Kepler astrology school closing down

[Niplan]

http://horoscopicastrologyblog.com/


[Mod note - thread moved here from Astrology Now, as not discussing the current astrological configurations or transits, but a currently 'Hot topic'.]

[smilingsteph]

That really is too bad.
Hard to pay all of that money when your school dosent hold accredidation.

Washington is supposed to be this very liberal state. After living her for 7months I disagree.

One can get a degree in painting, which is art, but I guess one cannot get one in astrology (also an art).

[Culpeper]

This does not surprise me. Astrology has many enemies both Christian and Humanist, and the politicians will not go against them. In the USA there is much talk about Liberty and they even stamp it on their coins, but the tyranny of the majority is what prevails. Then again as they say here, "It is always about money." At this time nothing with the name astrology will be found acceptable.

Still it would be good to have a college of astrology so that there would be some astrologers who could write intelligible books on the subject. It seems that most of the books written about astrology today lack scholarship. There are no footnotes or sources cited. I always keep asking where are they getting this stuff when I read them. Even the modern humanist astrologers write this way, but no one in academia pays attention to them. Then they blame this situation on traditional astrologers

[RockFish]

In this economy.....

[milkywaygirl]

i wonder if the founders of kepler started off with trying to create a department at an existing university? can anyone fill in on the history of its inception?

[Neptune Rising]

Its amazing how much people fear what they dont understand.

[waybread]

I had an academic career for over 30 years and am now happily retired.

From what I could understand of Kepler's curriculum, it was rigorous.

From what I could gather from the article, Kepler closed for financial reasons, not because of the unthinking prejudices of unnamed individuals.

From what I could gather about Kepler's faculty, they were widely admired within astrological communities, but their academic credentials would have been considered thin by the standards of any state-run 4-year college or university in the United States.

Nicholas Campion is certainly a scholar who plays by the rules established by the academy, and his two books on the history of astrology seem very credible to me.

Lee Lehman has a Ph. D. but it is in botany. I am not familiar with the work of Mark Urban-Lurain, but he might pass muster with the norms of American universities: one, at least, employs him.

The thing is, though, it is not just that the credentials (the "union card", if you will) of faculty at accredited colleges have to match up somehow with the widespread standards across American universities; but faculty in accredited institutions have to publish--in academic journals and scholarly books. The ones that bristle with footnotes. It doesn't count that astrologers publish popular books and articles, to the academic standard-setters. Increasingly these days, professors have to generate external funding (grants) and/or demonstrate some sort of community outreach.

Astrologers don't write the rules--not only for higher education in Washington state, but for higher education globally.

Rather than calling people prejudiced, astrologers need to take a hard look at the way we practice our craft. Surely all of us have read plenty of astrology that embarrasses us; and yet we somehow think physics or English lit. professors and should find our enterprise valid.

Re: Olivia's point, astrology disappeared from universities by the turn of the 19th century because its truth-claims were in shambles. This is a fact that traditionalists seem unwilling to recognize.

I truly hope that some day it will become more academically credible, but I don't think this will happen until astrologers make a serious effort to understand how universities operate, and then play by their rules. Because their rules are not going to change for us.

Alternatively, let us celebrate astrology for what it is right now.

[Niplan]

Re: Olivia's point, astrology disappeared from universities by the turn of the 19th century because its truth-claims were in shambles. This is a fact that traditionalists seem unwilling to recognize.



Your lamenting the loss of an astrology college, that taught traditional astrology, And yet your blaming the fall of the traditional astrology school on traditional astrologers?

You can't blame a branch of astrology for those that fail to grasp it. "modern astrology" has come along with the microwave dinner. Its easy simple quick, And it generaly applies to everyone. It makes no biased statements, And it wont tell you your going to die, or when or if you'll have kids.. no horary, no predictions, no mundane, nor medical...

it will tell you every lovey dovey possible manifestation of that mars moon trine.. It wont recognize that your father beat your mother, Or any kind of complex manifestation interwoven that you have to delinate seperatley then build up to the big picture...

You can pop open a modern astrology book, just like you can reach into your freezer, And pop a tv dinner in the oven, In just a few minutes youll think your a master, and youll have something to eat...

Then you have these people who read one book think their sigmund frude and start a youtube sun sign astrology channel, where they spout usless garbage to spoil the un-educated minds mostly unawake and therefore willing to soak up what there being told like sheep.

Then these people learn from this bad person and teach 2 other people... and so on and so on...

On the other hand...
Tv diner person picks up a copy of christian astrology or the tetrabiblos...
"I don't get it... this doesn't make sense.. this is too hard!!" and then they grab a sun sign book, and their instant TV dinner.

Or you get the person who repeats entire texts of what theyve memorized to sound smart... the people who don't get it still wont get it, and the people who know their **** will know the persons a moron instantly.

And the article goes into detail about how the lack of accreditation, was the cause for the financial downfall. LAck of accrediation means they dont qualify for student aid. or student loans, government funding etc.

And it was already too expensive for those of us not born into money to afford.

Modern astrology was a good way to keep the spirit alive during the 1900's when it fell from grace but maybe its time that traditional came back to what it once was and throw off the guise of freaudian feel goodness.

[waybread]

Slow down, Niplan! I think you misunderstand me.

I am not blaming traditional astrology or astrologers for the demise of Kepler College. As I understand it, the closure was due to financial shortfalls.

I also think that both traditional and modern astrology contain the "good, the bad, and the ugly." Modern astrology, when well thought-through, is not necessarily "quick." It certainly pre-dates the microwave oven! I have seen both breath-takingly insightful readings, and acutely embarrassing readings by both modern and traditional astrologers.

I don't know what kind of modern astrology you read, but I don't waste my time with the pop-Dell Comics kind, which I think is your "straw man" in this debate. I read only those authors whom I find thoughtful and informative. I would despise modern astrology, also, if it consisted only of the "bad and the ugly" types you describe. And this is precisely my point. When academics see this kind of astrological fluff, why should they think astrology deserves academic accreditation?

I am very familiar with the student aid/government loan &c. end of academic life. The argument about it regarding Kepler College doesn't wash.

Right now tuition at state-run universities is going through the roof, as administrators scramble to pay their bills on the backs of students. Many students are simply unwilling to take on these debts, in light of anticipated post-graduation earnings. I don't know what is the average income of professional astrologers, but most of them need a "day job" so far as I know. How much debt would you take on to get a MA in astrology? Note that there is zero way out of repaying a student loan with its accumulating interest except, I think, for death.

Also, money from the government paid to universities happens in two major ways.
(1) A state-run institution is supported by tax dollars. Kepler made no claims to be a public institution. This is why most private colleges charge astronomically high tuition. (2) Many professors get large grants to support their research [and grad students and overhead] from organizations like the National Science Foundation or the Institutes of Health. I doubt that Kepler faculty--most of whom live nowhere near Washington state, were in this league.

But seriously, Niplan. I fail to understand why proponents of traditional astrology make truth-claims about the amazing accuracy of their branch of astrology that the majority of historical and present-day facts just don't support. If people prefer traditional to modern astrology, hey, that's fine with me. I will learn something from them. But it is not necessarily more challenging than mastering reading a harmonic chart or working with midpoints, which are more modern astrological pursuits.

Either type of astrology--0r a meaningful debate-- does require careful, logical thinking.

[Neptune Rising]

I followed another link on that site, and discovered astrology is illegal in some states in the USA?!! I'm not sure if its legal over here in the UK too, but what a shock!! Illegal!?! The next time I get my tarot cards out in public I'll keep an eye out for the witch hunters, and anyone that has a match or torch.. reminds me of the Monty Python 'Holy Grail' sketch.

I do think though the more 'mystical' side of metaphysical subjects tends to put the layman off, then they instantly dismiss these things as mumbo jumbo. Then again, maybe some people just dont want to understand, or aren't ready to.

[tikana]

hi all

http://kepler.edu/home/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=295:where-we-are-now&catid=49:news-archive&Itemid=139

Neppy, not illegal but you cant practice astrology as a profession without having a psychologist degree.

cheers
T

[Neptune Rising]

Cheers Tik
Wow I'm looking into what is required in the UK too. Jeez I was accepted into a university to do a psych degree in 2001, turned it down to go travelling!

[Niplan]

I followed another link on that site, and discovered astrology is illegal in some states in the USA?!! I'm not sure if its legal over here in the UK too, but what a shock!! Illegal!?! The next time I get my tarot cards out in public I'll keep an eye out for the witch hunters, and anyone that has a match or torch.. reminds me of the Monty Python 'Holy Grail' sketch.

In some states divination and fortune telling are illegal... PA/MD being two of them, you have to expclitly state "For entertainment purposes only." and then you avoid getting a fine. kinda demeaning.

[waybread]

Waybread, it was the English Civil War that spelled the absolute death knell for traditional astrology, because neither church nor state wanted it around anymore - it was too dangerous. And even after the Protestant Reformation material on electional astrology was hard to come by.

By the 19th century, what was left was indeed the shambles from which modern astrology would arise - it had been more than two centuries since astrology was basically outlawed. That's why it failed. Not because it didn't work.

Olivia, I can see how the English Civil War might have disrupted English astrology--for a time. But astrology continued to be taught in universities on the Continent during and after England's troubles until it died out in the late 18th (and with a couple of hold-outs) early 19th centuries.

University scholars were in touch with one another across Europe and into European colonies as the Enlightenment and 19th century expansion of ideas cross-fertilized universities everywhere. Just for example, consider the rapid spread of Linnean plant and animal taxonomy during this period. And Linneas was Swedish! [e. g., not English]

As Jim Tester wrote in A History of Western Astrology (p. 241) astrology died in large part because the academic world radically changed around it during the 18th and 19th centuries, and astrologers either couldn't or wouldn't reposition themselves in the new intellectual order. Astrology was closely linked to medicine in Renaissance universities. As medicine evolved as a science, astrologers couldn't or wouldn't keep up with its advances.

In England, satirists like Jonathan Swift had many telling criticisms of the astrology of the day.

Again, my point being, that universities operate in certain ways; and disciplines that cannot or will not play by those rules should not be surprised if there is no place for them at the table.

This is not a criticism of traditional astrology,any more than it is a criticism of modern, Vedic, or any other type of astrology, BTW.