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Many people know what their signs are, but where did the Astrology? And, after all, is it a kind of science? THE series explaining, Netflix, addresses the theme in one of its chapters of the first season and tells how it came about and why the idea that our life can be governed by the alignment of stars and planets has become so present. 3m5332
Usually, we only know our sun sign – or just “sign”. With this information, the most common experience with astrology ends up being checking, daily, the horoscope in the newspapers.
However, they are not very specific. After all, they are written for all people in a generalized and superficial way. In Western astrology, we have a way of describing our entire personality. To deepen knowledge on the subject and understand more about signs, it is essential to make a birth chart.
What is a birth chart? 2g2o24
According to astrologer Chani Nicholas, in an interview for explaining, Netflix, the birth chart is the graphic representation of the sky at the exact moment of your birth. To assemble it, some calculations are needed based on the date, time and place you were born. The data must be accurate because a few minutes can significantly change the overall map setup.
The birth chart is divided into 12 houses, which include the position of the planets – which determines what each area of your life will be like. When analyzing the birth chart, the sun sign is the most important. Astrological Houses are variable chart divisions that represent our areas of experience in life. Technically, they are imaginary lines that start from the Earth and cut the sky in twelve stripes and indicate the characteristics of each person.
But before analyzing why we love astrology so much today, let's break it down.
How did astrology come about? 6cq1t
When observing the sky, our ancestors were fascinated by the stars that shone every night. They realized that the movements were predictable and had effects on seasons, tides and harvests, for example. It made sense to think that these stars also influenced aspects of our lives, such as personality and the way we act in certain situations.
The idea of 12 zodiac signs dates back more than 2000 years to ancient Babylon. They noticed that there were about 12 new moons over the course of a year, so they divided the sun's path into 12, each part marked by a constellation.
Mapping symbols on the stars, like a bull or a scorpion, helped them keep track over the years. This is how they created the sun sign: the constellation in which the Sun was positioned at the time you were born.
In the search for the emergence of astrology, we can't let Claudius Ptolemy beside. In Egypt, during the 2nd century AD, he wrote one of the most important books on astronomy and was the first to accurately map the speed and rotation of the planets around the Earth.
Ptolemy's feat gained popularity in the West. The idea just didn't catch on in China, where they already had their own zodiac made thousands of years ago based on the year of birth.
In the 16th century, European royalty used to rely on their own astrologers to inform them about the stars and the position of the stars in the sky, as is the case with Queen Elizabeth I, who had her own astrologer, John Dee.
At this time, two ideas began to radicalize the world and the role of astrology in it.
Throughout history, we have assumed to be the center of the universe, as Ptolemy expressed it in the theory that the Earth would be the center of the system in which we live.
Until scientists like Galileo Galilei helped establish that we actually orbit the sun; he who is the center of our solar system.
Already in the 17th century there were scientific discoveries such as gravity, the spectrum of light and the development of new telescopes that can reach new moons that humanity did not even know existed until then.
With this advance, the concept of truth and untruth began to be established; if it wasn't possible to prove it by science, it wasn't true.
Thereby, astrology and astronomy were separated, even though they had been studied together for thousands of years before the 17th century. It went unmentioned for years and years, until the appearance of columns of astrology.
What is astrology as we know it today? 3q4v2w
In 1930, a London newspaper published a text by the astrologer RH Naylor to celebrate the birth of Princess Margareth. Based on the stars, Naylor “predicted” that when Margareth turned 7, very important events would happen to the royal family.
And then, just before Margareth turned 7, her uncle abdicated the throne to her father. This made her older sister Elizabeth next in line to the throne.
This arrangement led Naylor to win a column in the newspaper. Only, instead of writing about royalty, he started writing horoscopes for everyone in the kingdom, based on their sun signs. The fashion took hold and other publications began to publish a column daily on the signs and predictions for each one.
In this period, another new trend also emerged that made astrology popular: psychoanalysis. One of the creators of some concepts in the study of the psyche, Carl Jung, popularized the idea of different types of personalities and inspired several tests that increased people's self-awareness.
Until, in the late 60s, we entered an era that further popularized astrology. In the songs we heard several mentions of signs, as in No Matter What It Means You Are ("It doesn't matter what sign you are", in free translation), by Diana Ross and The Supremes.
But nobody popularized the astrology at that time in the same way as Linda Goodman, who published his book Sun Signs: How to Really Know Your Husband, Wife, Lover, Child, Boss, Employee or Yourself Through Astrology.
Linda Goodman's book earned the honor of being the first astrology bestseller in the world. New York Times. In total, the publication sold over 30 million copies and was translated into 15 different languages.
Goodman promised to help recognize and identify someone's dreams, hopes, and true personalities based on their Sun sign alone. She said the signs could literally change people's lives.
In the United States, during the 80s, there were even hotlines for astrologers who were willing to give tips and advice.
But, after all, why do we like astrology? 4p3d3p
Many famous scientists criticize a astrology, like Carl Sagan. Despite this, many people are fans of this theory that promises to reveal so much .
An attempt to answer this question of why we like astrology can be seen during one of the biggest conferences in astrology. astrology of the world, exhibited by the series explaining, astrologer Nadiya Shah said that maybe astrology doesn't fit into the modern concept of science, but that doesn't mean it can't add a lot to people's lives.
Science has even proven that people who believe in astrology can improve their confidence based on their horoscope. In this way, we observe a placebo effect; that is, something need not be real, as long as its effect is real.
Stuart Vyse, a professor of psychology at several American universities and author of important essays on beliefs, believes that the reason people identify so much with horoscopes is because they really want to. This effect, called Barnum, suggests that everyone can see themselves in any given horoscope. Descriptions in horoscopes tend to be very ambiguous and kind of always positive after all.
Because of this, many astrologers have come to offer more detailed and larger horoscopes than the paragraph featured in newspaper columns. With that, the astrology became popular again with the wave of these publications on the internet.
Astrologer Sam Reynolds also opines in the series as to why we are drawn to astrology. He believes that astrology is a channel through which we seek to get closer to the divine, be it God, various gods or any other understanding people have of divinity.
Liked? You can watch the episode of explaining, Netflix, on which this text was based, clicking here (Must subscribe to service streaming).
