An alert reader sent me link to a stupid
article published by Reuters about the Olympics and Astrology.
It’s a classic kind of crackpot silliness, which I’ve described
in numerous articles before. It’s yet another example of pareidolia – that is, seeing patterns where there aren’t any.
When we look at large quantities of data, there are bound
to be things that look like patterns. In fact, it would be
surprising if there weren’t apparent parents for us to find. That’s
just the nature of large quantities of data.
In this case, it’s an astrologer claiming to have found
astrological correlations in who wins olympic competitions:
Something fishy is happening at the Olympic Games in Beijing. Put it all down to the stars.
Forget training, dedication and determination. An athlete’s star sign could be the secret to Olympic gold.
After comparing the birthdates of every Olympic winner since the modern Games began in 1896, British statistician Kenneth Mitchell discovered gold medals really are written in the stars.
He found athletes born in certain months were more likely to thrive in particular events.
Mitchell dubbed the phenomenon “The Pisces Effect” (pisces is Latin for fish) after finding that athletes born under the sign received around 30 percent more medals than any other star sign in events like swimming and water polo.