“The few who knew what might be learned, foolish enough to put their whole heart on show, and reveal their feelings to the crowd below, mankind has always crucified and burned.” —Faust tells Wagner in Scene I: Night
Zodiac Bias
Up until the 16th century, teachers, scientists and astronomers were regularly burned at the stake for debunking the grandiose idea that the earth was the center of the universe. Our civilizations have always been held back by fearful minds that are attached to false beliefs about the earth being flat, geocentrism or mind hijacking demons. Today, we still have news outlets publishing horoscopes and an increasing number of astrology apps, digital almanacs, and freelance constellation analysts. This reignition of zodiac interest comes at a surprise, given the advancements of science in astrophysics and space exploration. At present, children in school have a more sophisticated understanding of planetary systems than temple priests with their lofty claims of divine cosmic awareness.
“…There was a whole chain of separate departments dealing with proletarian literature, music, drama, and entertainment generally. Here were produced rubbishy newspapers containing almost nothing except sport, crime and astrology…” —George Orwell, 1984
Early astronomers honed their brains’ built-in pattern recognition engine, to map imaginary outlines inspired by what surrounded them in the natural world. In Ancient Greek, ‘zodiac’ literally means ‘circle of little animals’. One of the earliest constellations was the Ursa Major (also known as the Great Bear), which was mentioned in the Old Testament and Homer’s Iliad—further solidifying the mythologized bear in ancient man’s psyche. Animal representations of stars were discovered in cave paintings around 17,000 years ago (UNESCO) and are a recurring theme in archaic art. The 12 (actually 13) constellations of the zodiac were universally used by Ancient Egyptian, Chinese and Mesopotamian cultures—and are still widely (falsely) used today. In the past, tracking the heavenly bodies was a manual labor intensive endeavor. To trailblazing astronomers at the time, the zodiac symbols in the night sky served as a celestial coordinate system to keep track of the Earth’s rotation axis.
News papers with prepaid bias columns and outdated stock prices also act as daily fortune tellers, using crude umbrella terms. Surprisingly those rushing to read their horoscopes, focus more on their personal predictions for the day instead of what is actually going on in the world or what might be useful in their lives. It’s sad to observe confused people attributing their success or failure to the random scattering of stars in the information age. Since Babylon, humans gave meaning to random star clusters called constellations; the random collection of stars were linked together like a kids connect the dots book—but by prehistoric astronomers in the sky. Imagination and myth collided and came to symbolize ancient cultures and their passed down beliefs systems. If we connect the stars along the same lines today—with our current pop cultural and values—Aries would be an alligator Berkin; Leo would be LeBron, the god of halo dunks; and Sagittarius would be the Model S, in undefined orbit, much like our undefined space policy agendas.
We might as well include emoji constellations to reflect the values of the present generation too. Star sign conversations as ice breakers and openers are harmless but when people start attributing everything in their life path to how Mercury is in retrograde, we start slipping into delusional thought. Mythical astrology is interesting and beautiful through a historic and artistic looking-glass but shouldn’t be taken literally as predetermined personality prejudice or even at face value. Avid followers of astrology should consider following Nature Astronomy instead—lest they suffer more reputational (or mental) damage.
Astrology: Is it scientific?
In some ways, astrology may seem scientific. It uses scientific knowledge about heavenly bodies, as well as scientific sounding tools, like star charts. Some people use astrology to generate expectations about future events and people’s personalities, much as scientific ideas generate expectations. And some claim that astrology is supported by evidence — the experiences of people who feel that astrology has worked for them. But even with these trappings of science, is astrology really a scientific way to answer questions?Involves the scientific community?
Sharing one’s findings and critically evaluating the results of others are not integral parts of practicing astrology. An astrologer can go his or her entire career and not present findings at a scientific meeting or publish a single article. When astrologers do publish, these articles are not usually peer-reviewed or published in places where they will be critically scrutinized by the scientific community.Researchers behave scientifically?
Scientists don’t wait for others to do the research to support or contradict the ideas they propose. Instead, they strive to test their ideas, try to come up with counterarguments and alternative hypotheses, and ultimately, give up ideas when warranted by the evidence. Astrologers, on the other hand, do not seem to rigorously examine the astrological ideas they accept. As reflected by the minimal level of research in the field, they rarely try to test their arguments in fair ways. In addition, the astrological community largely ignores evidence that contradicts its ideas. (Source: UC Berkeley)
People are a product of the environment and if that environment is full of snake oil salesmen and card readers (tarot, not credit) then that environment is taking civilization backwards into the dark ages—not forward. Being too polite and refraining from nipping bullshit in the bud allows confused ideas to spread, especially if the source is under the misconception that they will not be questioned or (even worse) think they have superior influence. A great gut-check (BS repellent) would be to have a child in the conversation loop. Children are naturally intelligent and today have much more access, and think in 11D compared to the adult population. A curious child will always put knowledge claimers on the spot, by asking obvious and necessary questions; that insecure adults are too embarrassed to ask themselves. A conversation with today’s intelligent children is more interesting, honest, free from hidden intentions—and from what I’ve recently discovered—more logical than conversations I’ve had with adults in positions of perceived power and influence. In learning environments, be careful what you think and be aware of who plants it there. Always ask your inner-child if he/she agrees with what your adult self is thinking and doing. Indoctrination doesn't only come in the form of misguided religious rhetoric but also corporate reframing and cult/subgroup mental isolation.
“Look up at the stars and not down at your feet. Try to make sense of what you see, and wonder about what makes the universe exist. Be curious.” —Stephen Hawking
Lunar Neuroscience
Instead of trusting star sign charlatans, trust your own body and its built-in biological clocks. Living with the natural cyclical order of solar and lunar systems will reveal more to you than following Adidas wearing gypsies and stone carrying numerologists—who can’t recall the of phi ratio or define precious stone properties like a geologist. Most people’s favorite topic is—not coincidentally—themselves, so when they meet someone who tells them that they can read their specific ‘birth chart’ or explain away their precise bad phases based on the moon, that should signal an automatic mental alarm. Unless there is emotional manipulation at play, social engineering or deep unconscious acceptance, most of us are not that gullible.
Our bodies—like solar systems—have natural cycles and molecular clocks that are detectable at the nanoscale. Circadian rhythms (biological processes at 24-hour oscillations) have been observed in bacterial activity, as-well as human sleep patterns. In other words, these built-in metabolic clocks operate in us at the micro and macro scale, simultaneously. When our body is not aligned we sometimes feel, out of sync with ourselves, our friends or the environment. If we listen to our body, we can feel an innate discomfort and a need to withdraw from the world, to allow our body (and mind) to unwind and readjust. We live in very physically and mentally demanding times, which often result in burnout due to overwork and stress. Assigning adequate time to fully rest under comfortable conditions is a necessary part of maintaining mental and physical health. Being more aware of inside and outside cycles will help us live according to the natural harmony—which has existed for millennia—between the sun, the moon and our bodies. Understanding how circadian rhythms are intertwined in our chronobiology will help us be mindful and function on a deeper level.
The circadian clock of an individual cyanobacterial cell is extremely stable, and the resilience of the KaiC phosphorylation rhythm in vitro is thought to reflect the robustness of oscillation in vivo. Robustness of oscillation in the context of molecular noise is a general and important feature of circadian clocks. In eukaryotic circadian systems, the basic timing mechanism is based on transcriptional/translational feedback loops. (Source: Nature)
The waxing and waning of the moon plays a role in the neuroscience of our brains, which can motivate us towards certain actions. Scientific awareness, inner self awareness and social observation, can individually and collectively demonstrate how moonlight amplifies how we feel—and as a result affects our thoughts and/or behavior. The moon acts sort of like a magnet, attracting different neurotransmitters in our brain, in sync with its different phases. Our brains have different sensitivities to naturally produced neurochemicals and foreign substances. Just how coffee or alcohol affects people differently, dopamine can have a werewolf-esque effect on those more susceptible to the organic chemical.
“We are all like the bright moon, we still have our darker side.” ―Khalil Gibran
Humans are literally the descendants of stars. We are made from the common chemical elements that found their way to Earth through the destruction and creation of suns. In our flesh we have carbon and oxygen, the blood that pumps in our veins carries iron, and our precious brain cells contain phosphorous and sodium. This might explain humanity’s fascination with the star scattered night sky. Once we get past urban city life’s light pollution, we can rediscover our natural attraction to the Starry Night—but without arbitrary dot connecting. Reason rules above all the constellations.
Biorhythms (sometimes confused with chronobiology) are pseudo scientific prediction models of a person’s physical, emotional and intellectual states. I have heard the word ‘biorhythm’ loosely thrown around and attributed to false cycles. To avoid the spread of misleading ideas, we need to use our voice of reason to shut down wrong and often one sided conversations. When we meet people who challenge what we say, we should take it as an opportunity to stress test our ideas and world view. A superstitious or bias environment silences open discourse, and corrupts our internal monologue by limiting scope and context. This conversational conformity affects us even if we’re grounded in a content corner of our own understanding. Silence is golden but when ignorance fills the room, that silence needs to transmute into wisdom to be shared.
Has technology and market data blinded us from self-awareness? What if we used cyclical cosmic knowledge to structure our weeks and plan work days? Wouldn’t we fair better by syncing ourselves with chronobiology instead of resisting it? How different would the world be today if we snapped out of our current mass industrial schedule and started living like our ancestors, with the natural rhythm of the sun and moon?
Conclusion by Douglas Rushkoff
“…our culture and its technologies are increasingly leading us to behave as if we can defy these cycles — or simply ignore them completely. We fly ten time zones in as many hours, drink coffee and take drugs to wake ourselves, pop sedatives to sleep, and then take SSRI’s to counter the depression that results. We schedule our work and productivity oblivious to the way the lunar cycle influences our moods and alertness, as well as those of our students, customers, and workforces…
…a rediscovery and wider acknowledgment of chronobiology would also go a long way toward restoring the solidarity and interpersonal connection so many of us are lacking without it. As we all became more aware and respectful of our shared chronobiology, we would be more likely to sync up or even “phase lock” with one another, as well. This would allow us to recover some of the peer-to-peer solidarity and social cohesiveness that we’ve lost to a culture that treats the time like a set of flashing numbers instead of the rhythm of life.” (source)
“It is not in the stars to hold our destiny but in ourselves.” —William Shakespeare
We only grow and become better human beings by carrying less flawed ideas and biases. With topics that require critical thinking, we need to apply Occam’s Razor and use a reductionist approach to reach clarity. Arriving at solid and unshakable understanding requires us to remove everything that doesn’t work from our minds.
The cosmic perspective flows from fundamental knowledge. But it’s more than just what you know. It’s also about having the wisdom and insight to apply that knowledge to assessing our place in the universe. And its attributes are clear:
The cosmic perspective comes from the frontiers of science, yet it’s not solely the province of the scientist. The cosmic perspective belongs to everyone.
The cosmic perspective is humble.
The cosmic perspective is spiritual — even redemptive — but not religious.
The cosmic perspective enables us to grasp, in the same thought, the large and the small.
The cosmic perspective opens our minds to extraordinary ideas but does not leave them so open that our brains spill out, making us susceptible to believing anything we’re told.
The cosmic perspective opens our eyes to the universe, not as a benevolent cradle designed to nurture life but as a cold, lonely, hazardous place.
The cosmic perspective shows Earth to be a mote, but a precious mote and, for the moment, the only home we have.
The cosmic perspective finds beauty in the images of planets, moons, stars, and nebulae but also celebrates the laws of physics that shape them.
The cosmic perspective enables us to see beyond our circumstances, allowing us to transcend the primal search for food, shelter, and sex.
The cosmic perspective reminds us that in space, where there is no air, a flag will not wave — an indication that perhaps flag waving and space exploration do not mix.
The cosmic perspective not only embraces our genetic kinship with all life on Earth but also values our chemical kinship with any yet-to-be discovered life in the universe, as well as our atomic kinship with the universe itself.
—Neil deGrasse Tyson (2007)
Timeline References:
c. 23,000 BC — Dating from the Upper Paleolithic a baboon fibula known as the Ishango bone is carved; it is now the earliest surviving lunar calendar. The bone is marked with three columns of asymmetrical notches.
c. 16,500 BC — The earliest representations of stars appear in cave paintings in Cueva del Castillo in Spain and Lascaux in France. The patterns depict recognizable parts of the constellations Pleiades, Corona Borealis and Summer Triangle.
c. 15,000/14,000 BC — The constellation Ursa Major is imagined as a bear by people in both North America and Eurasia, suggesting that the constellation must have been recognized before the disappearance of the Bering Land Bridge linking Alaska and Siberia.
4000 BC — An arrangement of clam shells appears on a mural in a cave in Puyang, Henan Province, China, which represent the constellation we now call the Plough or the Big Dipper.
3500 BC — The Egyptians identify the twelve constellations of the Zodiac that we still recognize today.
c. 3000 BC — The ancient Egyptians use observations of the star Sirius to calculate a calendar year.
c. 3000–2000 BC — Stonehenge is constructed. Its true purpose is unknown but it is believed stones were aligned with the heavens.
c. 2500 BC — The great Pyramid of Giza is built in Egypt. An internal shaft is aligned on the Pole Star as the path towards heaven. Solar alignments are also common in Pharaonic architecture: the temple of Amun-Re at Karnak in Egypt is aligned on the rising of the midwinter Sun.
c. 2354 BC — Enheduanna is the first woman to hold the Sumerian title of ‘En’ or ‘priest’. As High Priestess, he duties include tracking the movements of the Moon and making other astronomical observations, which details in poems that survive today.
c. 2000 BC — Followers of the ancient Hindu Vedic philosophy in India hold the observation of the stars as a central pillar of their faith.
c. 1000 BC — Indian and Babylonian astronomers calculate a year’s length: 360 days. The Egyptians are later able to produce a more accurate calculation: 365.25 days.
650 BC — Astronomers in Assyria plot the stars within Gemini, the Pleiades and Pegasus on a clay disc.
687 BC — Record-keepers of China’s Zhou Dynasty not, ‘in the middle of the night, stars fell like rain’. Not only is this the first documented record of a meteor shower, but also the first mention of the annual meteor display known as the Lyrids.
c. 580 BC — Greek philosopher Anaximander creates a map of the world, which he envisages existing in space. This view is groundbreaking, showing Earth suspended in space without support.
c. 500 — Pythagoras proposes that the Sun, Earth, Moon and planets are all spherical. His theory is later confirmed by Aristotle, who observed the shadow of the earth during a lunar eclipse.
c. 5th century BC — The zodiacal constellations emerge in Babylonian astronomy. This idea spread through Greece, Rome and India. There were originally six constellations, all named after animals, hence the word ‘zodiac’, meaning ‘figured like animals’ in Greek.
350 BC — Aristotle postulates that the dust lane in the Milky Way is a ‘manufacturing fault’ in the creation of the Universe; a split or a join in the fabric of space. This is due to its meandering, river-like shape.
280 BC — Greek astronomer Aristarchus disputes the notion that the Earth is at the centre of the Universe (the geocentric model), but his Sun-centered model fails to find acceptance.
c. 250 BC — In Egypt, scientific writer, astronomer and poet Eratosthenes successfully calculates the Earth’s circumference to within five per cent accuracy.
c.190–120 BC — Greek astronomer Hipparchus devises a system organizing stars into orders of brightness. His system forms the basis of the star magnitude system still in use today.
45 BC — Julius Caesar introduces a new calendar which includes a leap day every fourth year to stay in line with the solar year of just under 365.25 days. This calendar remains in use in much of Europe until Pope Gregory XIII reforms the calendar again in 1582.
AD 400 — The Hindu text the Surya Siddhanta gives an average length of the sidereal year (the time it takes for Earth to orbit around the Sun) as 365.2563627 days. For a millennium this remains the most accurate estimate of the length of the sidereal year anywhere in the world and is very close to the modern value.
C. AD 500 — The ancient Mayan city of Chichén Itzá is founded. A huge stepped pyramid is constructed with four sides of ninety-one steps each and a top platform, all of which add up to 365, the number of days in a solar year.
AD 830 — Persian mathematician and scholar Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khawarizmi publishes one of the first major works of Arabic astronomy, the Zij al-Sindhind (Astronomical tables of Sindh and Hind), containing tables for the movements of the Sun, the Moon and the five planets known at the time.
c. AD 964 — Astronomer Abd al-Rahman al-Sufi updates the Almagest in his Book of the Fixed Stars and incorporates Arabic names for some heavenly bodies.
Late 10th century — Egyptian astronomer and mathematician Abd al-Rahman ibn Yunus composes a major astronomical work known as the Hakimi Zij. He is particularly renowned for his astronomical tables, and this book, about half of which survives describes forty planetary conjunctions and thirty lunar eclipses.
1030 — Persian astronomer Abu al-Rayhan al-Biruni proposes that the Earth turns daily on its own axis and travels annually around the Sun.
1054 — A new star is recorded by Chinese, Korean, Japanese and Arab astronomers. It is visible in daylight for nearly three weeks and doesn’t fully disappear for two years. The astronomers had witnessed the explosion that created of the Crab Nebula.
c. 1508 — In Italy, artist Leonardo da Vinci uses his notebooks to record his observations of celestial phenomena such as the luminosity of the Moon, which he concludes is the result of oceans on the lunar surface.
1666 — Giovanni Domenico Cassini, an Italian-French astronomer, is the first to observe polar caps on Mars and he posits they are formed of ice like those on Earth. Later, space probes confirm that they are indeed ice, 2–3 km thick.
1761 — Russian scientist Mikhail Lomonosov suggests Venus has an astmosphere.
1902 — Georges Méliès makes the silent movie Man in the Moon, the first science-fiction film, which depicts an exhibition using a rocket to land on the Moon, where they capture a Moon-dwelling Selenite to take back to Earth.
1915 — Albert Einstein develops his Theory of General Relativity in which gravity is a geometric property of space and time or ‘space-time’. Modern physics still adheres to this century-old theory.
1924 — Spanish artist Pablo Picasso fills sixteen pages of a notebook with what he calls his ‘constellation drawings’ — series of grids and lines joining dots that resemble stars in maps of the constellations.
1964 — Mariner 4 successfully conducts a ‘flyby’ of Mars and returns the first pictures taken of another planet’s surface.
1966 — The Soviet Luna 9 spacecraft becomes the first to land softly on another world, the Moon. It returned images of a dusty plain, the Oceanus Procellarum, the first from the surface of another world. — Soviet spacecraft Venera 3 reaches Venus and is believed to crash land. Although credited with being the first spacecraft to land on another planet, communication systems fail prior to Venera 3 reaching its destination so no data are returned.
1969 — America’s Apollo 11 is launched from Cape Kennedy (now Cape Canaveral) headed for the Moon. Four days later astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin ‘Buzz’ Aldrin land on the Moon in an area known as ‘The Sea of Tranquility’ and six hours later they walk on its surface. The two astronauts stay on the Moon’s surface for twenty-one hours. [Allegedly]
1975 — Soviet spacecraft Venera 9 is the first to land on another planet when it settles on Venus. It transmits the first images of the surface of another planet and reveals a rocky, volcanic surface.
1979 — NASA spacecraft Pioneer 11 makes the first flyby of Saturn. This visit and later visits by Voyager spacecraft in the early 1980s establish that the planet has weather systems that appear similar to those of its neighbor Jupiter.
1985—Royal Saudi Air Force pilot, Prince Sultan bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud, becomes first Arab astronaut aboard NASA’s STS-51-G Shuttle Program.
1987—Aleppo born Muhammed Ahmed Faris becomes the second spacefaring Arab on a joint Syrian-Soviet mission (Soyuz).
1989 — Voyager 2 returns thousands of images of Neptune to Earth and after passing the planet. The Voyager missions are notable for the discs that they carry, bearing images and sound recordings of the life and culture on Earth for the benefit of extraterrestrials who might find the spacecraft.
1994–95 — Russian cosmonaut Valeri Poliakov spends 437 days abroad Mir, the longest duration in space for any astronaut.
1998 — Construction begins in orbit of the International Space Station (ISS), a long term habitable orbiting labrotory. The United States, Europe, Russia, Japan and Canada are partners in the project.
2002 — The Hubble Space Telescope discovers the oldest white dwarfs in our galaxy. The discovery allows scientists to verify previous estimates of the age of the Universe at 13–14 billion years.
2003 — Danish-Icelandic artist Olafur Eliasson installs The Weather Project, a huge neon-yellow Sun, in the Turbine Hall of Tate Modern in London.
2012 — Dragon, a spacecraft built by private company SpaceX, becomes the first commercial spacecraft to successfully deliver cargo to the ISS and return safely with cargo to Earth.
2018 — NASA’s Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport (InSight) lander safely lands on Mars to study the deep interior of the planet.
2019 — China’s Chang’e 4 probe successfully lands on the dark side of the moon.
2019 — Privately funded Israeli lander (launched by SpaceX) crash lands on the moon, making it the first moon mission failure in 48 years.
2019 — First-ever image of a black hole reveled by the Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration, from the center of galaxy M87.
2019 — SpaceX launches second Falcon Heavy, the highest operational payload capacity rocket (at date of writing). Commercial payload: Arabsat-6A.
2019—Hazza Al Mansouri of the United Arab Emirates, becomes the third Arab in space aboard the Soyuz MS-15 spacecraft to the ISS.
