You might hear the sun and rest
February 5, 2019 3:17 PM   Subscribe

"Welcome to AIstrology. With the help of research scientist Janelle Shane, we built a bot to generate monthly horoscopes, trained on about 3,500 extant readings as well as current monthly horoscopes. Each horoscope below is therefore a prediction based on a wealth of predictions for each sign; a distillation of what the stars have in store for you this month."

Elsewhere in the 21st century's renewed fascination with astrology: The Signs as Highly Specific Stuff tumblr sorts the zodiac into such categories as fake restaurants from The Good Place, horrific fates that have befallen the Swedish Gävle Goat, and costumes from The Devil Wears Prada.
posted by Iridic (21 comments total) 10 users marked this as a favorite
 
Not to be confused with Alstrology.
posted by J.K. Seazer at 3:22 PM on February 5, 2019 [3 favorites]


congratulations, you've invented the magic 8 ball
posted by es_de_bah at 3:25 PM on February 5, 2019 [3 favorites]


Aquarius: Uranus is only new moons and sinews.

Indeed.
posted by Splunge at 3:37 PM on February 5, 2019 [8 favorites]


Astrology is fake. Humans will go extinct. The universe is not thinking about you because "thinking" is something our ape brains came up with because we didn't have anything better.
posted by East14thTaco at 5:03 PM on February 5, 2019 [1 favorite]


Astrology is fake? Then how do you explain Carl Sagan???
posted by museum of fire ants at 5:05 PM on February 5, 2019 [9 favorites]


Leo: You might hear the sun and rest.

I'm disappointed that I don't need to enter my exact time and location of birth to seed a random number generator for the AI, but I'm pleased with the result. I might hear the sun and rest, yes, I believe I might.
posted by sfenders at 5:15 PM on February 5, 2019 [2 favorites]


strengthening your partner planet of career planet of career planet of career planet of career planet of career planet of career planet of career planet of career planet of career.

This is more or less what I was afraid of.
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:23 PM on February 5, 2019 [4 favorites]


It is so true that life is a big month with a selion, tho.
posted by rodlymight at 5:26 PM on February 5, 2019 [1 favorite]


Scorpio: TV, your personal planet of communication

So accurate.
posted by Fig at 5:37 PM on February 5, 2019 [4 favorites]


I switched to the shipping forecast for my horoscope a while ago.
posted by chinesefood at 5:39 PM on February 5, 2019


The Whin yourrelf bamping good fortune sweet up a new being Plan.

I feel so optimistic!
posted by not_the_water at 8:14 PM on February 5, 2019 [1 favorite]


"Pisces: The Whin yourrelf bamping good fortune sweet up a new being Plan. Mars wild have some issuluc. This is on the twelfth house of First, or a gab on a scripplecority with it wild, are on the family personal resounational, engage for unwinds and truth you’re crdinger about it."

This sounds familiar.
And I'm a picon
posted by clavdivs at 8:42 PM on February 5, 2019 [1 favorite]


I can never tell if these stupid AI things are actually a joke or not. This is a joke right?
posted by bleep at 9:02 PM on February 5, 2019 [2 favorites]


The universe is not thinking about you because "thinking" is something our ape brains came up with because we didn't have anything better.

Not to be all “well actually,” but that’s actually not how astrology was thought to work in the ancient world!

The basic idea was that everything had been preordained, so everything in the universe was sort of running like an elaborate clock. Theoretically, an event on earth would be mirrored in the heavens, or in certain things on earth. If humans could learn to interpret these various signs and signals, they could therefore draw conclusions about the corresponding earthly events before they happened.

Astrologers carefully studied the movement of heavenly bodies (other people studied various things like scattering dice, or my personal favorite, scapulimancy, which involved reading cracks in roasted bones). They would then make predictions according to strict rules of interpretation based on what they’d observed. So it wasn’t that the universe was thinking about you, it was just that you could make informed predictions about the future based on the correct interpretation of what was happening around you.

As with anything in the ancient world, it’s important to remember that this was rigorous, serious science practiced and refined over thousands of years, in many different parts of the world. I won’t defend modern astrology except as a hobby. I don’t place any faith in it, or in its supporting cosmology. It’s really just that, as with many things, I find the historical viewpoint much more interesting when it’s given a more accurate treatment. I took a class on ancient magic once, and it was honestly one of the best classes I’ve ever taken.

Also, if I’m remembering right (it’s been a while since I read about this), there was a lot of conflict between astrology and early Christianity, because the latter eventually required a different concept of free will, in order to allow for salvation. So it was incompatible with much of what had supported ideas about astrology and other kinds of future-telling, because if everything was preordained, nobody could truly choose to be saved. Isn’t that interesting?
posted by shapes that haunt the dusk at 11:07 PM on February 5, 2019 [12 favorites]


Wow, Calvinist mysticism
posted by thedaniel at 12:03 AM on February 6, 2019 [2 favorites]


I think “predestination” is too monotheistic a concept for the ancient world, but +1 that astrology was a sort of science in the ancient world (or it could be; half-assed deception was recognized). Similarly, our understanding of how Oracles operates is pretty bad (and was often presented badly at the time as the Kiwi Hellenist explains). Not that astrology, divination, or oracles worked, but they weren’t random foolishness; they were very precise foolishness rigorously built on precise practice — although slap-dash “popular” versions existed (and were recognized as “pseudoscience” even then).
posted by GenjiandProust at 4:07 AM on February 6, 2019 [2 favorites]


Markov the Beast.
posted by Glomar response at 4:44 AM on February 6, 2019 [4 favorites]


I can never tell if these stupid AI things are actually a joke or not. This is a joke right?

Unless she's playing a very long game, Janelle Shane is legit. This is the 11th fpp since 2017 to feature her generation work.
posted by Iridic at 7:16 AM on February 6, 2019 [2 favorites]


took a class on ancient magic once, and it was honestly one of the best classes I’ve ever taken.

Magic still isn't real though. I get that I'm coming off as a pighead here but a lot of really bad shit happens behind people insisting supernatural claims are true. I have a list for those that care. Suffice to say that I am convinced that "spirituality" does more harm than good.
posted by East14thTaco at 8:43 AM on February 6, 2019


@Sorrowscopes
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 9:11 AM on February 6, 2019


Magic still isn't real though.

It doesn’t have to be real for the study and a class to be interesting; I am assuming STHTD isn’t saying that it is. We study a lot of things humans do and have don’t that aren’t real.
posted by [insert clever name here] at 11:59 PM on February 6, 2019 [1 favorite]


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