Cosmic Influences on Behaviour? - Professor Glenn D Wilson

Are human personality, health and vocational choice influenced by the position of the planets? If not, why do so many people read horoscopes and believe this to be the case? Terms such as jovial, martial, mercurial, venereal and saturnine are implanted in our psyche.

Are Psychological differences between believers ("sheep") and sceptics ("goats") affected by the season of birth? Do sunspots or the full moon affect human behaviour (lunacy or even 'werewolves')?


Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 1,500 lectures free to access or download from the website.

[robertplatt]

Typical YT comment here: "I doo wish that Gresham College would stick to subjects of no contro-versy, like John Dowling's views on Botany, or maybe a nice dicursus on the Periwinkle Windows of the Chapel of Saint[falls asleep]"

[roberrplatt]

Excellent, although Prof. Wilson throws around the term "New Age" while really not having a grasp of it. New Agers tend to be silly, but it's such a generic term that it can't really be used to describe any movement or group of people. He might as well be talking about Hippies or Beatniks. You can't really correlate New Age to any of the Big Five, imho

[lincolja]

Omg I can't watch more of this he talks like he's having a school presentation which he finished this morning... Speed it up man we waiting

[martin]

In a lecture regarding "Astrology" wouldn't it be "Scientific" to define one's terms, as there are 100's of different types of Astrology inc Tropical, Sidereal, Symbolic, Cosmobiological. The term "Traditional Astrology" could be applied to ancient Astrology which didn't include Natal Astrology & only had predictions for the King or Kingdom. All these I don't tend to believe in, but if one's definition of Astrology is "Astronomical influences on Biology", then it seems to me that the Cycles of the Day & the Year are in fact Astrological although they are not thought of as such, mainly because of our familiarity with them, we take them for granted. The often repeated point about the Gravitational "pull" of the Moon on the newborn is totally fallacious because it ignores the possibility of an indirect effect of the Moon on the Atmospheric envelope which then might effect the newborn. Seasonal Biology is also by this definition "Astrology" although some of the Scientists who have done the research like to point out that "Of course this isn't Astrology". Forgive the pun but this smacks of "Throwing the baby out with the bathwater", because if as it appears there are Astronomical influences on Biology, i.e. "Astrology" then surely it's too important to simply dismiss by simply artificaly framing it into a form we don't agree with! By the way your books on love & sex are excellent.

[mindlessmindwatch]

I daresay: watching this vid. and aprove of his sceptisism of the paranormal/astrology could be a sign that a bad omen will materialise in your life sometime in the future, but if you don't see the last five minutes you'l be forgiven.

[torosalvajebcn]

My next ice-breaker whenever I meet a lesbian: "let me guess, you were born in November, right?"

[torosalvajebcn]

Thumbs up if you were born in May and refuse to prove them right,

[MichaelLaiMusic]

apparently this lecturer's too academic to FEEL

[anthonyowen]

A very low quality lecture, unusual for Gresham who are more often of a very high standard.

The Professor states: "Even people who have the sames horoscopes do not share personality traits." People who have the same horoscope are exceedingly rare, a horoscope contains many hundreds of variables - far, far more than just the 'sign' of the sun.

Interesting that when it refers to something the Professor believes in the evidence/studies he presents are justified, when it presents something he doesn't believe in, then 'they need more evidence' or there is some fault with the data/sample.

A disappointment.

[Frederique]

The start of the lecture was key : women are more likely to believe in astrology...as if it is a rubbish feminist activity. I don't believe in astrology but this information was very telling about how bias the lecturer is...👎👎👎