Dr Dean claims that astrology was invented. In the same way the so-called laws of gravity, thermodynamics, general and special relativity, etc. were all invented. One day they ‘did not exist’, and then they did. As with all attempts to depict the world they are fictional in that they use language to make creative assertions about the nature of the world, and as with all fictions there are various degrees of accuracy. In the case of ‘laws’ these are created by science in an attempt to explain and predict natural phenomena, in the main by careful observation, measuring and counting. From these observations emerged the algorithms that have been erroneously attributed to the nature of the universe rather than the psychological needs of humans to make their world comprehensible. While Nietzsche was the first philosopher to draw attention to the fictive and self-serving nature of our descriptions the work of Wittgenstein, who was an engineer and mathematician prior to his work in linguistic philosophy, explored the matter more closely.

In his Philosophical Investigations Wittgenstein describes how numbers can be used for various purposes and are dependent on context. He observed that numbers, like other abstract entities, are not discovered as existing independently of human activity but are instead products of human language and practice. Numbers are tools that are used in various forms and activities to express and manipulate concepts, but they do not possess a separate existence outside of these applications. Mathematics is always in the process of being invented, with new forms being developed to describe the emerging complexities of the universe. In this respect it is regrettable that even in The New Scientist one can read that a newly discovered particle ‘does not obey the laws of physics’ rather than acknowledging that it is time to re-write our fictions. Our world is made explicable in the various forms of language available to us, and their usefulness (or otherwise) rests on the accuracy of their description and the readiness (or otherwise) to re-write dogma. Astrology is no different in this respect, though the vast range of its concerns make for demanding research protocols, not always welcome by some more traditional astrologers.

That said, it would appear that astrology has had much to offer the scientist by way of education. During the course of his interview with the French astrologer André Barbault the philosopher and anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss expressed his great interest in astrology as a system of linguistic relationships that formed the basis of the manner in which language was used to comprehend the world. Levi-Strauss believed that the complexity of astrology had proved of great value because ‘it helped man to think for thousands of years’ (Douglas 2014). It would be a pity if astrology’s contribution to the manner in which we make sense of ourselves and the world continues to be overlooked by those whose research has the potential to further extend it.

Reference
Douglas, Graham (2014) When Levi-Strauss met the Astrologers Culture and Cosmos Vol 18 No 2 page 150