A perennial question to which astrologers are drawn in moments of idle contemplation concerns the possibility of a form of our practice as it might exist on a planet other than Earth. This short essay offers a sketch of a theoretical framework which might allow for the development of such a practice on an alien world, and explores what it can tell us - in a general sense - about how 21st astrology evolved over the course of human civilization’s 10,000 year lifetime.
1/ Metaphysics
The metaphysics of the astrological perspective describe a universe which, for all intents and purposes, is sentient and intelligible; a cosmos that engages humanity in a participation mystique. Admittedly, it's an a priori assumption, but it underlies all forms of astrology, whether basic or enlightened. The conceit is simple: There is a correspondence between events as they occur in the world of human experience, and the wider field of planetary motion. This correspondence is a synchronistic phenomenon - and so, by definition, is acausal in origin - with expressions that propagate synchronically (at the same time, across time) and diachronically (evolving in time). Whatever sort of astrology comes to exist on another world, it will share some version of these metaphysics. Astrology is incompatible with a materialist or nihilistic worldview that denies the reality of a living cosmos.
(Before proceeding any further and to clarify definitively, the project described here - that is, the theoretical possibility of an astrology on a planet other than Earth - would be created by the descendants of human astronauts and colonists to that world. Creation of a sort of astrology as it might be realized by an extraterrestrial species - little green men, so to speak - is not the purview of this essay, although we might conjecture an astrological system created by aliens would share the necessity of a common metaphysical conceit, i.e. that the universe is intelligent.)
2/ The Meaning of Planetary Bodies
A new astrology divined by these off-world practitioners will emerge because of the spontaneously created and self-consciously directed goals of the people involved as well as the process they follow. Simply to say, systemic descriptors (delineations) of the various planets, aspects, houses, signs that constitute terrestrial astrology evolved over millennia, producing a rich and complex archetypal symbology. Development of astrology by humans on a planet other than Earth would occur relatively quickly in comparison, and conceivably might bring to bear knowledge that can only be intimated currently, in areas of study as seemingly disparate as astronomy, anthropology, depth psychology, and theoretical physics, as well as statistical science and chronobiology.
Viability of a human colony on another world would be directly influenced by resources available to the settlers, and their relationship with the planetary environment. This relationship would assume symbolic values in a new astrology. An artificial environment might mimic and modify circadian rhythms so that humans would become adapted to the extraterrestrial setting. These adaptations, in time, would come to describe activities, events and patterns that might be thought of as astrological.
3/ Temporal Linguistics
As more and more is discovered about gravity in the ongoing scientific work of physicists, consider what consequence this might have for an extraterrestrial astrology; not because of a causal relationship that a naïve astrology might assume, but as a result of gravity and its relationship to time, since time is encoded with the archetypal patterns and forms that astrology describes.
Another useful consideration involves exploring the intense social and cultural rate of change since the advent of the modern age, in contrast to previous eras. The modern age - always a murky term, but one we will define here as the period occurring between the discovery of Uranus by William Herschel in 1781 and our current century - coincided with the revival and refinement of the astrological perspective, spurred on by breakthroughs in many fields of human endeavour, including (but not limited to) politics, medicine, economics, psychology, historical studies, physics, technology and the arts. Observed in this way, we can see how the delineation of more recently discovered asteroids, planetoids, comets etc., imply an evolving and nuanced astrological perspective of humanity’s place in the cosmos. One can imagine a similar process taking place as an extraterrestrial astrology develops.
4/ Thought Experiment
How will the Earth be described by astrologers on Mars when they look to delineate the planet’s horoscopic meaning? What symbolic values, what metaphors and similes, what deities and archetypes, will describe the ancestral home of humanity? What was the method used by astrologers of the past to attribute meaning to the outer planets - Uranus, Neptune, Pluto - and to delineate the many smaller celestial bodies discovered in the last century?
It isn’t difficult to imagine that, in a Martian sky, the Earth might take on at least some of the symbolic associations connected with Luna, since terrestrial astrology delineates archetypal meaning of the Moon as premised on the mother and child, tradition, the past, and the idea of home, in its varied and sundry expressions. Since Earth would be regarded as the ancestral site of humanity’s origin by colonists on other planets, it makes sense that Earth’s coordinates in a Martian - or any extraterrestrial - sky would suggest traits and events rooted in originating cultures, tribal and familial loyalty, etc., much in the way Luna and the Zodiacal sign of Cancer arrogate such meaning in their symbology.
The Sun, too, presumably visible from the site of this new extraterrestrial astrology would more than likely retain the same symbolic associations that the terrestrial delineation assigns: illumination, consciousness, the ‘light’ of reason, renewal, creativity, play. Of course, these meanings will require further development and contextualization by the pioneers of this new divinatio scientia who will live their lives on other planets.
5/ Conclusion
As human civilization persisted on Earth, astrological observations and their corresponding Zodiacal placements came to constitute the earliest known form of an ecliptic coordinate system. The extent to which a similar coordinate system could be utilized on an alien world is unclear; however, it is altogether likely that if there is to be an extraterrestrial astrology, the influence of fixed stars will figure more prominently in the horoscopes it creates. This inheritance from astrology’s sidereal tradition bestows an intellectual pedigree stretching back to antiquity, to Egypt, Atlantis, and to our prehistoric ancestors who told the first stories about what was happening in the night sky.
(Extraterrestrial astrologers may indeed eschew Zodiacal-type referents in favour of planetary aspects, in addition to fixed star placements. For the purposes of this writing - which is to advance a model of how astrology might develop on another planet - the principles associated with non-Zodiacal-type delineations [ie, planetary aspects, fixed stars] are robust enough to transition into alternate horoscopic systems.)
So, in consideration of an extraterrestrial astrology, these ideas would be paramount: metaphysics, gravity and time, the historical increase in observed astronomical bodies and their synchronic correlates in human culture, delineation of the Earth in an extraterrestrial horoscope, the enhanced relevance of fixed stars and planetary aspects over Zodiacal symbology. Used as conceptual demarcations, ideas like these offer a glimpse into astrology’s future on other planets that can only be imagined - for now.
