An open notebook with a star chart pinned to the page

The journal

Honest answers about astrology

332 articles, sorted into 25 sections. Several answer no, and those are the ones we were most careful with. Where a claim can be checked, we checked it; where it cannot, we say so.

Try

Start here

Six articles that explain the most, if you are new to the site.

BaZi
What is BaZi? The Chinese system that isn't the zodiac
Eight characters, four pillars, and about twelve times more information than the animal on your placemat. This is the system I read in Hong Kong every week.
4 min read
Systems compared
Which is more accurate: Vedic or Western astrology?
Neither has been shown to be more accurate, because neither makes predictions specific enough to be scored against outcomes at scale.
4 min read
Divination and belief
The I Ching: a philosophy of change, not just an oracle
A philosophy of change with an oracle attached, not the other way round. Read the Wings before you throw the coins.
10 min read
Divination and belief
The Chinese divination systems, ranked by how hard they are
Five systems, five different questions, ranked by how hard they are to learn. BaZi still wins on use to an ordinary person.
4 min read
Vedic astrology
The 27 nakshatras: your lunar mansion explained
Twenty-seven divisions of the zodiac, and the layer Western astrology has no equivalent for.
4 min read
Western zodiac
Reading your chart in order: a step-by-step method
The information isn't the problem. The order is.
4 min read

The systems

Each tradition on its own terms.

How it works, and what it cannot do

The calculated, the interpreted, and the refused.

Technique

For readers who want the mechanics.

Divination and belief

Oracles, omens and the older Chinese arts.

Divination and belief · 55
The I Ching, Da Liu Ren, face reading, fortune cookies, past lives, and the question of what any of it is for.
- · Affirmations: what the research actually found
- · Chakras, crystals and incense: what each one is, and what it is not
- · What happens to your zodiac sign when you die?
All 55 →

The real sky

Astronomy, kept apart from astrology.

Culture, history and the fun ones

Where it came from and where it turns up.

Your own chart, computed properly

Real positions from real ephemeris data, every convention stated, and nothing invented where your birth time is missing.

Reveal my chart · free →