Should Scientists Date People Who Believe Astrology?

YourAstrologer writes "Wired Science asks: Should scientists date people who believe in astrology? Apparently, the argument is quite complex. Astrology is sort of a flawed mental shortcut for understanding the world, but so is disregarding someone because of their spiritual beliefs. Women are inundated with astrological nonsense from fashion magazines, so it is normative for them to believe it even if they are otherwise highly logical. Smart people can convince themselves of silly things."

Which method?

[Bloke down the pub (861787)]

Which method - radiocarbon or by slicing thenm and counting the rings?

Re:Which method?

[Bill, Shooter of Bul (629286)]

We are humans. Flawed machines. Human females deserve you treat them as equals. Maybe then you'll get a date.

The preceding was the only part of the parent post that shows any resemblance of intelligent thought. There is a big difference between a non falsifiable belief system, and one that does claim to make very specific predictions. I have no problem with a belief system that can not be proven or disproven and causes people to lead better lives. I do have a problem with people that believe that human behavior is influenced or predetermined by objects, but reject any knowledge about these same objects that was scientificly determined.

And yes, I did break up with a girlfriend because of this.

Sure, provided they are hot

[Registered Coward v2 (447531)]

But rememeber, you can fix a lot of things but you cant fix stupid

Re:Sure, provided they are hot

[sm62704 (957197)]

You can't fix stupid but you CAN fix ignorant. Thinking someone is stupid because they believe something patently false is stupid.

Re:Sure, provided they are hot

[gnick (1211984)]

No, it's arrogant.

Sounds like perfectly normal behavior. For a Leo...

This...IS....SLASHDOT!

[Internet Ronin (919897)]

Seeing as this is Slashdot, lemme just say, you should probably take what you can get. Astrology, piercings, fetishes, just be glad a girl's talking to you and not asking you to do her math homework. Seriously though, sometimes breasts are big enough to make other things not important.

Re:This...IS....SLASHDOT!

[Registered Coward v2 (447531)]

Seriously though, sometimes breasts are big enough to make other things not important.


Sometimes?

Re:This...IS....SLASHDOT!

[Mikkeles (698461)]

Yes, "sometimes"; else you may be faced with this [dailymail.co.uk]!

Astrology is just plain wrong

[Malevolent Tester (1201209)]

As a Marxist, I have no time for pseudoscientific concepts that claim to explain the workings of human nature in their entirety while offering no evidence or falsifiability.

Offense

[Stormcrow309 (590240)]

I have to take offense to this. Couple of years ago, the local paper's astrological peice listed for my birthday, 'If today is your birthday, you gonna get lucky today.' Now, yes I was dating the lady who was incharge of editing that section at the time; but by God, it was correct.

Ahh...

[nickos (91443)]

so is disregarding someone because of their spiritual beliefs

There's your problem - a growing number of people are realising it's fine to disregard someone if they believe in supernatural nonsense. Especially if they're beliefs include doing nasty things to women, homosexuals and non-believers.

Astrology != Spirituality or Religion

[glpierce (731733)]

Astrology differs from most religion and "spirituality" in one very important way (especially to scientists): It is testable. While there is no way to prove or disprove most spiritual things (including the existence of any god or the Judeo-Christian-Islamic God), we know that astrology is 100% wrong. It has been studied scientifically (because it makes testable predictions and claims), and the results always come back the same.

Try this page for a start:
http://www.badastronomy.com/bad/misc/astrology.html [badastronomy.com]

lets get one thing straight

[rucs_hack (784150)]

As a scientist I am likely to disregard most attempts at serious conversation on the subject of astrology.

That said, I would not, and I believe, nor would any other normal scientific single chap, turn away a hot chick just because she was pondering my star sign or wanting to read my palm. In most cases It's just another vector into a conversation anyway.

Oh man...

[o'reor (581921)]

From the comments on TFA:

check this 68k mac software does statistics on astrology.

http://dragonflypower.com/HSReadme.htm [dragonflypower.com]

(note, this is not even on /. !)

Which begs the question: Should anybody date someone who recommends taking a look at a 68k Mac software in 2008 ?

Multiple Choice

[rueger (210566)]

Women are inundated with astrological nonsense from fashion magazines, so it is normative for them to believe it even if they are otherwise highly logical.

a) Stupid
b) sexist
c) offensive
d) all of the above

Re:Multiple Choice

[JohnFluxx (413620)]

> Also, it makes the false assumption that more scientists are men than women.

Uh, most scientists /are/ men.

Mental shortcut?

[MrNemesis (587188)]

Only if you define a shortcut as a much shorter route that gets you to the wrong destination.

As an often-scientific athiest, I'm prepared to date people from any different religions, as long as we're both content to let one anothers belief systems not interfere with our love life. But I have difficulty talking to anyone who believes a few miniscule globules of rock millions of miles away can effect something as complex as our personalities and day-to-day activities. Same for alot of /.'ers I imagine - you can appreciate someone who's put a lot of thought into their belief system and come to their own conclusion and is happy with it and the way it helps them live their life - systems of belief are an entirely human construct and are thus irrational by default :) But people who have convinced themselves that astrology exists and then try to subvert physics with claptrap about subtle variations in gravitic attractions and how it aligns iron particles in your blood which short-circuit synapses into taking certain descisions? All without a shred of proof? All without a shred of evidence, even? You're a moron and I'm incapable of respecting your intellect.

Yes, I realise it's not their whole personality (don't get me wrong, I've met hundreds of lovely people who happened to believe in something ridiculous), but to me it's just like talking to someone with LIAR tattoed across their forehead and taking everything they say at face value.

http://www.badastronomy.com/bad/misc/astrology.html [badastronomy.com] /asbestos long johns

P.S. A prize of fifty points and a bowl of raspberry jelly to the first person who correctly guesses my relationship status :)

How to find a spouse

[romanm (178782)]

There's an old Bosnian joke about how Mujo decided which girl he should marry. He discussed about it later with his friend Haso:
H: I heard you got married. Congratulations! How did you decide?
M: Well, this was not easy. I had three candidates and I conducted a test. I asked the first one:
      "What's 2+2?".
      She said "4".
      I though to myslelf, that's good, the woman is smart.
      The second one said: "Well, it depends. It can be 4, but sometimes it can also be 3 or 5."
      That's even better, the woman is cunning.
      I asked the third one the same question and she says "I don't care. Whatever my husband says it is".
      I thought to myself, this woman surely will respect her husband. This is good.
H: So, which one did you take?
M: Oh. The one with big tits, of course.

I don't think that scientists are THAT different to other men.

Re:Well

[garett_spencley (193892)]

I would give Astrology some merit if it weren't for the countless scientific studies that consistently found it to be without merit. Astrology, like Psychics, employs simple psychological tricks in order to get the believer to believe that the horoscope applies to them, when in fact what it says could really be applied to anyone.

Astrology isn't "spiritualism". We're not talking about religion or believing in a higher power. We're talking about parlor tricks. Even if the alignment of the stars and the planets did have an effect on the world (and it would be ignorant not to investigate the possibility, I'm certainly not saying that science has proven otherwise), astrology certainly has not demonstrated any such phenomenon.

Re:Well

[MightyYar (622222)]

I can see that, for example, babies born in the Winter might tend to have a different personality to babies born in the Summer.

Ahh, your horoscope would be totally off if you changed hemispheres! :)

Re:Well

[Hal_Porter (817932)]

http://www.ctinquiry.org/publications/reflections_volume_1/torrance.htm [ctinquiry.org]

Here let me refer to a very interesting letter, recorded by Helen Dukas, which Einstein wrote to a child who asked him whether scientists prayed.

I have tried to respond to your question as simply as I could. Here is my answer. Scientific research is based on the idea that everything that takes place is determined by laws of nature, and therefore this holds for the actions of people. For this reason, a research scientist will hardly be inclined to believe that events could be influenced by prayer, i.e. by a wish addressed to a supernatural Being. However, it must be admitted that our actual knowledge of these laws is only imperfect and fragmentary, so that, actually the belief in the existence of basic all-embracing laws in nature also rests on a sort of faith. All the same this faith has been largely justified so far by the success of scientific research. But, on the other hand, everyone who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe-a spirit vastly superior to that of man, and one in the face of which we with our modest powers must feel humble. In this way the pursuit of science leads to a religious feeling of a special sort, which is indeed quite different from the religiosity of someone more naive

His 'spirit' is the actual laws that govern the universe as far as I can tell. In physics it would be a complete, consistent theory of everything. We don't have this yet, but we could possibly discover (and you'll note I didn't say invent) it. We do have various approximations of this uber theory though, relativity for big stuff and quantum mechanics for small. It's an odd idea actually - it reminds me of Plato's Theory of Forms [wikipedia.org]. By analogy, the spirit would be the True theory, and our current approximations would shadows of it. All of which is obvious very science friendly.

Re:What scientists should really do is.

[khallow (566160)]

It's called stereotyping. And if the characteristics being stereotyped are relevant to the judgement, say like a belief in astrology indicates some degree of ignorance, gullibility, or even stupidity, then it's not bigotry. Another example, I wouldn't let an ex-felon (especially one convicted for embezzlement or fraud) near large amounts of money in a business. It's just common sense.

Re:Oh really?

[SuperDuck (16035)]

women are easily swayed by what they read in fashion magazines.

Not married to a "fashionista", I guess?

Not any more, fortunately. She was *so* yesterday. ;-P

Re:Comtempt is not compatible with love

[erlehmann (1045500)]

I'm a person with very firm Christian beliefs.

Interesting - you believe in salvation through a holy zombie despite a total lack of explanation as to how the reanimation of dead bodies relates to human events ?

Re:Comtempt is not compatible with love

[Eli Gottlieb (917758)]

OK, let's at least get this clear: the resurrection of Jesus (you know, the fictional one) did not involve zombies. Jesus did not hunger for the flesh of the living. Instead, he actually came back to life.

We're talking Goa'uld Sarcophagus or Ancient Healing Device here, not a zombie virus.