossibility of a vaccine coming out in less than 5 years, if not more. Little did we know that we will have a working vaccine in less than a year - the fastest in human history by a huge margin.

Now you must be wondering? Well that is Science. Yes sure it is - but what do we before Science intervenes in all of the issues that face the world today from the Climate Emergency to Divisive Societies to Dwindling Birth Rates? Do we sit tight and accept our fate as one of leading towards doom - or do we believe in a world - albeit irrationally - where each of these gets solved by a magical intervention of a discovery.

And if Astrology provides an individual the tools to metaphorize their highly uncertain lives, helps them with a magical intervention which leads them to discover a path through all the chaos - then why should we stop? If Astrology is the spiritual equivalent of a placebo for our souls, then why not take it.

We are meaning making and meaning seeking creatures. A lot of our current preoccupations - from obsessing over material pursuits to our physical appearances to rigid ideas about identities stem from a deep desire to mean something and belong to a tribe. If Astrology provides us with the tools to step out of the superficiality of aforementioned ways of seeking meaning - and rather present us with a much gentler and yes esoteric framing of this world, ground us in a pseudoscientific and yet comforting understanding of who we are - give us a language to describe our idiosyncratic selves and describe our tribe, no how matter how made up and generic and then go out in the world to be kinder, more compassionate - and intentional, then so be it.

Astrology is as irrational a tool as buying a 3 bedroom house with a backyard in the suburbs. One helps you fit into a story you want to tell yourself, the other helps you fit into a story you have been told by society to believe in. Which one would you rather pick?