On the Influence of Celestial Bodies. Introduction to the Political Astrology

Abstract

The starting point of this paper is the transformation of the notion of influence, which as late as in the seventeenth century was defined as acting of celestial bodies upon the Earth, and only in the nineteenth century did it take on its present, more general meaning. I sketch this transformation against the background of other processes characteristic of modernity. One of them is the eradication of astrology from the field of science, linked to the triumph of dualistic philosophy and the birth of industrial capitalism, which together objectified and commodified nature. The second of these processes is the career that the concept of influence begins to make in the nineteenth century, becoming one of the most important categories not only of the natural sciences but also of the social sciences, where, understood more as spiritual power, it allows to describe the action of ideas on society and of intellectuals on government. The third one – the birth of the modern subject with its characteristic „influence anxiety“. These contexts, outlined in the article, allow us to see modernity in a new light – as a civilization in which influence that of the environment might exert on humans is unambiguously classified as a threat. They also allow us to ask the question to what extent may the modern redefinition of the relationship between man and the cosmos held responsible for the ecological crisis.