With Neptune you say goodbye reality, hello fantasy. It’s the planet of pretense and make believe and human beings are very inclined to pretend they know things when they don’t.
That’s because their mentalities are grounded in feelings and instincts and transforming information into knowledge requires a desire to deep-think and concentrate and when it’s non-existent or weak the urge to play Neptune’s knowledge pretend game easily kicks in.
The game has one simply rule: pretend you know and understand information when you don’t.
Knowledge is facts, information and skills related to the theoretical or practical understanding of a subject that are acquired through experience.
Experience is the teacher. People acquire general knowledge about this, that and the other through their daily life experience and specialist knowledge pertaining to a certain skill or subject through their academic education and this means they’re unable to apply their thinking skills to discern what’s going on to any matter that’s outside their field of experience. Yet many people think they can.
Logical, sensible thinking is developed through training and practice. It’s very common, but reasoning, the pinnacle of objective consciousness, is exceedingly rare. It starts with a desire to reason and human beings due to their state of evolutionary development are not great reasoners.
In the Age of Aquarius humanity is experiencing an information glut but in 2024 most people with easy access to a truckload of information have next to no knowledge about what’s important. So, they pretend to know what they don’t.
Who’s playing the game?
With Neptune featured in every birth chart it’s safe to conclude that everyone is predisposed to play the knowledge pretend game. It’s not a disease, syndrome or mental illness, just a mental trait involving false perceptions of personal knowledge and ability that is usually quite harmless; but it can be harmful, especially when words and actions have serious consequences.
In 2024 most people have a very limited understanding of politics, economics and how the world works so they believe what feels right for them. They follow the crowd, blindly accepting what the opinion makers, influencers and propagandists are saying, and pretend to know what’s going on.
In 2024 the economy is a major issue in the US presidential election yet most voters have next to no idea about the US economy and how it works. They’ll be voting for one candidate or the other and their economic policies with a scant amount of personal economic knowledge.
Politicians and business leaders make major policy decisions by applying their thinking skills to lots of bits of relevant data. And most people have no idea about what goes into making an important political or business decision; and they’re probably not aware that the decision makers with positional power, like all human souls, have a potential to experience false perceptions of their personal knowledge and expertise and make faulty decisions.
In 2024 the viewing audience is kept informed about developments in the Ukraine and Gaza conflicts. People apply their limited knowledge about warfare to form an opinion based on media reports, but what’s going on is scripted by military experts who are applying their military intelligence and thinking skills to making important military decisions.
Those with a limited knowledge of warfare can form opinions based on shallow understanding by pretending to know much more than they really do. And well-trained military experts with a potential to experience false perceptions of personal knowledge and ability can make dreadful mistakes.
The astrological indicators
A person with low self-esteem (a weak non-prominent Sun) and a person with significance issues (a discordant Sun) are predisposed to overestimate ability and intelligence and play the knowledge pretend game; but Mercury is the planet of perception, and discordant aspects to Mercury can indicate perception problems regarding actual personal knowledge and ability.
The outstanding birth chart marker for playing the knowledge pretend game is a discordant aspect involving Mercury and Neptune and US presidential candidate Donald Trump, who’s been overestimating his knowledge for decades, has Mercury square Neptune in his birth chart.
Mercury is in house 11 (his friends) and Neptune is in house 2 (his money and possessions) so he was predisposed to exaggerate and lie about his finances and play Neptune’s pretend game with his friends; who were inclined to play the game with him. His false perception of personal wealth easily developed into a habit and when his overconfidence (Sun) collided with his ignorance of this, that and the other it inflated into pretending he knew things when he didn’t and became his default option.
In the age of inversion and misinformation democracy is in trouble as millions of people blindly believe the fraudulent (Neptune) claims of their defeated political leaders who are playing Neptune’s pretense game.
What about you
It’s highly likely that your depth of knowledge and true understanding of matters outside your field of experience and learning aren’t as deep as you think; and if you think you understand something when you don’t, you’re living an illusion. Only you know if you know what you’re talking about or just pretending.
Your whole life is modelled on general knowledge that was passed on to you by your significant others. Your opinions are mostly based on feelings not facts; and if you don’t know something you’re inclined to pretend you do or accept unjustified beliefs.
When you state your opinion, you’re justifying your self-importance and because it’s your opinion you must be right. But if the person you’re talking to really knows what you’re talking about, and knows that you don’t, they’re likely to think you’re an ignorant fool.
It’s easy to act on your cognitive biases aka flawed thinking patterns.
Self-understanding aka personal insight reveals just how much you really know and how much you’re pretending to know and you’ll be shocked to learn how little you really know about yourself and the world around you. You believe what you want to believe.
But there’s only so much you can learn and understand for yourself so you have to rely on other people to keep you informed: and you don’t know the reliability of what your reading, hearing or seeing and you don’t have the time to fact-check all the information.
It could be AI generated fake news or disinformation or a deepfake and you could be believing things that are totally untrue. You could be supporting ideas or policies that are incorrect and unjustified.
In 2024 the world is jam packed with know-it-alls who don’t actually have any idea of what they’re talking about. And you’re left with the task of working out who’s drifted off into an I-know-everything state of mind and is pretending to know things when they don’t.
A troll spouting disinformation and fake news is not a truth-teller.
And now that you’re aware of Neptune’s knowledge pretend game and its astrological roots you can monitor your tendency to play the game and critically observe those who are probably playing it.
You should question what you’re hearing by asking: Are you sure? Healthy skepticism nods, smiles and thinks: That needs a fact-check. You should test out the claims of others and verify personal opinions and conclusions to the best of your ability.
Fact-check: you don’t have to play the knowledge pretend game to have a successful life.
In the social media age people have become receivers and transmitters of true and false information. The chances are high that many of the power crowd who run the world, the journalists who report on the world and the movers and shakers who shape the world are playing the knowledge pretend game.
Elon Musk with the Moon square Neptune and Mercury sesquisquare Neptune is very inclined to have false perceptions of his personal knowledge and ability and is sure to be playing it.
Confucius claimed that real knowledge is to know the extent of your ignorance; and Socrates reckoned that the only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.
Astrology for Aquarius – sharing our knowledge
