Astrology Debunkers Debunked: Part Three

YouTube video of a cosmologist debunking astrology.

“The Truth About Astrology & Zodiac Signs | Dr. Brian Keating & Dr. Andrew Huberman”

I haven’t posted a blog in a while. I’ve been busy writing my next book, tentatively titled Daimonic Astrology and the Cosmic Return. Read this blog post, which is sort of my placeholder stamp on the thesis until I can crank the book out.

Anyway, I decided to have some fun and do another installment of my Astrology Debunkers Debunked series. There are a metric shit ton (that’s approximately 2,204.6 lbs of shit, by the way) of YouTube videos about people ostensibly debunking astrology. Usually, the titles are something like, “Richard Dawkins LITERALLY DESTROYS astrology with FACTS & LOGIC!!!!” or something similar, because astrology is so god damned stupid, you know? It’s strictly for blissed out, credulous New Age hippies. I guess, to be fair, that is often the case. At least it was for a long time. But the tide is rapidly turning as ancient technical Hermetica, etc. is recovered, translated, and made available to astrologers like myself who reclaim lost techniques and restore the ancient art in practice. But I digress…

Okay, now watch this short video and you can either read the rest of this blog along with it (I put time stamps below) or watch the whole thing and read the blog afterward. I mean, do what makes sense to you—you’re an adult.

Okay, so the guest’s name is Dr. Brian Keating, Ph.D., and he is a cosmologist and professor of physics at the University of California, San Diego. My first question is:

Why are you asking a cosmologist about astrology?

That’s like asking a Vegas black jack dealer about the tarot. Sure, both things involve cards but what’s the point? This cat is no expert on astrology. And he makes that fact known right away.

:20 The guy admits he’s just arrogantly playing games with people he thinks are beneath him for having a worldview that extends beyond mere weights and measures. This is the principal hallmark of the astrology debunker: unrelenting hubris. See my blog post on the fresh prince of smug positivism.

:32 He says there’s no evidence for astrology’s predictive efficacy (or something like that). Astrology is a metaphysical art, not a physical science. You can’t use the language of one to describe the other. It’s a completely different scope of work. Plus, what astrologers were involved? Psychological astrologers who turn everything into Jungian shadow work and what not? Or, even better, an old 60s acid head who read some Alice Bailey and theosophizes all over the place? And what was the test? Was it something astrology even purports to do?

1:08 Oh, my favorite. He thinks signs and constellations are the same thing. This very telling error occurs again at 1:46. Let me make one thing super clear:

Signs are NOT the same thing as constellations.

Please stop with that. It’s embarrassing for everyone. It says that you don’t even know the most basic tenet of Western tropical astrology. It’s tropical, dude. It’s like it says on the tin. That means it’s aligned to the equinoxes. Western astrology is seasonal, not sidereal. Yeah, yeah, “What about Jyotish?” you ask. I don’t know or care about how they do it in India.

The signs are 30° arc segments of the ecliptic (the apparent annual path of the sun). There are twelve of them. Yes, they were named after the constellations they were nearby when the system was developed 2,000 years ago but, due to axial precession (the slow gyration of the Earth on her axis - damn, is it getting hot in here?), the equinoctial point has precessed into early Pisces/late Aquarius, depending on what you believe.

The constellations, however, are now and have always been discrete groups of stars forming recognizable, culturally agreed upon images. And none of them are exactly 30°. In fact, there are actually thirteen constellations on the ecliptic. Ophiuchus is not some mystery that just showed up and is now being used as a wooden stake to the heart of astro-vampires. In fact, a Hellenistic astrologer was the first to record it in the 2nd century CE. Yes, it’s a constellation - but it’s not one of the twelve signs. See 3:40 for that load of bullshit. But I’m jumping ahead a bit.

1:14 This is rich. “#Fail” is what he says as he bashes the base-60 (sexagesimal) system, which he attributes to the Babylonians but was actually developed much earlier by the Sumerians in the 3rd millennium BCE (one would think that Neugebauer’s Exact Sciences in Antiquity would be required reading for cosmology school or whatever he did that makes him some kind of an authority). Lol, he says we use the base-10 (decimal) system because we have ten fingers, which is probably true, BUT we actually still use the five-fucking-thousand year old sexagesimal system STILL whenever we talk about space, time, astronomy, astrology, cosmology, etc. We have no other numerical measurement system to talk about spacetime besides base-60. Look at any clock. How long is an hour? 60 minutes. How long is a minute? 60 seconds. Base-60 is vastly superior to the decimal system. Sixty, being a highly composite number, is divisible by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12, 15, 20, 30, etc. Way easier for fractions, division, etc. Plus, all of geometry is based on the 360° circle, which is base-60. All geographical coordinates are base-60. I could go on.

This cat is supposed to be an expert?!

At 2:45 he finally veers back into his lane and starts talking about cosmological stuff. He should just stick with that. He doesn’t know anything about astrology. And you shouldn’t talk about things you don’t know about (unless you show some epistemic humility while you do it).

It’s like Abe Lincoln or Mark Twain or the Quaker Oats guy said:

"It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt."

The Quaker Oats guy in real life, fr fr.

So, Lastly, at about 4:45, he talks about this “astrologer” he and his then fiancé went to see. Apparently (and I don’t know if I believe this), the astrologer didn’t even ask his birthdate/time/location. She just asked, “What’s your sign?” and went on a big rant about super vague and general shit. I’m sorry, but if that’s true then no wonder he has this opinion. There are a lot of lame astrologers out there, I guess. Or maybe they’re like psychics or empaths or whatever, who just kind of dabble in astrology.

Anyway, take my Genethlialogy Course, buy my books, and let me delineate your nativity right in front of your eyes on Zoom, or in a 7-10 page PDF document. I behold both the dawning of events and the unborn echoes of what is to come. Try me. Or recommend me to someone who’s into that sort of thing.