Science
Related: About this forumhistory of science and astrology
I get pissed off every time I see the astrology column in my daily newspaper. However, my attitude toward astrology is tempered by an enthusiasm for its history.
Why would I care about the history of such nonsense? That's a fairly long story. Those with short attention spans may not wish to read further.
As a physicist, I am naturally interested in the history of my subject, which is all tangled up with the history of mathematics and astronomy. Of course I am interested in the scientific revolution of the 16th and 17th centuries, including the work of Copernicus, Tycho Brahe, Galileo, Kepler, and Newton. All but the first and last scientists on this list were court astrologers.
The king of Denmark supported Tycho Brahe's career as an astronomer only because Tycho's meticulous observations of stars and planets would supposedly lead to better horoscopes.
Galileo and Kepler were also expected to cast horoscopes in the regions (not yet nations) of Italy and Germany, respectively. Around the turn of the 17th century, Kepler landed a job as Tycho's assistant at Prague, in the court of Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II. Tycho gave Kepler his observations of the planet Mars to play with. When Tycho died (1601), Kepler became his successor as Imperial Court Mathematician. The Mars data were crucial for Kepler's subsequent discovery that planets move in elliptical orbits. And that discovery led to Newton's law of gravitation.
To summarize: if it weren't for astrology, Kepler and Newton would never have made their most important discoveries.
2naSalit
(86,646 posts)the oldest form of timekeeping known to man. It is hard for some to grasp as it involves more than just looking at the planets and signs and because it views conditions for past, present and future all at once. It's not a belief system as some would insist.
Response to 2naSalit (Reply #1)
abqtommy This message was self-deleted by its author.
soothsayer
(38,601 posts)I occasionally dress as Tycho Brahe for Halloween, with a metal nose and all (result of a duel).
He might have died during a drinking contest where first one to use the bathroom loses, and his bladder burst. He might have been poisoned, I think is another version. I prefer the former.
He was a badass and a good astronomer.
Lionel Mandrake
(4,076 posts)Science has never proved astrology to be anything but a medieval superstition.
Astrology as practiced in the West has its origins in the ancient near East, specifically Babylonia. From there the nonsense spread to Greece, Rome, and elsewhere.
Tycho certainly died from a burst bladder. No reputable historian of science takes the idea that he was murdered seriously, but he did have toxic levels of mercury in his system (probably owing to his dabbling in alchemy).
soothsayer
(38,601 posts)Lionel Mandrake
(4,076 posts)fierywoman
(7,686 posts)"Astrology is not a belief system, it's a phenomenon." --Nicholas Campion
IMHO astrology is to present day science as kairos is to kronos. They both deal with time but in different (and both relevant) ways.
Lionel Mandrake
(4,076 posts)But astrology was pretty dumb to start with. Its intellectual bankruptcy was pointed out by the philosopher Pico della Mirandola (1463 1494), echoing St. Augustine of Hippo (354 430). Tycho Brahe, to his credit, lost interest in astrology after looking for empirical justification of it and not finding any. Newton, to his credit, never had the slightest interest in astrology.
Astrology lost respectability during the 17th century. Court astrologers disappeared, and the subject was no longer taught in universities. This was the beginning of the Age of Enlightenment. The irrational nonsense didn't disappear completely, but it was marginalized. And it remains marginalized today, I'm happy to say.
abqtommy
(14,118 posts)the science of chemistry, which is also an interesting study that I completed when I was in high school...
https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffnt&q=relationshp+between+alchemy+and+chemistry&ia=web