If you haven't read my earlier article, "Astrology – A Rational Introduction," I recommend reading it first. This article builds upon those ideas from a different perspective.
For the past week, almost all my social media feeds have been flooded with advertisements for AstroTalk. Either the platform's algorithms have somehow concluded that I believe in astrology, or they have identified me as someone with a high probability of subscribing to their app. Whatever the reason, I must admit that their marketing is impressive. Many of their advertisements feature celebrities, seemingly suggesting that if famous people trust astrology, perhaps we should too.
But this raises a fascinating question: Does astrology actually work? Can the course of our lives really be predicted from the positions of celestial bodies at the moment of our birth?
Whenever I look for a convincing answer, I find people sharply divided into two camps. One group firmly believes that the positions of the planets at birth shape our personality, relationships, career, and future. The other dismisses astrology as pseudoscience with no predictive power whatsoever.
Interestingly, many believers go a step further and attempt to justify astrology using science. They argue that the gravitational pull or other physical influences from planets somehow govern the unfolding of our lives, as though invisible cosmic strings are pulling us in predetermined directions.
But does astrology really have a scientific basis rooted in physics or gravitation?
Before discussing this question, it is worth remembering that astrology and astronomy share a common historical origin. For much of human history, observations of the night sky served both scientific and astrological purposes. Over time, astronomy evolved into an evidence-based science, while astrology retained its traditional interpretive framework.
This shared history explains why astrology and astronomy still have many similarities. Both describe the positions of the Sun, Moon, and planets relative to one another. Many astrological concepts correspond to real astronomical events. For example, the apparent motion of Venus sometimes places it ahead of the Sun and sometimes behind it in our sky, giving rise to what astronomers call retrograde motion. Similarly, when the Sun and Moon occupy nearly the same direction in the sky, we observe a new moon (Amavasya), while a separation of approximately 180° results in a full moon (Purnima).
In other words, the celestial bodies shown in an astrological chart are real, and their relative positions at the time of birth can indeed be computed with remarkable accuracy.
The real question, however, is this: Do these planets influence our lives through their gravitational fields?
From a physics perspective, this seems highly unlikely. The gravitational force exerted by distant planets on a newborn is extraordinarily small—far weaker than the gravitational pull of nearby objects such as the doctor delivering the baby or even the walls of the hospital. If gravity were the underlying mechanism, it would be difficult to explain why only planets should matter while countless nearby objects do not.
Perhaps we should be asking a different question.
What if an astrological chart is not a theory of causation at all, but simply an ancient system for classifying people according to the environmental conditions prevailing around the time of their birth?
Researchers have long observed that the season in which a person is born may be associated with certain health and developmental outcomes ([1, 2]). Seasonal variations can affect temperature, humidity, nutrition, sunlight exposure, infectious diseases, air quality, and even maternal health during pregnancy. These environmental differences can leave measurable biological and developmental signatures. A child born during the peak of summer experiences a very different early-life environment than one born during the monsoon or winter.
Now consider the possibility that the positions of the Sun, Moon, and planets simply encode the time of year with remarkable precision. In that case, an astrological chart may indirectly capture a wide range of environmental conditions prevailing around the time of birth, without requiring the planets themselves to exert any mysterious physical influence.
In other words, the planets may not be causing events through gravity. Instead, they may simply serve as markers of when we were born, and that timing may correlate with environmental factors that genuinely influence human development.
I find this perspective more intriguing than the conventional debate over whether astrology is "true" or "false." If astrology contains any kernel of truth, perhaps it lies not in the planets influencing our lives through gravity, but in the planetary chart acting as a remarkably precise timestamp of the environment into which we were born.
Perhaps the planets do not control our destiny. Perhaps they merely record the moment our journey began, while the environment associated with that moment quietly helps shape the path that follows.
References:
[1] Vaiserman, A. (2021). Season-of-birth phenomenon in health and longevity: epidemiologic evidence and mechanistic considerations. Journal of Developmental Origins of Health and Disease.
[2] Buckles, K., & Hungerman, D. (2013). Season of Birth and Later Outcomes: Old Questions, New Answers. Review of Economics and Statistics.
