The Horoscope Word Cloud

Not that you need any more evidence to convince you that horoscopes are complete bullshit, but this is one I hadn’t seen before and it’s fantastic.

The folks at Information is Beautiful made a word cloud for each astrological sign compiled from 22,000 “predictions” from Yahoo. This is what they found:

What do you know… the same words seem to pop up for each sign.

Feel. Life. Better. Sure. Keep. Energy.

The unique words to each astrological sign are in red — but they’re almost all throwaway words (e.g. “instead,” “totally,” “looking”).

That leads to this meta-horoscope you can all use at anytime:

Ready? Sure? Whatever the situation or secret moment, enjoy everything a lot. Feel able to absolutely care. Expect nothing else. Keep making love. Family and friends matter. The world is life, fun, and energy. Maybe hard. Or easy. Taking exactly enough is best. Help and talk to others. Change your mind and a better mood comes along…

Sounds just like me!

If you want to teach your gullible friend a lesson, cut out each wedge and have her pick the one that best describes her. Odds are she’ll pick a sign different from her own. And hilarity will ensue.

(via Kottke)

Claudia

Ohh that looks like fun. Here’s mine!

Be sure you are ready. Enjoy the situation. Talk to others but keep secrets. Expect love, make best friends and plans. Life is hard, but fun and full of energy. Take care of relationships. Expect a change of mood or to change your mind. You sure will be better.
Richard Wade

Whenever somebody asks me my astrological sign, I always randomly tell them one of the wrong ones. Then after they’ve gone through telling me “Oh of course! You’re so exactly like a…” (whatever sign I said) and they tell me in detail why I’m so typical of such and such a sign, I tell them I lied.
Jeanine

Awesome, Richard! I will do this from now on.
Mike

You think that’s funny, check this out!! Thought you were Aquarius? Nope!!

http://newsfeed.time.com/2011/01/13/horoscope-hang-up-earth-rotation-changes-zodiac-signs/
Will Rieske

This is cool, but I really don’t think that a word cloud can effectively convey the essence of each sign. Words must be arranged.
Tony

When people ask “What’s your sign.”
I tend to say things like:
Danger! Blasting area ahead.
Do not feed the animals.
Caution! Falling rock zone.
No parking. Violators will be towed.
Closed.
Jamar

lol@ Tony… hahahahahaaaa
Dani

I have a sudden urge to get this printed, framed, and hung over my couch.
Tom

It’s funny how you, Hemant, use the female pronoun “her” when you tell us to ask our friend to choose a wedge. And you are right to do so! It’s almost 100% women who follow Zodiac stuff
David

I’m not much for horoscopes but I feel I must point out that life could have been better spent in other ways. It seems like energy has been wasted creating this thing. I’m not sure we should keep harping on this.

The point I’m making is that the common words are as meaningless as the unique ones without context. As amusing as this is, it seems like a fairly meaningless exercise to me.
ash

Whenever asked my sign, I always reply ‘fire dragon’. It’s correct according to chinese astrology, neither I or the questioner knows FA about it (which tends to shut them up) and it sounds way cooler 🙂
Dan

Funny you posted that. I cut out the horoscopes from my local paper, scanned it, and highlighted the similarities in each sign…

http://img3.imageshack.us/img3/253/mysticsaysstayhome.jpg
Allogenes

Hey, anyone can have friends, but Gemini’s the party sign! We’ve got that word all to ourselves! So that’s why Jesus is scheduled to return on May 21…
Who says astrology is bunk?
hipopotamo

Well, Scorpio is passional, charming and overtly sexual! And that is so totally me!

And as I said in Pharyngula, I’m also a Monkey by Chinese signs, so, double the sexual wantoness!

Don’t you dare tell me horoscopes are not for real!

Back to my runes now

Hippo

P.S. I’m not superstitious, because it brings bad luck!
Heynonny

I like how in the inner circle of the word cloud, Capricorn is shortened to “Ca’Corn,” because my mind then translated that to “Candy Corn.” Sagittarius is also shortened to “S’ttarius,” but that’s not as funny.
Dan W

When I get bored and look at horoscopes, I always read the entire list of them for every astrological sign, because they’re all so vague that any one of them could apply to any given person. It’s like saying “in bed” after reading your fortune from a fortune cookie, and similarly amusing.

I also like what Richard Wade does when people ask his astrological sign. I may have to start doing that as well.
Claudia

I don’t have the visceral dislike of horoscopes of other skeptics. I’ll look at “my” horoscope if my eyes fall across it in a newspaper, and I’ve even played the childish “compatible” game. I treat it much the way I treat discussions with my friends about orcs, elves and hobbits, mere entertainment. Of course, it’s helpful to be a Leo, which is about an ego-inflating a sign as you can have.

@hippo, I had no idea monkeys were supposed to be sexual. I remember we’re supposed to be smart, manipulative bastards lol. The Eastern zodiac is even more fun than the Western one. You take every single person in your own grade when you’re still in school, most born on the same year, and declare that all 200-300 odd kids have the same personality type. Suuuure.
JB Tait

When asked my sign, I usually reply, “Slippery When Wet.”

I’m pretty sure that pie does not represent the commonly distributed horoscopes though. Libra, for example, should have had a large contribution from the words “balance,” “diplomat,” “balance,” or “harmony.”

Each of the other signs have similar attributes that are supposed to apply to their members and thus show up frequently.

Just as a coin can be used as an Executive Decision Device (if you disagree with it and want best two out of three, you have your answer) so too the horoscopes can be used as a thought of the day. Some of them are almost as good as Quotes of the Day for providing food for thought and the opportunity to agree, or not, with the advice.
Claudia

I’m pretty sure that pie does not represent the commonly distributed horoscopes though. Libra, for example, should have had a large contribution from the words “balance,” “diplomat,” “balance,” or “harmony.”

They aren’t word clouds from the description of each sign, which would be different for each one. They are made from the predictions for each sign, the daily horoscope, which almost always contain the same sort of vague “be open to a new relationship” “something unexpected will make you reevaluate priorities” shit. A fun activity is to cut up one week old predictions without their label (write them on the back) and then present someone who believes this stuff with which one was theirs. They will very likely (91.7%) get it wrong.
Stephen P

And if your gullible friend insists that he/she is not interested in silly games and is only interested in serious discussions of the subject, offer him/her the results of the Astrotest.
Mike

When people ask “What’s your sign,” I usually say “Yeild.”