Q: I personally hate astrology, but I have a couple of friends/acquaintances/family members who are into it and from what I can tell, the attraction of astrology isn't that it can predict the future. 99% of astrology fans don't know if Mercury is in retrograde or what that even means. They couldn't identify a single one of the zodiac constellations in the actual night sky.  The attraction of astrology is that it's an elaborate personality test that encourages a lot of self-reflective navel-gazing, which some people enjoy and find beneficial. For instance, the "typical" positive Aries traits are courage, daring and competitiveness, while the negative traits are self-centeredness, anger and pushiness. Obviously, not every person born in the month of April has these as their dominant traits... but pretty much everyone has these traits present to some extent, so they'll reflect on this crude psychological assessment. An Aries who actually is dari
 ng and c
 ompetitive might acknowledge that they come off as rude or attention-seeking to others. And an Aries who's naturally shy might feel empowered by a personality test that tells them that deep down, they're courageous and decisive. Astrology books that promise to give relationship tips for Capricorns and Libras (or whatever) are actually just full of basic good communication advice that will probably smooth a relationship between any two people. So people can feel like they're getting real benefit from astrology.  If people really don't feel like their personality fits their sign, they can get a fancy natal chart done that will tell them that even though their sign in Taurus, the position of Jupiter or whatever counteracts their Taurus traits and makes them a true Scorpio. Astrology is just a very elaborate, mystical personality test that you can manipulate to get whatever results you want. It's really not that different from the MBTI personality test, which is extrem
 ely popu
 lar among "rational" people even though it's junk science. People like personality tests and astrology because people like thinking about themselves and coming up with fancy terms to express their identity.
A: astrology is often hijacked and re-purposed as a 12-option personality test, but that's not what real astrology actually is