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Comment by lukan | Hacker News Reader

Well, the gravity alone definitely affects us, so also our personality. But whether it affects us in any meaningful way, is doubtful, since the force is really, really small.

What definitely has an impact is, in what season you were born(if there are seasons). Whether your first steps outside are in snow, or in warm sun. That has an effect on development.

Still, I always loved Astronomy and could never understand the appeal of Astrology in the first place. It never made the slightest sense. So if I am born on day X, I am supposed to have trait A, but if I would be born some hours later I should be personality Y? (besides the fact, that the baby was alive and conscious before the birth). The reason why people take it serious, is probably to find guidance in a chaotic world and they seem to think some guidance is better than none (but I rather have no guiding, than one that makes no sense to me in the first place).

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> Well, the gravity alone definitely affects us, so also our personality.

You're talking absolute micro-units of G force difference. Within a margin of error of most sensors. Orders of magnitude lower than we can detect as humans physically.

And even if we were not, how is there an obvious correlation between these two?

This is the exact sort of pseudo-scientific nonsense that's being spewed everywhere these days.

"This is the exact sort of pseudo-scientific nonsense that's being spewed everywhere these days."

Instead of insulting, you could have also quoted my complete statement:

"But whether it affects us in any meaningful way, is doubtful, since the force is really, really small."

"And even if we were not, how is there an obvious correlation between these two?"

Have you ever heard of the butterfly effect?

A small change here, can lead to a big outcome there.

Change a brain cell here and a neuron there and who knows what happens in the long run.

But like I said, the forces in this case are really, really small.

> who knows what happens in the long run

This is simply an appeal to ignorance, who knows indeed. But that does not mean "anything in possible".

You do agree, that the personality depends on what the brain processes at a certain time, right?

Do you rule out, that this process is influenced by gravity?

I'm sorry, but I'm not going to engage in a hypothetical conversation about possibility that unimaginably small gravitational fluctuations affect brain composition to a noticeable degree.

You certainly don't have to engage in conversations about things you cannot imagine. Would not be much point in it. But I mean, this article was literally about a measurable effect from Mars on Earths climate and I never claimed there was a measurable effect or any significant effect at all on the brain (that would support Astrology). Just that there is influence.

> But I mean, this article was literally about a measurable effect from Mars on Earths climate and I never claimed there was a measurable effect or any significant effect at all on the brain (that would support Astrology).

> Just that there is influence.

Wait, what? There's no effect at all, just influence? You're talking in circles.

Confuse, conflate, insinuate, obfuscate. It's the way of psudoscience pushers and apologists.

Ah the next one. Do you also negate, that the gravity of mars influences particles on earth, so also in the brain?

And maybe I used 2 different terms to emphasize, that I do not claim that there is a significant change in the brain because of that influence. But a force is influencing, even though it is very small and below of what you can usually meassure. You can still calculate it if you want and extrapolate the meaning, if you are capable:

F = G x m1 x m2/(d²)

"Where G is the universal gravitational constant (meaning it has the same value throughout the universe), m1 and m2 are the masses of the objects in kilograms, and d is the distance between them in meters"

Spoiler alert, the result will be really, really small, but not zero. And none of this will proof claims of astrology, in case you got that mixed up.

To reiterate: the base of my argumentation is -

gravity: every object with mass influences EVERY other object with mass

butterfly effect: small changes in complex systems can lead to great outcome

The particles in the brain have mass and are a complex system.

So if you declare my argumentation is unscientific, it would probably help your case to show where exactly.

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