Meaning of 'free will' in mundane astrology?

1
Good afternoon,

Following the worthy suggestions of our Moderator, may i open a new thread about the specific meaning, if any, of 'free will' in mundane as contrasted to natal astrology?

Before examining the issue of 'free', might it not be appropriate to ask ourselves what 'will' might mean in a mundane context? Using Aristotle as a base but not exclusive reference, mundane objects like clans, towns, regions, countries, continents, corporations, associations, political parties are considered 'universal' in contrast to the 'particular' entities or individuals that comprise them.

At a microcosmic level one might consider individual living cells and organs of, say, a sperm whale (whose brain weighs on the average 5 times as much as a human brain) as 'particulars' contrasted to the whale an as entire organism, a 'universal'. As sperm whales and several other species of marine mammals learn to recognise their own images in mirrors and no longer consider these images to be potential playmates, they are presumed to possess self-consciousness or 'ego'.
Image
Of course one may object that i obscure the subject of 'mundane will' by such an analogy.

Best regards,

lihin
Non esse nihil non est.

2
Members might be interested in this old thread on Skyscript which discussed the philosophical implications of mass disasters for mundane astrology:

http://skyscript.co.uk/forums/viewtopic.php?t=3391

I want to quote my opening comment from that thread as it still sums up my viewpoint on this subject.
It appears to me this is one of those fundamental issues where the astrologer cannot divorce their astrological conclusions from their core philosophical and spiritual beliefs. Fate versus freewill, karma or divine providence, reincarnation or judgement day, and our concept of God or Dao all colour how we perceive such matters.

The astrology in such questions can therefore only serve to support what we basically believe. As someone once said 'you will see it when you believe it'
Mark
As thou conversest with the heavens, so instruct and inform thy minde according to the image of Divinity William Lilly

3
Mark wrote:As someone once said 'you will see it when you believe it'
You could turn that around, 'When you believe it, you will see it'...... whether it is really there or not....

Charles Carter (somewhere) addressed the question of how an individual's natal chart could show happiness and well being at a time when the mundane chart showed a nation in distress or war. He answered this by invoking the relativity of good to bad, rather than treat them as absolute values. He said too that the chart of the individual was "subsumed" by the national chart.

I think a mundane chart can be thought of like a box of gas molecules. Individually, the molecules can be travelling fast or slow, backwards or forwards or any other direction, interacting with the wall of the box or other molecules - or not. But, taken as a whole, the behaviour of the molecules can be expressed as temperature and pressure in very precise ways. Altering the volume will change the temperature and pressure in very precise and predictable ways as well.

So it is that taking all the individuals in the area concerned with a mundane chart into account, their collective actions and reactions are predictable. But the actions and reactions of any individual are played against the background of what is going on in the mundane chart.

It follows that the mundane chart should be much more certain and predictable than the natal chart of any individual within the influence of the mundane chart.

Geoffrey

Relativity of the relative

4
Good afternoon,

Basically i would concur with Mr Geoffrey. As astrologically interested persons we might enjoy bearing in mind that, whilst the fixed and wandering stars exhibited patterns presumably quite similar to those observable today, thousands or more belief systems, religions, languages, empires, philosophical systems, scientific paradigms et cetera have been washed away by time's tides like elaborate sandcastles on the beach, many if not most leaving few to no observable traces.

Concerning universals and particulars, one can observe that many even highly qualified individuals prefer to remain in their native countries under often 'malefic' circumstances like prolonged mass unemployment rather than emigrate to countries generally enjoying more 'benefic' circumstances for the last few centuries, ex. gr. the Balkan states compared to Western European ones.

To what extent is a state a 'universal'? Louis XIV is quoted as having said, ?L'?tat, c'est moi.? Joseph Stalin could have said something similar in respect of the USSR. The identity of rulers with states varies. Should for example Elizabeth II Regina today publicly state, 'The United Kingdom - that's Me', one might be inclined to think she might be suffering from old age mental debility. To define the 'will' of a supra-individual entity is, thus, not so easy.

Best regards,

lihin
Non esse nihil non est.

5
The whole notion of "free will" needs to be unpacked. It is always limited and circumscribed in some way.

As the body ages, it doesn't do certain things as well as a young body would. Try telling your body not to age. A white male from a privileged background in the US has more opportunities than a poor woman on the streets of an Indian slum. Each of us is a product of our own time, place, culture, socio-economic status, and so on.

I prefer terms like "moral choice" or "personal agency."

To the determinists I would say that the society in which we live is predicated upon the idea of moral choice. Our legal system is based upon the principle that people can know right from wrong and choose to act accordingly. Much of our inter-personal dynamics are based on the idea that people can act morally and out of choice. The notion that Hubby was simply manifesting his irrevocable fate or destiny isn't going to cut it with the wife whose husband comes home late, drunk, and with lipstick on his collar.

So we have to think about means somewhere between the two extremes.

The balance between choice/fate equally applies to nations. Some have highly oppressive forms of government (North Korea) whereas others are more open democracies. I have choices in Canada that I wouldn't have in China.

In terms of event charts, I wonder if we are due for an overhaul, or at least finding different systems of the past that seem to work better. A natural disaster hitting one community, for example, may leave another nearby community untouched, even though their proximity doesn't give them different event charts.

In terms of Hurricanes Sandy and Katrina, a lot of the extended human impact and suffering depended upon the community's elevation above sea level, population density, average income level, and priority in the utility company's grid system; not to mention long-term historical tampering with coastal barrier islands and beaches.

It gets really tricky trying to discern all of these variables in a horoscope.

Geoffrey, I like your analogy, but I wonder if it works that way in practice. I suspect that horary and natal chart interpreters have a better success rate, on average, than mundane astrologers.

To me, the more the complexity of a real-world system multiplies, the harder it should be to analyse it via a horoscope as per CEO Carter's system. I mean, the moon can only represent so much; or the second house can only be extrapolated so far.

6
I would agree that "free will" is a poorly defined notion. But I suppose it is most commonly represented by the idea that each of us is born with equal opportunities in life which we may exploit as we wish, limited only by circumstance - rather than each person having a pre-ordained destiny, regardless of circumstance. This idea is specious though, as I have touched on earlier.
waybread wrote:The notion that Hubby was simply manifesting his irrevocable fate or destiny isn't going to cut it with the wife whose husband comes home late, drunk, and with lipstick on his collar.
This is an interesting cultural comment as the Arab culture, for example, is very fatalistic. In the Middle East, Hubby may well think that this is a perfectly good excuse for poor behaviour. "The will of God" is a simple short circuit across intellectually more challenging ideas of cause and effect, or natural laws, and thoroughly permeates the culture - today anyway. Perhaps this is one reason why astrology had a great flowering in the Arab culture and why we (that is, our culture) have a problem with astrology on the basis of free will.

Geoffrey, I like your analogy, but I wonder if it works that way in practice. I suspect that horary and natal chart interpreters have a better success rate, on average, than mundane astrologers.
That is also my impression - which is why I made the point......

Geoffrey

Morals? Why?

7
Good morning,

If possible, we are trying to determine what 'free will' might mean in mundane astrology, although perhaps its definition might not be so different in natal astrology.

Is is really necessary to include 'morals'? Why not 'immoral' or even 'amoral'. Many notable, eminent mundane successes have been and are achieved through individuals that exhibit primarily 'amoral' conduct, although they might try to appear otherwise through propaganda. To avoid political controversies by mentioning current individual rulers of states, one might point out the frequent practice of condemnation and subsequent execution of political (sometimes called military but not engaged in armed combat) opponents without anything remotely resembling 'due process'.

One can cite 'shining' examples of amoral leaders who died natural deaths in honour and never expressed any regrets concerning their 'heinous' deeds, ex. gr.:

Lucius Cornelius Sulla Felix, Tom?s de Torquemada, Joseph Stalin, Francisco Franco del Monte.

Those who might infer from the above that i am not a partisan of the Neo-Platonic school of philosophy, in my humble view a dualistic one, are correct.

Best regards,

lihin
Non esse nihil non est.

8
Lithin, I have to ask if you are the same person as Jupiter Ascendant at Astrologer's Community. You write in much the same way.

Morality has to do with knowing the difference between right and wrong (as your society defines it) and then having some choice as to whether you do right or wrong. Of course there are shades of grey. History is all about how nations and political leaders behave in moral, immoral, or amoral ways. They can't excercise total free will. If they could, nobody would lose a war or risk falling off a fiscal cliff.

Geoffrey, you are very right that some cultures take a more fatalistic view than others. Which should give astrologers pause, in terms of analysing how our own culture looks at personal agency vs. fatalism. Presumably in a Muslim culture, Hubby might have his faults, but coming home drunk wouldn't be one of them!

9
If a referendum had been conducted in the UK on 1st March 1939 with the question. "Do you want the UK to go to war with Germany or not?" I would have been surprised if as much as one percent of the population had voted, "Yes." And yet, six months later, the UK was at war with Germany.

There had been an inevitability about a renewed conflict with Germany for much of the previous decade - a steady and unstoppable slide which defied the best efforts to the contrary by the UK Government, and was not wanted by Hitler either. Yet there is was, by the end of 1939 the UK and Germany were at war.

Where was the mundane 'free will' in 1939?

Geoffrey

10
regarding the fate / free will debate -
maybe it is a left brain / right brain thing.. or, it's another way to think about why some folks seem more oriented towards free will or fate.. same deal science verse magic perhaps.. you only get 1/2 the picture if you grab onto one side of an opposition.

i don't see why fate/free will would have to be thought of differently in mundane verses natal astrology.. there are no definitive answers for this ongoing philosophical debate as i see it and i must be missing something in this question for a distinction for the meaning of free will in mundane verses natal.. how about a distinction for the meaning of free will in a horary too?

maybe certain types of astrology are more fatalistic then others.. maybe people tend to think of individuals as having more free will then a country for example.. maybe dogs think differently then people.. maybe we will never know the differences!

11
Geoffrey, you raise a good point. Of course the major astrological blooper of that period was CEO Carter's judgement that WW II wouldn't happen.

On the other hand, there is a long history of viewing mundane astrology in terms of the political leaders. If we looked at horoscopes for Winston Churchill, Neville Chamberlain, Adolf Hitler, and others, we might very well find a different dynamic.

Of course the balance tipped when Germany invaded Poland on Sept. 1, 1939. With a prior British government commitment to defend Poland, the declaration of war really wasn't up to a matter of public opinion.

Doubts permitted?

12
Good morning,

May one doubt that criteria of 'moral, immoral' are all that clear even within a given mundane social framework and time period? One salient example: behaviour that in wartime is deemed heroic (ex. gr. mass killing of fellow humans) is in peacetime subject to severe sanctions except for example in cases of undercover agents entitled and expected to 'liquidate' political and or military foes. Obviously, there must be sufficient individuals capable of both sorts of behaviour for such societies to function by the adage, "All is fair in love and war."

But before resolving 'good or evil' will, what about collective or mundane will altogether? Does it, contrasted to individual will (what is even this?), exist at all and if so, what is it?

HERE is the English Wikipedia article on (philosophic individual!) will. We find the components: mind, intent and action. May non-action also be a form of 'action'? The specific use of mind seems to imply some kind of self-consciousness.

Best regards,

lihin
Non esse nihil non est.