NASA Drops Sick Burns On Astrology While Talking About That ‘New’ Constellation

Astrology vs. Astronomy has to be the their/there/they’re of the space geek world. So when the news started circulating that NASA had somehow changed the Zodiac by revealing that the imaginary line that determines the zodiac actually moves through 13 constellations in the course of a year, not 12 people freaked out.

The levelheaded space agency was quick to come in and smack that hippie talk down before the patchouli scent could seep into their g-force-resistant couches.

“Here at NASA, we study astronomy, not astrology,” they wrote in a post to their Tumblr.”We didn’t change any zodiac signs, we just did the math.”

FRESH BURN NASA! But it was drowned out by the continued panic of horoscope adherents:

https://twitter.com/mads_almighty/status/778599873188859904

https://twitter.com/carolynmcfish1/status/778165033524224001

After clearing up the difference between astrology and astronomy, NASA wasn’t done. They went “Hit ’em Up” on the entire practice of reading the stars to predict the future.

“It’s not science. No one has shown that astrology can be used to predict the future or describe what people are like based on their birth dates,” they said.

To which the rest of the space agency responded with:

Following that, they pointed out the fact that no matter what the back of your favorite alt-weekly tells you, the new constellation isn’t exactly new. As you might expect, being that it’s a constellation that’s visible from Earth with the naked eye, Ophiuchus has been on our radar for a long, long time. In fact, the inventors of the zodiac knew about it and left it out so that the zodiac would jibe better with their 12-month calendar.

“Even according to the Babylonians’ own ancient stories, there were 13 constellations in the zodiac. So they picked one, Ophiuchus, to leave out. Even then, some of the chosen 12 didn’t fit neatly into their assigned slice of the pie and crossed over into the next one,” they wrote. “To make a tidy match with their 12-month calendar, the Babylonians ignored the fact that the sun actually moves through 13 constellations, not 12. Then they assigned each of those 12 constellations equal amounts of time.”

Basically, they were saying this:

We assume the writer of NASA’s blog post then shut his laptop, muttered “idiots,” and promptly returned to reading the tea leaves that NASA uses to determine all important launch dates.