Astro Blog

The Longest Journey in Human History

On Planet Earth, we revolve on our axis at 1000 mph, traveling around the Sun at 67,000 mph, whilst the Sun is traveling around the center of the Milky Way at a speed of 450,000 mph. Everything is revolving and spiraling through space, generating enormous gravitational and magnetic forces. Read More

Mercury: What to say and how to say it

Mercury is tricky, because it is the mind. That is why mythology had the baby Hermes (Mercury) creating mischief from the moment of birth, when he famously stole Apollo’s herd of cattle and lied about it, much to the amusement of the gods. Apollo is the Sun, and the interaction of Mercury and the Sun which are never more than 28 degrees away from each other in the horoscope is reflected in the constant retrograde and direct movement of Mercury in front of and behind the Sun in relation to Earth. Hermes played tricks on Apollo in mythology, just as the mind play tricks on self-perception in our own lives. Read More

Changes in the Middle East

Since the creation of Israel after the Second World War, the Middle East has been a cauldron of emotion, as states from Iran to Morocco have seethed at perceived injustice and at the post-war solutions imposed by the Allies. Huge financial benefits from the exploitation of oil reserves subsequently empowered these countries, giving them considerable leverage against USA. With the decline of oil in coming years, this leverage will ebb out. Globalization and the ubiquity of the internet and social media, along with the coming of age of the predominantly young populations of Middle Eastern countries will probably lead to a weakening of religious fundamentalism and a corresponding growth of liberalization. This is a recipe for change in the Middle East. Read More

Astrology, Science and Buddhism

Over the last 100 years or so, developments in scientific theory have brought science much closer to Buddhist theory, but at the same time, a window has been opened to understanding astrology in a new light.

Einstein once said: ”The religion of the future will be a cosmic religion” and that : “if there is any religion that would respond to the needs of modern science, it would be Buddhism.” (Note 1). This is probably because Buddhism does not believe in any kind of external God, or even in a general organizing principle or intention with the universe. The human need to ascribe meaning is based on an identification with an illusory sense of self, and the perception of the outer world as separate from consciousness is, according to Buddhism, based on false premises. Read More

China rules?

This is a time of doubt for the democratic and pluralistic countries of the world, as weak leadership on the one hand and populism on the other, lead to disillusion with many Western values like globalism and multiculturalism. Discontented people look at Vladimir Putin in Russia and Xi Jinping in China and ask if these authoritarian systems are more stable and perhaps even superior to Western democracies. Is it not likely, that China will overtake the USA during the course of the twenty first century, and that the United States and European Union will go into decline?

This will not happen – at least with the existing political system in China. Read More

Astrology and the Daily News

The magic of astrology can be seen in all things large and small. It’s a great lens to see and understand the world with, because it relates to an exact moment, in a precise place, for which a map or horoscope can be erected freezing that moment in time. That map shows exactly where we are in the world and when, and where the world is in relation to the moon and planets, and where the solar system is in relation to the galaxy. Just like when we used to write our address as a child:
Me, 12 London Road, Southport, Lancashire, England, the World, the Universe.
Read More

Welcome to Earth – and Water

It has been a hair-raising journey with the passage of Uranus through the first sign of the zodiac – Aries. This is an 84-year cycle, the last one happening in the 1930’s, which politically is characterized by extremist leaders, who awaken survival instincts in the population, and establish a cult of personality in true Aries fashion. In the 1930’s the top men were Stalin, Franco, Hitler and Mussolini, leaders who quickly turned to military methods to achieve their goals. Since the arrival of Uranus in Aries (initially in May 2010 and then, after a retrograde period, finally on March 11th, 2011) we have also had our share of autocratic and populist leaders like Duterte in the Philippines, Trump in the USA, a variety of East European leaders, Erdogan in Turkey, Modi in India – the list is long, though fortunately less extreme, so far, than in the last century.    Read More

Shadow over America

Here is a prediction that is sure to come true: During the afternoon of August 21st, 2017, the population of the United States will be looking at a solar eclipse which will darken the country from Portland in the West to Atlanta in the East. This is the first total eclipse in the USA since February 1979, which was incidentally the month Ayatollah Khomeini returned to Iran, with all the consequences this had for President Carter and his nightmare 444-day Iranian embassy hostage crisis. Read More

Freedom of Speech

They say the pen is mightier than the sword. The powers that be have feared satirists for centuries, and there have been many attempts to bully them into silence. In the 18th century, Voltaire, who for a period had to live in exile in London, was one of the most famous, renowned for ridiculing the French king and Catholic Church. Charlie Hebdo, the Paris-based satirical magazine continues the same tradition, skewering religious fundamentalism and political power abuse. Read More

Global Warming

In the late 1960’s and 1970’s early computer projections came to the alarming conclusion that the exponential growth of the population would make our planet unlivable. Since that time, the curve has continued. The population of New Delhi in 1970 was 3 million, and today it is 27 million. Even with China’s one-child policy, introduced in 1979, the population has in fact doubled over the last 50 years and is at about 1.4 billion today. And looking historically from the beginning of the Industrial Revolution to today, the world population has increased from about 1 billion to over 7 billion. Seems like a problem, right? Read More