Astrology is “the study of the movements and relative positions of celestial objects as they have an influence on human affairs and the natural world.”
Before shedding light on the importance of astronomy study, I must explain what astronomy is and also clear up the confusion between the likely terms such as “astronomer, astrologist,” and “astronomy and astrology.
Defining astronomy as basically as possible: “The study of the universe as a whole”
There’s another term that is often confused with astronomy, which is “cosmology.” The term “cosmology” can be defined as “the study of the origins and evolution of our universe.”
Astrology is “the study of the movements and relative positions of celestial objects as they have an influence on human affairs and the natural world.”
I think this astrology is just a hoax and the movements and positions of celestial bodies can’t have any direct or indirect, good or bad result on humans and world. I can prove my point with reasonable, considerable and acceptable proofs.
For example, consider my star is Scorpio. It is Scorpio in Greek system because the Greeks saw the random arrangement of stars as a Scorpion. It is also possible that someone else, from somewhere else in the world saw the same arrangement of stars as a Dolphin.
Similarly, many people can see many patterns in random arrangement of stars. If I start to follow every system, then first of all, I don’t have a star symbol in particular, for a Scorpion in Greek system can be a Butterfly in Japanese system because there is no particular rule or law for considering a specific arrangement of stars as a particular shape.
So whose horoscope do I follow? It is possible, that considering my star as Scorpio, says that I will have a very good week and at the same time considering my star as Butterfly, my horoscope says that I will have a heavily bad week. As you can see none of it makes sense.
Secondly, the stars are not actually forming ANY patterns in the sky as we see them. They are actually really far away from us and from one another to form a specific pattern.
It is just their appearance on our (imaginary) celestial sphere that they seem to form a specific pattern, and if they don’t actually form any patterns in reality, how can their apparent patterns to us be relevant enough to affect our lives?
Thirdly, another point is that, if moon is passing in front of the Sun why would that affect my life? If a star has completed his life and has exploded, how does that affect my life? If three stars appear together and by chance form a pattern, how does that affect my life? Seems irrelevant enough to me.
By all this explanation, I wanted to state that Astrology and Astronomy should not be confused with one another for Astronomy is real while (in my opinion) Astrology is not.
Now finally, I will define the difference between an astronaut and an astronomer. An Astronomer is a person who studies, observes and explores universe with his theories, calculations etc.
While Astronaut is a person who travels to the space. And it is not always that he knows, understands and studies universe. Even the early astronauts were military pilots and some other people who were not astronomers. But the real question of my paper still remains un-answered, that is: Why should we study Astronomy any way?
I can answer this question in many ways and I will try to answer this question as simply as possible. First of all, it is a way to locate our position, place, value, importance etc. in this vast universe.
It first of all gives answer to our question: Where are we? Imagine someone asks you that where do you live? And you are not able to answer because you never studied any numbers or letters which could help you explain your location in the city or the town. Same is the case with Astronomy.
It teaches you how to know your address in this vast universe (In case you get lost and someone finds you, you must know your address in order for them to drop you back home).
Secondly, it tries to explain to us the purpose of our lives. Don’t you ever look up to the sky and think about those millions and billions of light years away stars.
Don’t you think “why are these things created?”, “why are these things that much far apart?”, “why am I even thinking and wondering at these wonders?”, “what is the purpose of my creation”, “how did I manage to build this conscience which drives my wonder and interest in this vast universe?” and many many more questions just like these.
If these questions don’t hit your mind at least once, you must train your brain to ask these questions. For these are the questions which can one day give us answer to the major question “why are we here? Why were we created?”
Astronomy is also an adventure and mystery in itself. Many of us are interested in great puzzles and mysteries. But why? I think the answer is in the following quote:- “Challenges are what make life interesting and overcoming them is what makes life meaning full”
So as for someone interested in mysteries and puzzles, Astronomy provides us the ground to deal with really big, thrilling and interesting mysteries. Plus it is a vast and free field; anyone can dive in its depths and can find invaluable pearls.
Astronomy is also necessary in the understanding of other subjects. If you study Physics, then its laws and theories have to apply somewhere otherwise it will be meaningless to study and derive all those long equations for hours if they don’t apply anywhere.
For example, taking Newton’s laws of motion, as his one law of motion states that a body in rest will continue to be in rest and a body in motion will continue its motion in a straight line unless disturbed by an external force.
So where does this apply? As on Earth, if we push a ball, it stops by itself after sometime. But if we set a rocket in motion in space, it keeps on going with uniform speed unless we fire thrusters to accelerate or decelerate the space craft. And many more laws of Physics can only be understood by the study of Astronomy.
There are many elements which were discovered in space before Earth. For example, Helium was found in Sun before on Earth.
There can be signs of life in the space and perhaps it can be intelligent life. This all can be discovered with the study of Astronomy.
Also the study of this universe gives us clear clues that there is a creator of all this vastness and there is a power, beyond our understanding capacities, which governs the universe.
All in one sentence, the Astronomy teaches us the philosophy of life. This discussion could be much longer. Therefore we all must know and understand (if not full then a little bit) the universe for it is the most intuitive, interesting and important subject to study if we want to find out the pattern, philosophy, arrangement, wisdom etc. of our creation.
I hope that the readers of this article find Astronomy as interesting as it is and want to understand more about universe because it is a magic within itself if you dive deeper and deeper into it!
