1 00:00:00,031 --> 00:00:01,734 Is there Buddhist astrology? 2 00:00:02,555 --> 00:00:04,978 Can planets really affect our reality? 3 00:00:09,425 --> 00:00:13,952 Remember you're asking a question about a Buddhist monk and his friends. 4 00:00:17,558 --> 00:00:24,849 So, I mean, to ask such a broad question like that, I can't answer properly. 5 00:00:24,869 --> 00:00:27,793 I could, but... 6 00:00:29,798 --> 00:00:58,523 It's going to be one of those questions where I say, in our tradition, from the point of view of our tradition, the Buddha was against using astrology, relying on even prognostication, predictions about the future. 7 00:00:59,785 --> 00:01:04,111 thinking about the future is not of interest. 8 00:01:05,053 --> 00:01:08,177 Monks are not allowed to learn astrology. 9 00:01:08,277 --> 00:01:21,016 We're only allowed to learn astronomy to the extent that we can predict, calculate the quarters so that we know when the full moon is going to be, when the empty moon is going to be. 10 00:01:23,199 --> 00:01:27,345 But I'll go out on a limb and say that indeed the Buddha didn't deny it and 11 00:01:27,713 --> 00:01:36,283 probably would have accepted the validity of Indian astrology. 12 00:01:37,104 --> 00:01:37,745 They even use it. 13 00:01:37,765 --> 00:01:40,048 I mean, many people do use it in Thailand. 14 00:01:40,248 --> 00:01:46,936 There are astrologers in Thailand who have talked to them about it. 15 00:01:46,956 --> 00:01:48,217 They've done my horoscope. 16 00:01:48,277 --> 00:01:50,700 And it's always interesting to listen. 17 00:01:53,043 --> 00:02:21,480 I would say just speculating that it's not that planets affect our reality it's that there's an interconnectedness to reality it's all one system so if you look at one facet of reality or one aspect of the universe you can you can recognize patterns that 18 00:02:22,557 --> 00:02:37,034 on a microscopic level or on a local level actually do have an effect of some sort or are mirrored on a local level. 19 00:02:37,195 --> 00:02:46,626 So humans might... human behavior might change based on the positions of planets. 20 00:02:46,646 --> 00:02:49,189 That being said, I would say it's... 21 00:02:52,392 --> 00:03:00,988 It's probably, I would guess that it's about 50% delusion and 50% actual recognition at best. 22 00:03:02,150 --> 00:03:12,409 Because a lot of astrology is just what, positive affirmation, I don't know what the term is, but some sort of... 23 00:03:19,072 --> 00:03:23,379 recognition, the wishful thinking you want to, you want it to apply to you. 24 00:03:24,741 --> 00:03:41,106 Now, there was an interesting article, an interesting video that I think I even shared out on the internet with Michael Shermer, this guy who does Skeptic Magazine, and he interviewed a, what's the word, are they called Ayurvedic astrologers? 25 00:03:41,146 --> 00:03:42,668 What are these Indian astrologers called? 26 00:03:43,430 --> 00:03:46,935 People who study, this guy who studied Indian Hindu astrology, 27 00:03:48,923 --> 00:04:07,106 and did an experiment where they had 10 people, something like 10 people, and these 10 people were to just give their birth date and I think their gender. 28 00:04:08,467 --> 00:04:12,873 I don't even know if they gave their gender, but their birth date may have been the only thing that he got. 29 00:04:12,893 --> 00:04:18,019 So he got the birth date, and then he recorded a video 30 00:04:19,130 --> 00:04:25,199 where he gave a horoscope for each of the ten people. 31 00:04:26,561 --> 00:04:36,515 And then they got all these ten people together and they put this guy behind a two-way mirror so he could watch and see what's going on so that they didn't see him. 32 00:04:36,855 --> 00:04:42,403 And they played back the video for each person one by one. 33 00:04:43,801 --> 00:04:55,393 And the things he said about them, they found about a 70%, something like a 70, I think, to 80% validity or correlation. 34 00:04:56,575 --> 00:05:05,745 So some things were, the person would say, no, that's not like me, but 70, 80% of the things that were said were recognized as being correct. 35 00:05:08,067 --> 00:05:09,408 Except for the last two people. 36 00:05:10,289 --> 00:05:13,673 Because this is the interesting part of the experiment, is that 37 00:05:14,024 --> 00:05:44,031 they switched the two last people's birth dates and so when it came to the last two people he gave the horoscope for the last person to the second last person and gave the horoscope for the second last person to the last person and the correlation was like twenty percent or thirty percent it was exact opposite then they told these two people that this is what they had done and then flipped them around again and right away got back up to seventy to eighty percent so 38 00:05:44,585 --> 00:05:57,912 You know, it's a small experiment, but the idea that these things could have an effect, it seems to be well documented in a pseudo-scientific way. 39 00:05:59,816 --> 00:06:04,365 Whether it would actually survive rigorous scientific testing is something else.