If someone told you they aced the final exam in Creationist Studies, or earned an advanced degree in making homeopathic products, the proper response would be laughter followed by more laughter. Because becoming an expert in bullshit is the academic equivalent of multiplying by zero. You still haven’t achieved anything useful.
Yet the New York Times‘ Callie Beusman has an article all about the “grueling” exam astrologers take to earn the International Society for Astrological Research’s Certification of Astrological Proficiency (ISAR CAP).
I don’t blame the Times for writing about it — it’s a fascinating read considering the topic. So what’s this exam all about?
It includes an essay portion and about 600 multiple-choice, true-false and short-answer questions, which cover chart calculations, the history of astrology, basic astronomy as applied to astrology and forecasting skills. Sample questions include: What is the Sun’s greatest distance from the celestial equator? What is the harmonic of a quintile aspect, and how many degrees is it? And how often are Mercury and Venus trine? (Trick question! A trine is a 120-degree angle between two planets, which never occurs between Mercury and Venus!)
This is the only test you fail just by signing up to take it. Those sample questions are utterly meaningless even if you get the right answer.
