When someone accosts me as an astronomer and asks my view on whether planets govern our destinies, I am dismayed. The questioner is usually not an illiterate villager; he is a mobile-touting, educated citizen of India. Is he unaware that scientists no longer take astrology seriously?
By Dr Jayant Narlikar ( One of the greatest Astrophysicist in the world)(http://scientistsinformation.blogspot.com/2011/06/dr-jayant-narlikar.html)
The idea that planets rule human destinies seems to date back to Babylonian and Greek cultures. There is no reference to planetary astrology in the Vedas, by the way. Night-sky watchers had noted that across the well-regulated, celestial framework of stars a few bodies had motions that seemed irregular, sometimes going backward, sometimes forward.
The Greeks called these bodies planets, in their language wanderers. Why did planets wander? Scientifically inclined observers followed Aristotle and tried to place planetary motion in a geometrically defined framework that would reveal the pattern behind the wanderings.
Those who were not in this select group assumed that planets wandered on account of their will power. From that assumption, they concluded that the will power of planets was also exercised on mortals on earth. This belief blossomed into a large system that came to be called astrology.
It spread far and wide, and found a very positive reception in India. The scientific approach went through several hiccups, but eventually the works of Copernicus, Galileo and Kepler discovered the real pattern behind planetary motions.
Kepler's findings in the first half of the 17th century led Isaac Newton to the discovery of the law of gravitation.
Today, we know why planets wander. They do not have any will power. Rather, they are inert systems that move in mathematically determined orbits round the sun.
Primarily, it is against the Directive Principles of the Constitution, which insists on inculcating scientific temper among the people, since astrology is just a bundle of superstitions, which will lead us back to the days of cavemen. Horoscope, the outcome of astrology is supposed to be the text detailing the destiny of a man which is mainly based on the Hindu scriptures. Secondly, Vedic astrology includes non-existing Rahu and Ketu as two of the nine planets brought out by the wide imagination of the Hindu Vedic Pandits. If that is so, it is against another basic principle of the secular Indian constitution in dividing Indians into Hindus and Non Hindus. Not only have numerous studies failed to support astrology, but the techniques used by astrologers are also very dubious. In fact scientists insists that astrologers' business should be brought under Consumers Protection Act. Consumers should be allowed to sue astrologers if they fail in their predictions.
By Dr Jayant Narlikar ( One of the greatest Astrophysicist in the world)(http://scientistsinformation.blogspot.com/2011/06/dr-jayant-narlikar.html)
