February 9, 2011 • 21 mins
Inspired by an article about recent changes to the zodiac, Cristen and Molly examine the use of horoscopes in modern society. Tune in to learn more about horoscopes -- and how they can affect an individual's perception of happiness.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
It's ready. Are you welcome to stump Mom never told you?
From House top works dot com. Hello and welcome to
the podcast. I'm Kristen and I'm Molly Molly. A few
(00:21):
weeks ago, I received some very disturbing news like, Oprah,
do you have a half sister? I don't have a
half sister that I know of, Okay, so that one
can still come. So that yeah, So that's um that
remains to be seen. But I went on Gawker towards
the end of the day. I was finishing at my
work day and just kind of needed a little mind break.
(00:42):
Went on Gawker, and I found out that I was
no longer a sagittarius. Goodness. In fact, I found out
that I was not only no longer a sagittarius, but
I was a sign that I had never heard of
and can barely pronounced. I believe it's called an effusius.
What am I supposed to? You know? How how am
I supposed to deal with that? You've been living alive,
(01:05):
you know, see since I you know, my life is
dictated by my cosmo horoscopes. You know, and and there's
no there's no box in there for an effusions. What
are you supposed to do? How am I supposed to
meet the right man at a at a bar if
I don't know how my sign will match up? Could
you even finish your assignment that day not knowing what
(01:27):
your future? Help? You know what? I put my pencil
down and I just I just went home and I
just got into bed, you know, I actually I didn't.
I wrote something on Facebook and people got, you know,
got got really excited about it. But people say that
when they find out your sylambic, Oh, that's so, that's
so arious of you, so sagittarious of you. Um, and
(01:48):
that was you know, people sometimes abscribe these traits to
themselves because of their star sign, even they although they
claimed not to believe it, because the Facebook outcry and
the Twitter outcry was usually people saying, I may not
believe in astrology, but I sure to want my sign change.
I just remember a lot of people being outraged that
they had gotten bumped to being in a Sagittarius. I
(02:09):
was feeling a lot of anti anti sage sentiment and
it was really making me very resentful. Well, despite the
fact that everyone fell apart at the seams. There was
really nothing to worry about. That's all got started because, uh,
this guy gave an interview about how the fact that
the stars have all changed since ancient times, and you know,
(02:29):
the signs are not related to where they actually should
be based on the planet's now. But the fact of
the matter is for us, Kristen, uh, we tend to
read horoscopes based on Western astrology, and they are all
these different zodiacs, and our zodiacs did not change. There's
a tropical zodiac fixed to the season, and that's the
one Western astrology follows, whereas there's another zodiac which is
(02:52):
more fixed the actual movement of the constellations and can
handle it when the stars moved positions, and uh, we
tend we we use the seasonal one, so we've always
had two zodiacs. This article will probably come up, This
idea will come up again in five years. It came
up five years ago. I found an old article about it.
It's your sign will never change, Thank goodness. And that's
(03:14):
good because Kristin, you and I are quite matched, quite
the perfect pair. We are to your aries. We are.
It works well meant to be, and that must be
why the podcast is so long running. I mean, I
always knew that I was supposed to be seeking out
Sagritarius is for my romantic relationships, but I looked up
(03:35):
our friendship, poor Skip Christen, and we are just dynamite.
The two of us are forever searching for adventure, and
but we are accident prone. Well, I'm pretty closed. We
are kind of complexy. Yeah. Um, sometimes I can be
too overbearing for your freedom loving ways, that's true, But
but I need you to remember christ and that I
am more sensitive than you. And sometimes you be careful
(03:56):
before you speak and say something too blunt. I apologize
in advance. Those are our challenges. But after reading this
horsecope from an anonymous astrology site, I just feel like
the world is our oyster and with our powers combined,
we can do anything. Now, I think it's time for
us to let people know why we're talking about astrology,
(04:19):
because we tend to stick to pretty pretty logical, factual topics.
We love things that are proved by science. How happened
if we talked about studies on this podcast and astrology
is so it seems so frivolous in many ways you know,
it's like going to a psychic or a fortune teller.
You know, take it with a grain of salt um
and it's nothing exactly, It's nothing that can be proven
(04:43):
by scientific methodologies. But why not talk about astrology? We
figured because a people freaked out about the possibility their
sign of change and be According to a Gallop pole,
a good amount of people believe at least a little
bit in the principles of astrology. According to a Gallop Pole,
(05:06):
of American women and twenty three percent of men believe
that astrology, or the position of the stars and planets,
can affect people's lives. And you know, women tendably more
than men. And while that gap is pretty small in
the US, the difference becomes more pronounced when you consider
Canada and Great Britain. And Canada pent of women believe
(05:28):
that astrology can have an effect on your life versus
seventeen percent of men. Percent of women in Great Britain
believe that in fourteen percent of men. So it's always
something that's been associated more with women. And you like
Christ and you already mentioned Cosmo, you only have to
open up a cosmotivecy horoscopes. Your guy's horoscopes, your love horoscope.
And uh, since we talk about love so often, we've
(05:50):
got to consider the fact that love can be written
in the stars. And you know, some signs are better
match than others, and and is is there anything to this?
And if you're gonna turn to good old scientific studies,
people are going to tell you know. And this goes
back to one when a fellow named Bernie Silverman at
(06:11):
Michigan State University took all these charts of happily married
couples and all these charts of couples who had split,
mixed them all up, sent them out to astrologers and said,
tell me which ones are matched astrologically, have those compatible signs,
and tell me which ones are not. And let's see
if the divorce ones are the ones who are just
(06:32):
not matched astrologically and there was no connection. Science is
not going to ever help us, uh figure out who
were meant to marry. But we still can't help checking
that daily horoscope. Well, maybe you know we talked about
in the with a gallop Pole. It's about a third
of women tend to believe at least a little bit
(06:52):
in astrology. Maybe, Molly, if we look at those women's signs.
We would find that they are positive signs because there
was a study that we found called who Believes in Astrology? Um,
then you have to read the whole title. It's the
longest title for what boils down to a question of
hocus in astrology. This is by Margaret Hamilton's from the
(07:16):
University of Wisconsin, who believes in astrology. Effect of favorable
nous of astrologically derived personality descriptions on acceptance of astrology.
And this is pretty cool because I did not realize
that there are sort of divides between the astrological signs. Yeah,
there are six positive odd numbered signs which are aries Gemini, Leo, Libra, Sagittarius,
(07:42):
in Aquarius. So that's both of us fall into these
masculine signs positive signs, which is weird since we do
a lady pock, I know. And then there's six negative
even number signs that are considered the feminine signs, which
are tourists, Cancer, Virgo, Scorpio, Capricorn, and Pisces. So according
to hand Alton, the positive slash masculine signs have really
(08:03):
awesome descriptions. Everyone wants to be part of these groups.
Like when you read a description of an areas, you're like, yes,
I'm awesome, and that's probably why you were so sad
that you lost your Sagittarius standing because it's a masculine science.
Got a good description. Yeah, masculine science tend to be
more extroverted, a little bit more determined, um, a little
more outspoken than the more feminine signs, right, and so
(08:26):
the feminine signs often have these descriptions that are like,
you don't like conflict, and you will shy away from
these interactions and you will just think things are pretty
and live a normal life, whereas your areas is fiery
and um. And so what Hamilton's came to the conclusion
of is that when people are presented with these differing descriptions,
(08:48):
the people who have the masculine signs are going to
think that's a good description and that defines me, whereas
people when they're confronted with the descriptions of the other
six signs, are like, no way, I don't think so,
not gonna happen. So it's possible that perhaps we're more
attuned to our astrological destiny if we believe that our
(09:09):
sign can help us in some way. And that was
the subject for an article on web md about you know,
if if you read a horoscope and they tend to
be positive, there always seems to be something good coming
your way. There's nothing wrong with thinking that that, hey,
something good's coming. Or if you learn that you're in
areas and you're real fiery, to let that inspire you
(09:30):
to be more outspoken, to take the reins and make
something happen for yourself rather than to be passive. It can,
it can be a helpful, self fulfilling thing if you
let it. But you have to keep in mind if
you tend to read horoscopes on a regular basis, and
I'll tell folks right now, I love to read my horoscope.
I go to day, I go to Free Wheel Astrology,
and it's so entertaining every Thursday. Um. But you have
(09:55):
to keep in mind that there is a confirmation bias
at work, and it's basically, you take what seems to
match your life and you leave the rest. Right. When
it matches up, you're like, oh my gosh. Yes, When
it doesn't match up, you're like, it's off this week.
And I mean, you know, when there's something that's written
for people who's who you know, for a group of
(10:17):
people who all were born within a set period of time.
That's a pretty wide range of people, and some things
are going to ring true for some of them, and
some are are going to ring true for none of them.
And um, you know, if you can take it with
that grain of salt and use it to propel your
life forward. Doctors are saying and researcher are saying, that's
no big deal, but you're facing your life on it.
(10:37):
Of course problem. I mean, of course it's a bad
idea for us to base our life on horoscopes. But
even just taking you got to take the personality descriptions
with a grain of salt as well. Because there was
an article from Discovery News on a two thousand six
study from a school in Denmark and the Sky looked
(10:59):
at astrological connections between over fifteen thousand people and their
UH and their personality descriptors and found absolutely no correlation.
Fifteen thousand people. It's it's pretty significant population size. So oh,
you know, every study you read, you you think that
this is never gonna work. It's it's all chance. These
(11:20):
astrologers who look at random charts, they it's they always
do about as well as they would do if they
flipped a coin. So you always bear than in mind.
But when you read Hamilton's study and you you realize
that there's this confirmation bias at work. Let's say that
I do think, Okay, i am the stereotypical Arias, and
I'm going to read this fun horoscope and and you know,
use it to inspire me to live my best life.
(11:40):
To borrow what term from Oprah? What does that then
mean when I then flipped the page and read you know,
about the kind of guy that I should be attracting.
How am I supposed to use that information? Am I
closing myself off to a love with another Arias despite
the fact that that would be a really pestible thing? Right,
(12:01):
Because what you're talking about in terms of astrological compatibility
is something called sinistry. That is true, and this is
comparing sinistry gets much deeper than just your sun's sign,
and sun signs are based solely on your birthday. For instance,
I was born on December three, hence I am a Sagittarius.
(12:21):
Sagittarius is my sun sign. But sinistry goes a lot
deeper by looking at and comparing the alignment of the
planets between you and your intended lover um and how
they match up right. And you know, since we have
this royal wedding coming up, there's been a lot of
(12:41):
trying to determine the sinistry between Prince William and Kate
Middleton and so far things are looking pretty great. Look
is great. So anyway, like christ And said, taking sinistry
is is a little bit more complicated. And what they
do is they measure sort of positions of planets and
suns and how uh they're going to interact with someone else.
And it gives you this picture of ways in which
(13:02):
you're going to interact really well and also what the
weaknesses in your relationship are going to be. And it
doesn't doom anyone. Is just a metter of how you're
how you're going to have to work. If if you
could know your trouble spots ahead of time, would you
want to And you know they're not saying anyone's doomed,
but if you know that, hey, we tend to butt
(13:23):
heads a lot, could that help you in your relationship?
And I think it's kind of an interesting question. I mean,
it doesn't seem like it could hurt anyone to know
what some trouble spots might be, but then are these
really your trouble spots. If if astrology is just a
lot of bump, if your mars and venus alignment does
not show much attraction, should you just give it up? Well,
(13:44):
that that's the question. And you know, people who even
are our master astrologers claim that the concept of synistry
is one of the harder things about astrology, measuring these
these two people against each other, and you know, it's
it's just gonna real things like chimis stree, uh, temperaments
and how they're going to interact. But it's not going
to be any sort of thing like on April fifteen,
(14:07):
you guys are gonna have a really big fight and
things will be uh, you know, and not you just
can't fix them. It'll be more things like this person
is really headstrong and this person is really laid back,
so watch out well, and you have to keep in
mind And this was something that came up in an
article that you found about the trouble with snistry is
that people do not exist in a vacuum. It's fun
(14:28):
to look at horoscopes and maybe there are certain um
certain insight we can glean about ourselves and about our
interactions with other people. But when it comes to, you know,
relationships we were, it's not just you and the other
person and nothing else affecting you. But let's take it
one last time. Let's take the hopeful approach to it,
(14:49):
because I have to say, Kristen, when I really want
to believe in this stuff, I just want to believe it.
But I'm going to try and take the best positive
point of view and relate it to this other study
we found about what happens from people who take the
best positive you go home to a loved one. Because
this was pretty interesting. And I thought this was interesting
mostly because when I did read that you and I
are so compatible, I was like, oh, that brings true.
(15:10):
I get along with Kristen. They've had a great adventure
on this podcast, and um, you know, sometimes when I
look at who I'm compatible with and then I find
out what their birthdays are, I'm like, I could see something.
So let's say I'm this typical person who sees something
to it and who can get the occasional really great
horoscope and have it brightened my day. Researchers named Susan
(15:31):
Blackmore and Mary and Sebold wanted to see what someone
like that would do and when they went home to
a loved one after reading that kind of horor scopes.
What they did is they took groups of women and
gave them a positive horoscope about love, things that were
like passions at a high, things are going to be
a great romance, all speed, full speed ahead. And then
(15:55):
they gave the other group of women really neutral love horoscopes, like, ah,
you should really work on interdependence and personal skills and communication,
just kind of a to do list of things to
work on. Nothing negative they said that would be ethically questionable,
break up with your fiance right now. But just things
that were sort of you know, yeah, it was okay.
(16:15):
The kind of horse scope you disregard if it wasn't
what you wanted it to say, Like the fortune cookies
that are like today was pleasant. Yeah, you're like, do
you like to travel? Yeah? Really really tell me something
I don't know, fortune. So anyway, those are the two
groups of women they have. Before they gave women these horoscopes,
they asked them to rate their happiness and satisfaction with
their current relationship, and it was things like, you know,
(16:36):
we talk a lot, we see eye to eye, things
are great, things are not great. Then they gave him
the horoscope, and then they had the women do uh
the same status of the other relationship survey again a
week later, and even the women who believed fervently that
their horoscope could tell them something and also got a
horroscope that said romance is great, You're madly in love,
(16:57):
this is the one they didn't rate their relationship in
differently than the women who had gotten the neutral horoscope.
It was I mean, I guess maybe it was a
really small bump, but statistically insignificant, not worth talking about.
So I think that that's when you do see all
these love horoscopes and Cosmo. It's interesting to realize that
even in this study, the women who believed that everything
(17:21):
in a horoscope could apply to their lives still didn't
have a magical change in their relationship because of it. Right,
It didn't affect any any behavioral outcome. Really, so even
if we do talk about people who find that confirmation bias,
who take the best part of their horoscopes move forward
with it, it's not going to affect love. So it's
not written the stars, not written in the stars, and
(17:42):
that probably means that our title of the podcast, What's
Your Sign Baby is not a very good pickup line.
It never was um and apparently cancers and capricorns need
not apply with me. But that's just that's just according
to some random astrology. Stay. Yeah, I think I'm supposed
to find another sagittarius. But does that make me a narcissist?
(18:04):
I don't know. Question for another day, Kristen. I think
that might be one of one of my personality drinks.
But anyway, so I'm glad. I'm really glad that all
of this, uh, this podcast research says that astrology is bunk,
so I don't have to worry too much about the
shortcomings of being a sagittarius. But it all depends on
the culture. You know. In India, for example, people still
(18:24):
do married based on whether the charts tell them this
is a good match and also picking the day they
get married. So if you do find yourself reading your
horoscope and you are a woman, you can at least
chalk it up to statistics and that women are more
likely to read their horoscope and take something from it.
There we go and tune in for our next podcast,
which will be on fortune telling and dear, oh God,
(18:47):
but we want to know from you guys if if
astrology has played any part in your life, zero part
in your life. If you have stopped listening by now,
you can probably are emailed us that this was don't sang,
I mean, I'm just gonna stay. Don't take yourself too
seriously about let us let us talk about astrology for
an episode if we want to. Okay, and uh, we
look forward to hear what you guys have to say.
Maybe someone did find the perfect love match and we're
(19:10):
all because of that pickup line. What's you're signed? Or
maybe you defied a repellent match. That's true, that's what
we want to hear about. So mom stuff at how
stuff works dot com is the email, and I will
read an email from Tim about eyebrow grooming. Tim rights
when it comes to male eyebrow grooming, I would like
to weigh in with a few points. I believe I
(19:31):
read an Esquire grooming tip either this year last year
that this official distance between eyebrows is the size of
your thumb. You take your thumb place between your eyebrows,
and then either shave or pluck the hairs in between
out and then grooming my eyebrows since high school, and
with mixed results. When I was first starting, I just
took a razor and shaved a straight line down the
middle portion, which created a large and awkward space between.
(19:52):
I've also tried shaving each one individually, point the razor
against one brow, then going for the next, which would
often create unevenly sized and clearly groomed eyebrows. Now I
just did with plucking, although one of my friends says
that he waxes, but only when they grow together and
his hairdresser won't let him leave without it. I think
that the largely unspoken rule of men's eyebrow grooming is
to do it discreetly and in a way that looks
(20:14):
as if you have groomed your brows without actually having
groomed your eyebrows, so the inside our scoop. Good tip
from a male listener. Well, if you have any tips
you'd like to send our way, our email is mom
Stuff at how stuff works dot com, and of course
you can catch up with us and send us a
note as well on Twitter and on Facebook. We'd love
to see you over there. And finally, you can read
(20:35):
what we're writing during the week at our blog stuff
We'll Never Told You, and it's how stuff works dot
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(20:56):
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It's ready, are you
Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
It's ready. Are you welcome to stump Mom never told you?
From House top works dot com. Hello and welcome to
the podcast. I'm Kristen and I'm Molly Molly. A few
(00:21):
weeks ago, I received some very disturbing news like, Oprah,
do you have a half sister? I don't have a
half sister that I know of, Okay, so that one
can still come. So that yeah, So that's um that
remains to be seen. But I went on Gawker towards
the end of the day. I was finishing at my
work day and just kind of needed a little mind break.
(00:42):
Went on Gawker, and I found out that I was
no longer a sagittarius. Goodness. In fact, I found out
that I was not only no longer a sagittarius, but
I was a sign that I had never heard of
and can barely pronounced. I believe it's called an effusius.
What am I supposed to? You know? How how am
I supposed to deal with that? You've been living alive,
(01:05):
you know, see since I you know, my life is
dictated by my cosmo horoscopes. You know, and and there's
no there's no box in there for an effusions. What
are you supposed to do? How am I supposed to
meet the right man at a at a bar if
I don't know how my sign will match up? Could
you even finish your assignment that day not knowing what
(01:27):
your future? Help? You know what? I put my pencil
down and I just I just went home and I
just got into bed, you know, I actually I didn't.
I wrote something on Facebook and people got, you know,
got got really excited about it. But people say that
when they find out your sylambic, Oh, that's so, that's
so arious of you, so sagittarious of you. Um, and
(01:48):
that was you know, people sometimes abscribe these traits to
themselves because of their star sign, even they although they
claimed not to believe it, because the Facebook outcry and
the Twitter outcry was usually people saying, I may not
believe in astrology, but I sure to want my sign change.
I just remember a lot of people being outraged that
they had gotten bumped to being in a Sagittarius. I
(02:09):
was feeling a lot of anti anti sage sentiment and
it was really making me very resentful. Well, despite the
fact that everyone fell apart at the seams. There was
really nothing to worry about. That's all got started because, uh,
this guy gave an interview about how the fact that
the stars have all changed since ancient times, and you know,
(02:29):
the signs are not related to where they actually should
be based on the planet's now. But the fact of
the matter is for us, Kristen, uh, we tend to
read horoscopes based on Western astrology, and they are all
these different zodiacs, and our zodiacs did not change. There's
a tropical zodiac fixed to the season, and that's the
one Western astrology follows, whereas there's another zodiac which is
(02:52):
more fixed the actual movement of the constellations and can
handle it when the stars moved positions, and uh, we
tend we we use the seasonal one, so we've always
had two zodiacs. This article will probably come up, This
idea will come up again in five years. It came
up five years ago. I found an old article about it.
It's your sign will never change, Thank goodness. And that's
(03:14):
good because Kristin, you and I are quite matched, quite
the perfect pair. We are to your aries. We are.
It works well meant to be, and that must be
why the podcast is so long running. I mean, I
always knew that I was supposed to be seeking out
Sagritarius is for my romantic relationships, but I looked up
(03:35):
our friendship, poor Skip Christen, and we are just dynamite.
The two of us are forever searching for adventure, and
but we are accident prone. Well, I'm pretty closed. We
are kind of complexy. Yeah. Um, sometimes I can be
too overbearing for your freedom loving ways, that's true, But
but I need you to remember christ and that I
am more sensitive than you. And sometimes you be careful
(03:56):
before you speak and say something too blunt. I apologize
in advance. Those are our challenges. But after reading this
horsecope from an anonymous astrology site, I just feel like
the world is our oyster and with our powers combined,
we can do anything. Now, I think it's time for
us to let people know why we're talking about astrology,
(04:19):
because we tend to stick to pretty pretty logical, factual topics.
We love things that are proved by science. How happened
if we talked about studies on this podcast and astrology
is so it seems so frivolous in many ways you know,
it's like going to a psychic or a fortune teller.
You know, take it with a grain of salt um
and it's nothing exactly, It's nothing that can be proven
(04:43):
by scientific methodologies. But why not talk about astrology? We
figured because a people freaked out about the possibility their
sign of change and be According to a Gallop pole,
a good amount of people believe at least a little
bit in the principles of astrology. According to a Gallop Pole,
(05:06):
of American women and twenty three percent of men believe
that astrology, or the position of the stars and planets,
can affect people's lives. And you know, women tendably more
than men. And while that gap is pretty small in
the US, the difference becomes more pronounced when you consider
Canada and Great Britain. And Canada pent of women believe
(05:28):
that astrology can have an effect on your life versus
seventeen percent of men. Percent of women in Great Britain
believe that in fourteen percent of men. So it's always
something that's been associated more with women. And you like
Christ and you already mentioned Cosmo, you only have to
open up a cosmotivecy horoscopes. Your guy's horoscopes, your love horoscope.
And uh, since we talk about love so often, we've
(05:50):
got to consider the fact that love can be written
in the stars. And you know, some signs are better
match than others, and and is is there anything to this?
And if you're gonna turn to good old scientific studies,
people are going to tell you know. And this goes
back to one when a fellow named Bernie Silverman at
(06:11):
Michigan State University took all these charts of happily married
couples and all these charts of couples who had split,
mixed them all up, sent them out to astrologers and said,
tell me which ones are matched astrologically, have those compatible signs,
and tell me which ones are not. And let's see
if the divorce ones are the ones who are just
(06:32):
not matched astrologically and there was no connection. Science is
not going to ever help us, uh figure out who
were meant to marry. But we still can't help checking
that daily horoscope. Well, maybe you know we talked about
in the with a gallop Pole. It's about a third
of women tend to believe at least a little bit
(06:52):
in astrology. Maybe, Molly, if we look at those women's signs.
We would find that they are positive signs because there
was a study that we found called who Believes in Astrology? Um,
then you have to read the whole title. It's the
longest title for what boils down to a question of
hocus in astrology. This is by Margaret Hamilton's from the
(07:16):
University of Wisconsin, who believes in astrology. Effect of favorable
nous of astrologically derived personality descriptions on acceptance of astrology.
And this is pretty cool because I did not realize
that there are sort of divides between the astrological signs. Yeah,
there are six positive odd numbered signs which are aries Gemini, Leo, Libra, Sagittarius,
(07:42):
in Aquarius. So that's both of us fall into these
masculine signs positive signs, which is weird since we do
a lady pock, I know. And then there's six negative
even number signs that are considered the feminine signs, which
are tourists, Cancer, Virgo, Scorpio, Capricorn, and Pisces. So according
to hand Alton, the positive slash masculine signs have really
(08:03):
awesome descriptions. Everyone wants to be part of these groups.
Like when you read a description of an areas, you're like, yes,
I'm awesome, and that's probably why you were so sad
that you lost your Sagittarius standing because it's a masculine science.
Got a good description. Yeah, masculine science tend to be
more extroverted, a little bit more determined, um, a little
more outspoken than the more feminine signs, right, and so
(08:26):
the feminine signs often have these descriptions that are like,
you don't like conflict, and you will shy away from
these interactions and you will just think things are pretty
and live a normal life, whereas your areas is fiery
and um. And so what Hamilton's came to the conclusion
of is that when people are presented with these differing descriptions,
(08:48):
the people who have the masculine signs are going to
think that's a good description and that defines me, whereas
people when they're confronted with the descriptions of the other
six signs, are like, no way, I don't think so,
not gonna happen. So it's possible that perhaps we're more
attuned to our astrological destiny if we believe that our
(09:09):
sign can help us in some way. And that was
the subject for an article on web md about you know,
if if you read a horoscope and they tend to
be positive, there always seems to be something good coming
your way. There's nothing wrong with thinking that that, hey,
something good's coming. Or if you learn that you're in
areas and you're real fiery, to let that inspire you
(09:30):
to be more outspoken, to take the reins and make
something happen for yourself rather than to be passive. It can,
it can be a helpful, self fulfilling thing if you
let it. But you have to keep in mind if
you tend to read horoscopes on a regular basis, and
I'll tell folks right now, I love to read my horoscope.
I go to day, I go to Free Wheel Astrology,
and it's so entertaining every Thursday. Um. But you have
(09:55):
to keep in mind that there is a confirmation bias
at work, and it's basically, you take what seems to
match your life and you leave the rest. Right. When
it matches up, you're like, oh my gosh. Yes, When
it doesn't match up, you're like, it's off this week.
And I mean, you know, when there's something that's written
for people who's who you know, for a group of
(10:17):
people who all were born within a set period of time.
That's a pretty wide range of people, and some things
are going to ring true for some of them, and
some are are going to ring true for none of them.
And um, you know, if you can take it with
that grain of salt and use it to propel your
life forward. Doctors are saying and researcher are saying, that's
no big deal, but you're facing your life on it.
(10:37):
Of course problem. I mean, of course it's a bad
idea for us to base our life on horoscopes. But
even just taking you got to take the personality descriptions
with a grain of salt as well. Because there was
an article from Discovery News on a two thousand six
study from a school in Denmark and the Sky looked
(10:59):
at astrological connections between over fifteen thousand people and their
UH and their personality descriptors and found absolutely no correlation.
Fifteen thousand people. It's it's pretty significant population size. So oh,
you know, every study you read, you you think that
this is never gonna work. It's it's all chance. These
(11:20):
astrologers who look at random charts, they it's they always
do about as well as they would do if they
flipped a coin. So you always bear than in mind.
But when you read Hamilton's study and you you realize
that there's this confirmation bias at work. Let's say that
I do think, Okay, i am the stereotypical Arias, and
I'm going to read this fun horoscope and and you know,
use it to inspire me to live my best life.
(11:40):
To borrow what term from Oprah? What does that then
mean when I then flipped the page and read you know,
about the kind of guy that I should be attracting.
How am I supposed to use that information? Am I
closing myself off to a love with another Arias despite
the fact that that would be a really pestible thing? Right,
(12:01):
Because what you're talking about in terms of astrological compatibility
is something called sinistry. That is true, and this is
comparing sinistry gets much deeper than just your sun's sign,
and sun signs are based solely on your birthday. For instance,
I was born on December three, hence I am a Sagittarius.
(12:21):
Sagittarius is my sun sign. But sinistry goes a lot
deeper by looking at and comparing the alignment of the
planets between you and your intended lover um and how
they match up right. And you know, since we have
this royal wedding coming up, there's been a lot of
(12:41):
trying to determine the sinistry between Prince William and Kate
Middleton and so far things are looking pretty great. Look
is great. So anyway, like christ And said, taking sinistry
is is a little bit more complicated. And what they
do is they measure sort of positions of planets and
suns and how uh they're going to interact with someone else.
And it gives you this picture of ways in which
(13:02):
you're going to interact really well and also what the
weaknesses in your relationship are going to be. And it
doesn't doom anyone. Is just a metter of how you're
how you're going to have to work. If if you
could know your trouble spots ahead of time, would you
want to And you know they're not saying anyone's doomed,
but if you know that, hey, we tend to butt
(13:23):
heads a lot, could that help you in your relationship?
And I think it's kind of an interesting question. I mean,
it doesn't seem like it could hurt anyone to know
what some trouble spots might be, but then are these
really your trouble spots. If if astrology is just a
lot of bump, if your mars and venus alignment does
not show much attraction, should you just give it up? Well,
(13:44):
that that's the question. And you know, people who even
are our master astrologers claim that the concept of synistry
is one of the harder things about astrology, measuring these
these two people against each other, and you know, it's
it's just gonna real things like chimis stree, uh, temperaments
and how they're going to interact. But it's not going
to be any sort of thing like on April fifteen,
(14:07):
you guys are gonna have a really big fight and
things will be uh, you know, and not you just
can't fix them. It'll be more things like this person
is really headstrong and this person is really laid back,
so watch out well, and you have to keep in
mind And this was something that came up in an
article that you found about the trouble with snistry is
that people do not exist in a vacuum. It's fun
(14:28):
to look at horoscopes and maybe there are certain um
certain insight we can glean about ourselves and about our
interactions with other people. But when it comes to, you know,
relationships we were, it's not just you and the other
person and nothing else affecting you. But let's take it
one last time. Let's take the hopeful approach to it,
(14:49):
because I have to say, Kristen, when I really want
to believe in this stuff, I just want to believe it.
But I'm going to try and take the best positive
point of view and relate it to this other study
we found about what happens from people who take the
best positive you go home to a loved one. Because
this was pretty interesting. And I thought this was interesting
mostly because when I did read that you and I
are so compatible, I was like, oh, that brings true.
(15:10):
I get along with Kristen. They've had a great adventure
on this podcast, and um, you know, sometimes when I
look at who I'm compatible with and then I find
out what their birthdays are, I'm like, I could see something.
So let's say I'm this typical person who sees something
to it and who can get the occasional really great
horoscope and have it brightened my day. Researchers named Susan
(15:31):
Blackmore and Mary and Sebold wanted to see what someone
like that would do and when they went home to
a loved one after reading that kind of horor scopes.
What they did is they took groups of women and
gave them a positive horoscope about love, things that were
like passions at a high, things are going to be
a great romance, all speed, full speed ahead. And then
(15:55):
they gave the other group of women really neutral love horoscopes, like, ah,
you should really work on interdependence and personal skills and communication,
just kind of a to do list of things to
work on. Nothing negative they said that would be ethically questionable,
break up with your fiance right now. But just things
that were sort of you know, yeah, it was okay.
(16:15):
The kind of horse scope you disregard if it wasn't
what you wanted it to say, Like the fortune cookies
that are like today was pleasant. Yeah, you're like, do
you like to travel? Yeah? Really really tell me something
I don't know, fortune. So anyway, those are the two
groups of women they have. Before they gave women these horoscopes,
they asked them to rate their happiness and satisfaction with
their current relationship, and it was things like, you know,
(16:36):
we talk a lot, we see eye to eye, things
are great, things are not great. Then they gave him
the horoscope, and then they had the women do uh
the same status of the other relationship survey again a
week later, and even the women who believed fervently that
their horoscope could tell them something and also got a
horroscope that said romance is great, You're madly in love,
(16:57):
this is the one they didn't rate their relationship in
differently than the women who had gotten the neutral horoscope.
It was I mean, I guess maybe it was a
really small bump, but statistically insignificant, not worth talking about.
So I think that that's when you do see all
these love horoscopes and Cosmo. It's interesting to realize that
even in this study, the women who believed that everything
(17:21):
in a horoscope could apply to their lives still didn't
have a magical change in their relationship because of it. Right,
It didn't affect any any behavioral outcome. Really, so even
if we do talk about people who find that confirmation bias,
who take the best part of their horoscopes move forward
with it, it's not going to affect love. So it's
not written the stars, not written in the stars, and
(17:42):
that probably means that our title of the podcast, What's
Your Sign Baby is not a very good pickup line.
It never was um and apparently cancers and capricorns need
not apply with me. But that's just that's just according
to some random astrology. Stay. Yeah, I think I'm supposed
to find another sagittarius. But does that make me a narcissist?
(18:04):
I don't know. Question for another day, Kristen. I think
that might be one of one of my personality drinks.
But anyway, so I'm glad. I'm really glad that all
of this, uh, this podcast research says that astrology is bunk,
so I don't have to worry too much about the
shortcomings of being a sagittarius. But it all depends on
the culture. You know. In India, for example, people still
(18:24):
do married based on whether the charts tell them this
is a good match and also picking the day they
get married. So if you do find yourself reading your
horoscope and you are a woman, you can at least
chalk it up to statistics and that women are more
likely to read their horoscope and take something from it.
There we go and tune in for our next podcast,
which will be on fortune telling and dear, oh God,
(18:47):
but we want to know from you guys if if
astrology has played any part in your life, zero part
in your life. If you have stopped listening by now,
you can probably are emailed us that this was don't sang,
I mean, I'm just gonna stay. Don't take yourself too
seriously about let us let us talk about astrology for
an episode if we want to. Okay, and uh, we
look forward to hear what you guys have to say.
Maybe someone did find the perfect love match and we're
(19:10):
all because of that pickup line. What's you're signed? Or
maybe you defied a repellent match. That's true, that's what
we want to hear about. So mom stuff at how
stuff works dot com is the email, and I will
read an email from Tim about eyebrow grooming. Tim rights
when it comes to male eyebrow grooming, I would like
to weigh in with a few points. I believe I
(19:31):
read an Esquire grooming tip either this year last year
that this official distance between eyebrows is the size of
your thumb. You take your thumb place between your eyebrows,
and then either shave or pluck the hairs in between
out and then grooming my eyebrows since high school, and
with mixed results. When I was first starting, I just
took a razor and shaved a straight line down the
middle portion, which created a large and awkward space between.
(19:52):
I've also tried shaving each one individually, point the razor
against one brow, then going for the next, which would
often create unevenly sized and clearly groomed eyebrows. Now I
just did with plucking, although one of my friends says
that he waxes, but only when they grow together and
his hairdresser won't let him leave without it. I think
that the largely unspoken rule of men's eyebrow grooming is
to do it discreetly and in a way that looks
(20:14):
as if you have groomed your brows without actually having
groomed your eyebrows, so the inside our scoop. Good tip
from a male listener. Well, if you have any tips
you'd like to send our way, our email is mom
Stuff at how stuff works dot com, and of course
you can catch up with us and send us a
note as well on Twitter and on Facebook. We'd love
to see you over there. And finally, you can read
(20:35):
what we're writing during the week at our blog stuff
We'll Never Told You, and it's how stuff works dot
com For moral nos and thousands of other topics. Visit
how stuff works dot com. To learn more about the podcast,
click on the podcast icon in the upper right corner
of our homepage. The How Stuff Works iPhone up has
(20:56):
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