How To Astrology - Human Ethics

Given that astrology is neither exact science, nor a religious doctrine, it is not obvious what it has to say about good or evil, or the nature of human experience, meaning of life, these sorts of things. Since I do maintain that astrology is not a collection of random nonsense either, there must be some value judgments involved, or insight into who we are and how we should live. After all, astrology does focus specifically on the composition of human soul and the meaning of events made manifest. 

It is true historically that some configurations of planets and stars have been widely considered positive or negative, and it is also true that natal chart is supposed to outline individual's potential, rather than absolutely predetermine everything they will inescapably become, or what will definitely befall them. The way I see it, if people are involved in the shaping of their own future, and if we can judge the quality of various astrological configurations, then it is clear that we are indeed dealing with a basis for ethical system.

The first question I think needs asking is as follows - if the natal chart describes you and your future, what would it mean to succeed or fail at living up to it? If it were to literally determine your actions, it would make your every decision meaningless. Based on the experience of various astrologers, the natal chart does probably only map the outer limits of what is possible, and outline the sequencing or timing of key events. However, each predetermined event, coupled with the precise nature of personal limitations, presents a kind of subjective experience and moral dilemma, rather than an objective occurrence.

In almost all cases, if not in every single one, meaningful personal choice affects the precise outcome of such challenges, which means that people with exactly the same starting point can easily end up in increasingly different places as time progresses toward the end of their lives. Much like the players of complex role playing computer games do, especially of games that include narrative structures bound to an element of choice - the character would be more and more customized every step of the way, and different actual events would have happened, possibly at variable speed in a variable order.

It is important to understand, though, that different manifested outcomes wouldn't mean there isn't one particular system behind it all. Just like a simulated interactive scenario, the "game" of life would be about something, and heading somewhere. There would also be conditional rules, which have to be figured out on the way, no tutorial. Continuing the game analogy, it may be useful even to draw parallel between the signs, or individual natal charts, and the concept of character class. A good game design (of an enjoyable and fair game) has character classes that are both meaningfully different from each other to play, but which are also perfectly balanced.

The rules are therefore not directly the same for all, a distinct flaw of all man-made laws, but systematically customized and contextual - acknowledging the unique differences between various types of people and situations, but always dealing with each "player" equally fairly. It is really not very hard to imagine and understand such a system. What is the most difficult question is this one - by what (or who's) measure would the system be set up? The ultimate measure behind astrology, given its universal scope, has to be the ultimate meaning of existence, at least as far as it concerns us. Not a simple thing to explain.

Astrology of course doesn't present a complete answer, but it does have some useful things to say. Over the course of its development, astrology has been most likely inferred from observation, with a special focus being given to what leads to rise or to fall, to happiness or to sorrow. Unlike sheer philosophical speculation, astrology is built on two objective, measurable reference points - moment of birth and moment in question. Each is assigned a particular quality, also through systematic observational inference, and therefore you have a grasp of the subjective context.

First element of the context is what is happening now (or at the moment of question), second element of the context is who is it happening to (entity born from the quality of a particular moment in the past). Within this framework, at any given point in time, currently unfolding events will have a unique meaning for practically every individual, but it would still be all part of the same system of meaning. The relation of the chart of the person to the chart of the future moment would be a sort of qualitative equation, which would determine the nature of the choices that are available at that moment for that person.

Person in and of herself would also be only a set of possibilities allowed by the relations of various aspects of her natal chart, not an exact, objectifiable outcome. Given the degree of variability, there is a flexible ethical system within astrology, inferred from how the universe seems to treat various personalities making various decisions at various times. But just like you can have an underlying ethical philosophy behind a complex computer game, you can have one in a world, where various things can be good or bad, depending on who is doing them under what circumstances.

It may be in our nature to seek easy, simple, straightforward, and absolute answers to fundamental ethical questions, but we cannot really require the universe, even a naturally meaningful one, to be as we want it to be. Unlike what most skeptics might think, astrology is not an attempt at anthropomorphization of the natural world - there is no expectation that it will be *humanly* subjective. If anything, astrology is designed to point out all the ways in which the cosmic judgment diverges from common human expectations.

You may of course believe that everything in the universe happens randomly, without any rhyme or reason, since a reason would require intelligent design, for which there is no evidence. The funny thing is that astrology doesn't actually absolutely require the universe to be created or designed at all. Just like natural selection could be a process that simply emerges, there could be a similar process working on the level of consciousness, rather than on the level of biology, and on some level, the modern theory of memetics is starting to look in that direction. Just like natural selection regularly weeds out inferior DNA, the inferior ideas or inferior values can face similar fate through a similar kind of process.

The only way in which science can have a handle on anything like this is as quantitative information, but that doesn't preclude the possibility of a fundamentally qualitative natural dimension to it. In the astrological view, the universe's involvement with you starts with you being initiated by being born into the universe, and ends with you being removed from existence. In between the two, the universe can essentially only make things either easier or more difficult for you through imposing circumstances on you that are external to your will. Overall, it is not all that complicated to make sense of through observation.

That is why the "goodness" or "badness" of particular astrological configurations evolved more toward the concepts of easiness or difficulty, with each having their pros and cons. What is good is simply to get closer to realizing your full potential, since it has been outlined by the universe itself, and really, why would it allow for something completely undesirable to emerge? There is of course the chance that the ethical algorithm of our universe is not particularly good, and many people do point out all the nasty things in existence to that effect. But logically speaking, a universe in which nothing bad can happen can hardly leave any possibility for choice - choice implies the necessity of having something fundamentally different to choose from.

Since astrology is not really anthropomorphic, it doesn't really expect the universe to be made specifically for us, anyway, and therefore organisms or natural processes that thrive on making our lives terrible can be simply just as valid to the universe as we are, and therefore justified in their chance to exist. The qualitative system of the universe doesn't even have to put special emphasis on conscious entities, since all that occurs chaotically in nature is equally a choice under astrology, just maybe alien enough for us to not see it as such. In my opinion, thinking that only we are capable of processing meaning would be an exceptionally anthropomorphic assumption.

In this way, astrological philosophy is not very wishful. You look at what happens, time and again, and that tells you what the rules are, whether you like them or not. From what astrology observed so far, it seems that all the various alternative value systems that we have devised have their place and have their time. Come to think of it, it is only logical that we wouldn't come up with and develop ways of life that are truly irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. In all likelihood, there is an infinity of individual variations of these, so each astrological configuration is only a simplification, generalization and reduction, but as long as we keep that in mind, it can still be quite useful for meaningful differentiation.

To put it simply, if you are born as aries, other things are good and bad *for you* than if you were born in any other sign, both in principle and at specific times, but on the level of that principle, it is substantially similar to what is true for other people marked by the same sign. It doesn't necessarily mean the same objective, external manifestations, but that is only logical. If aries stands for example for originality or individuality, it outright demands objectively different outcomes. The opposite principle to it would be conformity, much more likely to result in objective outward sameness, though still conditionally - maybe conformity in a given context paradoxically requires customization of one's appearance. It is tricky to prove by an objective experiment, but it makes sense.

Not coincidentally, the ancient Greek culture, responsible for the most substantial advancement of astrology, had a concept, a value held in high regard, that is so lost to us now that we don't even have a proper translation for the term - sofrosyne. As best as I can describe it, it means the importance of truly knowing who you are and acting in accordance with it. If anything is a singular value derived from astrological view of the world, this would be it. You are an individual with a unique system of values, yes, but it is not arbitrary. It does allow for some variability, but within clear limits. You need to know when you are acting in accordance with who you really are, and you need to know when you are going against yourself.

Most importantly, you must not be, as they say, full of shit. It may mean that you sincerely like causing others suffering or that you like breaking rules, and then, apparently, the universe will judge you on the basis of how true you hold to that. It may even reward you, if you are properly wicked. This is one of the moments where the perceived unfairness of the world may surface - judged by the standards of "good" people, this would be wrong. But that reasoning is precisely what's wrong, because a man can only be really judged by his own internal standards. Not according to me, according to the universe, which astrology merely observes in action.

According to astrology, there is an extent to which conventional evils are necessary - pain and tragedy, while not easy or fun, can make one a much stronger or refined person than they otherwise would have been. However, barring some extraordinarily difficult karma, everyone should only get as much as they can handle. Which is to say, not all lives seem to be equally easy, even though all of them can be equally meaningful, since health, wealth or intelligence do not seem to be simply better than other "goods" in an unconditional way. A rich person may see poverty as terrible, while a poor person may actually lead a much happier life, perhaps because of better health. Similarly, an intelligent person could scarcely imagine something worse than mental retardation, while a mentally handicapped simpleton can in fact be much happier thanks to a loving family, which would be denied to others, and so on.

There is no absolute standard, only conditional answers, and infinite amount of variations. However, according to astrological approach, each unique instance does have a solution. Each combination of astrological aspects is a list of priorities in order, and a set of specific conditions for success or failure, as well as any particular results and feelings about them. It may not always be possible to get to a happy ending, but astrology can at least offer the serenity, flowing from the understanding of why things are the way they are, at any given moment, for any given person.