Can Someone Guide Me As To How To Find A Good Astrologer?

[modest]

I think not. There are always at least two variables that need to be a part of any data point. Some publicly observable, physical, measurable Independent variable and some publicly observable, physical, measurable dependent variable (the observed "caused" result).

 

Every data point needs to be a caused result to be scientific? And, just think, not long ago you were advocating a “what would happen if...” process of science ;)

 

Astrology does give "caused results". According to astrology, human behavior is dependent on astronomical variables. It is no different, in that respect, from Newton's law of gravity which has mass giving the caused result of gravitational attraction. Neither Newton's law nor astrology explain why the one causes the other.

 

Ignoring for a moment the whole issue of causality, the Astrologer and other pseudo-sciences might do well on the Independent variable side, but they are characterized as a group, as using dependent "measures" lacking in either Validity and/or Reliability.

 

Of course, astrology may indeed be lacking in validity and reliability (even Validity and Reliability, I suppose). But, like I was saying before, this is not a reason, believe it or not, to call astrology unscientific. Newton's law of gravity, again, has no validity or reliability in predicting or explaining the precession of Mercury. This makes neither the law of gravity nor data concerning Mercury's orbit unscientific.

 

Newton's law of gravity is scientific because it is, among other things, falsifiable. Astrology is unscientific because it is not falsifiable. Neither is 'true' or 'valid', but one of them is science. A system which produces falsified results is not necessarily an unscientific system.

 

Perhaps I should back up and explain what I mean by that (or, perhaps better put, what I understand the scientific method would mean by that).

 

Take an example of a law of science: the second law of thermodynamics. It can be stated most simply as "a perpetual motion machine cannot exist". This statement, and this law of nature, is falsifiable. To falsify it all one needs do is find or make a perpetual motion machine. This would prove the second law of thermodynamics wrong. It therefore satisfies the criterion of falsifiability meaning it can be scientific if it satisfies the other criteria of the scientific method.

 

A similar such example of astrology... I'll make one up because I'm not familiar with any astrological system. Let's say... "people born in the month during which Venus transits will be blessed by Venus (during that month) with creativity and social graces". It could be that this idea is based on a wealth of empirical data. Perhaps many people in the past have observed the very thing which I've just stated. If so, it is an empirical conclusion and an example of the inductive method. It is not, however, science—because, it is not falsifiable.

 

How, after all, would you falsify this astrological conclusion? Even if you found a person, or a group of people, born in the month of the transit who did not feel particularly creative or socially inclined, the astrologer could always say "yes, but if not for the transit of the Venusian goddess, you would be even less creative and socially ingratiated this month". So, it cannot be falsified—most specifically, because it is not intended to be falsified.

 

That is the reason we can reject astrology, as a whole, as unscientific. It isn't that astrology's accuracy or methodology are questionable. I could give many examples where science has been less than accurate with quite poor methodology. Those would be examples of bad science as opposed to non-science or pseudo-science.

 

Well, that seems to put me in the unenviable position of humbly suggesting that they missed something directly under their noses. ;) The definition of Science should include the quality of measurements of both types of variables.

 

Again, astrology has both types of variables which you've described. It uses the inductive method to predict or explain one set of variables (human behavior) given the observation of another set (the position of the planets and stars and whatnot).

 

The problem with verificationism as a demarcation of science is the problem of induction. You can't really verify a theory via induction... so it would of course be a mistake to reject systems of astrology as unscientific on the grounds that they are not verified systems.

 

The criteria of falsifiability was introduced exactly so that we could reject things like astrology as unscientific. That was the very reason it was introduced. It only makes sense to reject astrology for that reason now.

 

~modest

[C1ay]

Excuse my skepticism, but I doubt that there is such a thing as a "good" astrologer.

 

I'll second that. It looks more like a good oxymoron to me...

[Ken]

Every data point needs to be a caused result to be scientific? And, just think, not long ago you were advocating a “what would happen if...” process of science ;)

 

Hmm.. Not advocating so much as including it as one part of the process.

 

 

 

Astrology does give "caused results". According to astrology, human behavior is dependent on astronomical variables. It is no different, in that respect, from Newton's law of gravity which has mass giving the caused result of gravitational attraction. Neither Newton's law nor astrology explain why the one causes the other.

 

I intentionally put "caused results" in quotation marks to suggest that it wasn't meant as precise definition. I could have said something along the lines that "the dependent variable is defined as a variable whose value changes as the independent variable changes, in a consistent manner". This would allow for either functional relationships or simple correlations that are essentially random coincidences.

 

 

 

Of course, astrology may indeed be lacking in validity and reliability (even Validity and Reliability, I suppose). But, like I was saying before, this is not a reason, believe it or not, to call astrology unscientific. Newton's law of gravity, again, has no validity or reliability in predicting or explaining the precession of Mercury. This makes neither the law of gravity nor data concerning Mercury's orbit unscientific.

 

Newton's law of gravity is scientific because it is, among other things, falsifiable. Astrology is unscientific because it is not falsifiable. Neither is 'true' or 'valid', but one of them is science. A system which produces falsified results is not necessarily an unscientific system.

 

Perhaps I should back up and explain what I mean by that (or, perhaps better put, what I understand the scientific method would mean by that).

 

Take an example of a law of science: the second law of thermodynamics. It can be stated most simply as "a perpetual motion machine cannot exist". This statement, and this law of nature, is falsifiable. To falsify it all one needs do is find or make a perpetual motion machine. This would prove the second law of thermodynamics wrong. It therefore satisfies the criterion of falsifiability meaning it can be scientific if it satisfies the other criteria of the scientific method.

 

A similar such example of astrology... I'll make one up because I'm not familiar with any astrological system. Let's say... "people born in the month during which Venus transits will be blessed by Venus (during that month) with creativity and social graces". It could be that this idea is based on a wealth of empirical data. Perhaps many people in the past have observed the very thing which I've just stated. If so, it is an empirical conclusion and an example of the inductive method. It is not, however, science—because, it is not falsifiable.

 

How, after all, would you falsify this astrological conclusion? Even if you found a person, or a group of people, born in the month of the transit who did not feel particularly creative or socially inclined, the astrologer could always say "yes, but if not for the transit of the Venusian goddess, you would be even less creative and socially ingratiated this month". So, it cannot be falsified—most specifically, because it is not intended to be falsified.

 

That is the reason we can reject astrology, as a whole, as unscientific. It isn't that astrology's accuracy or methodology are questionable. I could give many examples where science has been less than accurate with quite poor methodology. Those would be examples of bad science as opposed to non-science or pseudo-science.

 

A very nice description. I agree with everything except perhaps losing sight, in the last two sentences, that Science is self-correcting because it depends upon incorporating new data, revising theories based on that data, and then subjecting the predictions from theories to specific theory-testing hypotheses.

 

 

Again, astrology has both types of variables which you've described. It uses the inductive method to predict or explain one set of variables (human behavior) given the observation of another set (the position of the planets and stars and whatnot).

 

The problem with verificationism as a demarcation of science is the problem of induction. You can't really verify a theory via induction... so it would of course be a mistake to reject systems of astrology as unscientific on the grounds that they are not verified systems.

 

From a practical perspective I would argue that Astrology does not meet any reasonable criteria for measuring dependent variables. Probably the greatest contribution of the Vienna Circle and the Logical Positivists is the Operational Definition. The "measured" data from Astrology is a hodgepodge of mixed information, which appears to me as simply picking "observations" that support the theory and ignoring any that don't. Data collection is unsystematic, anecdotal, etc.

 

I find it both fascinating and, for me, educational to see how our different perspectives lead to a focus on somewhat different issues. You come at this from the perspective of Philosophy, and I think you have a better grasp of that approach. I come at it from the perspective of the practice of research and a rather long experience in teaching students the process. My thoughts about this are formed by research experience and by my more limited reading and understanding of the current philosophical arguments.

 

 

The criteria of falsifiability was introduced exactly so that we could reject things like astrology as unscientific. That was the very reason it was introduced. It only makes sense to reject astrology for that reason now.

 

I'll have to go back and re-read some of your posts here. I thought you rejected falsifiability as a criterion when it came up earlier - but perhaps I misunderstood. I certainly agree that Astrology lacks it and can be rejected solely on that issue.

[modest]

Hmm.. Not advocating so much as including it as one part of the process.

 

It may be part of the process and it may not, depending on what is done with it. For this reason, I do not find it all too useful as a means of demarcation.

 

A very nice description. I agree with everything except perhaps losing sight, in the last two sentences, that Science is self-correcting because it depends upon incorporating new data, revising theories based on that data, and then subjecting the predictions from theories to specific theory-testing hypotheses.

 

I don't see how that matters. Newton's law of gravity is still science whether or not Einstein's general relativity improved upon it. Newton was still 'doing science' either way. Astrology can also, in principle, improve upon itself with the addition of new information, so I again don't find a useful distinction or inference.

 

From a practical perspective I would argue that Astrology does not meet any reasonable criteria for measuring dependent variables.

 

It can. And, I would argue that it occasionally, if not often, has.

 

Astrology is, I think, not the poison pill that others here have made it out to be for the reasons that have been given. If you look at the discipline without bias... I mean... a couple of examples: Chinese astrologers were successfully predicting solar eclipses more than 2,000 years ago. There is no way to overstate how freaking insane that is. You could put a handful of modern astronomers on an island, give them a pencil, some paper, a sextant, and a few years to work with, and ask them to predict the next time the sun will be eclipsed on the island and I very seriously doubt they could accomplish the task. Yet, Chinese astrologers were doing this some 2,000 years ago. Their means and methods of research were clearly not that bad.

 

Likewise, in terms of measuring and understanding human behavior... there probably were no better ancient and medieval examples of experts in this field. Look, for example, at Nostradamus. He, like other astrologers, had to be experts in human behavior—to understand how famine precedes war—how jealousy, pride, and power are all related—how human decisions and human relations were cycles to be repeated. Astrologers were the anthropologists of their day. They had to be in order to do their job.

 

They did honestly measure and understand these things very well.

 

Probably no one in this thread is going to recognize what an enormously ingenious accomplishment this all was. Yet, something was wrong with their method. Put it this way: there was one thing different between what Newton did and what the astrologers of his day did. They both used the inductive method. They both used extremely precise and empirical measurements and were both very gifted in recognizing patterns in those measurements. They both tried to explain the patterns and they both made predictions based on them. But, what Newton did was science and what the astrologers did was pseudo-science. Why?

 

I would suggest that the answer is *not* that astrologers were bad at measuring and understanding 'dependent variables'. I would also suggest that the answer cannot be that astrologers were simply mistaken in their premise that the heavens influence humanity. Many premises of scientific theories have turned out mistaken. We really aren't in a position to reject them as unscientific on that basis.

 

So, yes, I clearly think the answer is falsifiability. Astrology structured itself over the years to be unfalsifiable. The reason they did this was no doubt because if their predictions ever were falsified, the astrologer making the prediction would probably be killed—or, at least, put out of a job. But, the reasons are not important. The fact is: astrology structured itself further and further from falsifiability. Science structured itself in the opposite direction. To me it is clear, this is the distinction—the demarcation—between the two systems.

 

Probably the greatest contribution of the Vienna Circle and the Logical Positivists is the Operational Definition. The "measured" data from Astrology is a hodgepodge of mixed information, which appears to me as simply picking "observations" that support the theory and ignoring any that don't. Data collection is unsystematic, anecdotal, etc.

 

Yes, the positivists were quite right in advocating good, and unbiased, empiricism.

 

I find it both fascinating and, for me, educational to see how our different perspectives lead to a focus on somewhat different issues. You come at this from the perspective of Philosophy, and I think you have a better grasp of that approach. I come at it from the perspective of the practice of research and a rather long experience in teaching students the process. My thoughts about this are formed by research experience and by my more limited reading and understanding of the current philosophical arguments.

 

No doubt For me as well—from the other side of the coin, I should say.

 

I'll have to go back and re-read some of your posts here. I thought you rejected falsifiability as a criterion when it came up earlier - but perhaps I misunderstood.

 

I did reject falsifiability as "necessary for any useful investigation" (and, I'd most certainly stand by that). But, no, I certainly would not reject it as a requirement of science. My point has always been that astrology should be rejected on that basis. In my first post I probably should have been more clear rather than letting Popper and Wiki talk for me.

 

~modest

[HydrogenBond]

Astrology was around before the definition of the method of science was defined. It did not develop with the modern definition in mind since there is a time barrier. That does not mean the intent of those in the field, were not to do their best, within the context of the state of the art within its day.

 

An analogy is like using the modern definition of Pluto, not being a planet. Let us apply this newbie definition to all the science of Pluto when it was thought to be a planet. Based on the new definition, was there a lot of pseudo-science going on, using the erroneous premise that Pluto was a planet? This judgement would be based on a subjective convention.

 

What is interesting, in Greek mythology, Pluto was the ruler of the underworld or Hades. By making Pluto less than a planet, science was downgrading the power of Hades. Pluto was discovered in 1930, when Hitler was moving up the company ladder. Science could have named it anything, but Pluto may have been unconsciously chosen, due to the finger in the wind, before the second world war, when hell would break loose. In astrology, Pluto is a symbol of death and regeneration, which sort of coordinated with the WWII and after. Now death, Hades and regeneration is less, because of the new naming convention chosen by science. It could have been left alone, but unconsciously there appeared to be a needed to downgrade Pluto and hades. I am not sure if Astrology accepts the new science convention.

[modest]

Astrology was around before the definition of the method of science was defined. It did not develop with the modern definition in mind since there is a time barrier. That does not mean the intent of those in the field, were not to do their best, within the context of the state of the art within its day.

 

Yes. Though their method was flawed, I'm sure at least some had the intent of doing their best.

 

Based on the new definition, was there a lot of pseudo-science going on, using the erroneous premise that Pluto was a planet?

 

No. Categorizing Pluto one way or the other does not necessitate doing pseudo-science.

 

What is interesting, in Greek mythology, Pluto was the ruler of the underworld or Hades. By making Pluto less than a planet, science was downgrading the power of Hades.

 

Very metaphorically true. I'm quite sure this had absolutely no bearing on Astronomers' decision to reclassify Pluto.

 

Pluto was discovered in 1930, when Hitler was moving up the company ladder. Science could have named it anything, but Pluto may have been unconsciously chosen, due to the finger in the wind, before the second world war, when hell would break loose.

 

No. More reasonable—yet still mistaken—would be that the name "Pluto" was chosen because it was discovered toward the beginning of the great depression where hell metaphorically came to earth.

 

Regardless, the name was actually chosen because the name Pluto seemed "appropriate for such a presumably dark and cold world" the planet would surely be (as wikipedia puts it).

 

I am not sure if Astrology accepts the new science convention.

 

The actual new convention to science is falsifiability. Regardless of how astrologers view Pluto, the real problem is that Astrology rejects the convention of falsifiability. In this, it is a very flawed and unscientific system.

 

~modest