The Personal Website of Mark W. Dawson

Containing His Articles, Observations, Thoughts, Meanderings,
and some would say Wisdom (and some would say not).

What Sign are You?

For millennia astrologers have been casting charts to determine the future of a person or events. This is often done by plotting the positions of the stars and planets relative to arbitrarily defined constellations at their birth or at the time of significant events in their life. It is claimed by astrologers that there is a force in the universe that acts upon a person and influences their life based on these positions. However, only “The Fundamental Properties and Constants of the Universe” are known to science, and there are only “The Four Forces of Nature” known to science. The forces in the Universe known to science are Gravity, Electromagnetism, and the Strong and Weak Atomic forces. Therefore, these are the only forces that can affect a person. But do these forces affect a person in an astrological manner?

Gravity is the only universal force, as that it exists in all places and at all times in the spacetime of the universe. Whereas the other forces, strong atomic, weak atomic, and Electromagnetism forces exist only in their local area of spacetime. Gravity is also the weakest of all forces by many orders of magnitude. All mass has a gravitational field, and the more massive something is the greater the gravitational field. All mass interacts gravitationally with other mass, and whenever masses move relative to each other they change the gravitational influence of each other.  Therefore, whenever anyone is moving near others, they each are exerting a gravitational force on the other, and the gravitational influence on each other changes. However, this gravitational influence of earthly objects it is so minuscule that it is immeasurable but present.

The Electromagnetism force is stronger but not very strong.  It can be transmitted across the universe, but it only exists at one point in space-time at any time or place. Think of a hand-magnet as it approaches a magnetic surface. Your muscles are in control of the hand magnet and can overcome the magnetic force with ease. Of course, the magnetic force can be increased to overcome your muscular force, but a stronger force can be utilized to overcome the magnetic force. The same is true for electricity, as electricity and magnetism are the two sides of the same coin. Hence the Electromagnetism force is not very strong in comparison to other forces.

The Strong and Weak Atomic forces only exist in the atomic and sub-atomic spacetime of an atom. It is also a weak force and bound into atoms, and working only within atoms, they do not affect anything but the atomic behavior of atoms.

So, can these forces be utilized to directly affect your life other than utilizing them to assist in living.? For an answer let us examine the forces that are present when you are born. Typically, most Americans are born in a delivery room inside a hospital. In the delivery room is a doctor and several nurses assisting the doctor, the mother giving birth, and sometimes even the father is present. The gravitational force of the Earth is so strong as to exert an influence which keeps everything in the delivery room in its place. There are also Electromagnetism forces for the lighting and medical devices in use to assist in the delivery of the baby. And the Strong and Weak Atomic forces are only acting in the atomics and sub-atomics of everything in the delivery room.

All the Electromagnetism forces from outside the delivery room are so much weaker than the Electromagnetism forces inside the delivery room that they are of no consequence to what is happening in the delivery room. The gravitational force of the people in the delivery room is much stronger than the gravitational force of anything other than the Earth. So, therefore, how is it possible that the forces outside of a delivery room can impact what is happening to the baby when it is born? They cannot and do not impact the baby being born. Therefore, Astrological phenomena have no impact on a baby.

Astrological phenomena also have no impact on any other places on the Earth, as the more distant natural forces are so much weaker than the immediate natural forces in the environment in which you are present. There are no other forces in the Universe other than Gravity, Electromagnetism, and the Strong and Weak Atomic forces, which means that Astrology has no forces with which to work with and, therefore, Astrology is not possible and is indeed scientific nonsense.

The Force in Star Wars is a mysterious energy field created by life that binds the galaxy together. Harnessing the power of the Force gives the Jedi, the Sith, and others sensitive to this spiritual energy extraordinary abilities, such as directing actions, levitating objects, tricking minds, and seeing things before they happen. But no such force exists in the Universe, and no Astrological Force exists in the Universe. For if it did exist science would have been able to detect it or its impacts on the Universe.

Another problem with Astrology is that you must believe in predeterminism to believe in Astrology. To believe that there are forces outside your control that can determine your fate is fatalistic. Of course, we are all born with different capabilities such as intelligence, talents, physical abilities, etcetera, but your life is not predetermined but it is what you make of it. You should control your life and not let life control you. To do otherwise is to abandon hope for a better life, and it is also an excuse for not trying to make your life better.

Some people say that astrology is harmless or simply fun. Given what I have said in the previous paragraph if you believe in astrology then you will make bad decisions, or no decisions, that will negatively impact your life. This outcome is not harmless to you, your family, your friends, nor society. And there is so much other fun in life that you do not need to indulge in the pseudoscience of astrology to have fun.

Disclaimer

Please Note - many academics, scientist and engineers would critique what I have written here as not accurate nor through. I freely acknowledge that these critiques are correct. It was not my intentions to be accurate or through, as I am not qualified to give an accurate nor through description. My intention was to be understandable to a layperson so that they can grasp the concepts. Academics, scientists, and engineers entire education and training is based on accuracy and thoroughness, and as such, they strive for this accuracy and thoroughness. I believe it is essential for all laypersons to grasp the concepts of this paper, so they make more informed decisions on those areas of human endeavors that deal with this subject. As such, I did not strive for accuracy and thoroughness, only understandability.

Most academics, scientist, and engineers when speaking or writing for the general public (and many science writers as well) strive to be understandable to the general public. However, they often fall short on the understandability because of their commitment to accuracy and thoroughness, as well as some audience awareness factors. Their two biggest problems are accuracy and the audience knowledge of the topic.

Accuracy is a problem because academics, scientist, engineers and science writers are loath to be inaccurate. This is because they want the audience to obtain the correct information, and the possible negative repercussions amongst their colleagues and the scientific community at large if they are inaccurate. However, because modern science is complex this accuracy can, and often, leads to confusion amongst the audience.

The audience knowledge of the topic is important as most modern science is complex, with its own words, terminology, and basic concepts the audience is unfamiliar with, or they misinterpret. The audience becomes confused (even while smiling and lauding the academics, scientists, engineers or science writer), and the audience does not achieve understandability. Many times, the academics, scientists, engineers or science writer utilizes the scientific disciplines own words, terminology, and basic concepts without realizing the audience misinterpretations, or has no comprehension of these items.

It is for this reason that I place understandability as the highest priority in my writing, and I am willing to sacrifice accuracy and thoroughness to achieve understandability. There are many books, websites, and videos available that are more accurate and through. The subchapter on “Further Readings” also contains books on various subjects that can provide more accurate and thorough information. I leave it to the reader to decide if they want more accurate or through information and to seek out these books, websites, and videos for this information.