Have you ever been tempted to check your horoscope to see if your relationship is star-crossed, or a match made in heaven?

If so, you're not alone. Not unlike the Twinkie, astrology is our culture's guilty pleasure: Many of us have a hard time resisting it. Even if we don't believe in it, we can't help but take a peek at what's being predicted for us.

Consider the evidence:

• The MSN Astrology channel is one of the most popular sites on the MSN network. Many, many Web portals, in fact, put links to horoscopes on their home pages.
• MSN producers told me that the most popular chat ever on MSN was with a psychic. She beat out Britney Spears and Bruce Willis--combined.
• It's hard to find metropolitan newspapers and beauty magazines that don't carry horoscopes.
• You're reading this story.

It may make you feel better to know that you're in good company.

Donald Regan, White House chief of staff during the Reagan years, says the president got help from an astrologer while in office. In his memoir, For the Record, Regan describes in detail how First Lady Nancy Reagan used an astrologer to help plan her husband's schedule. According to Regan, the president (an Aquarius) did not travel, speak in public, or negotiate with foreign leaders unless the astrologer's reading recommended it.

I like to imagine what President Reagan's horoscope might have been for June 12, 1987, the day he told Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev (a Pisces) to tear down the Berlin Wall.

Aquarius, June 12 will be a good day for you to challenge Pisces--to tear down the walls that divide you. Also, be sure to forget you ever met Ollie North.

Aside from former first ladies, teenagers are the most likely to believe in astrology, at least according to a 1988 Gallup poll taken after Mrs. Reagan was revealed as a believer. According to the poll, 52 percent of teens believed in astrological predictions--compared to 12 percent of the general population.

Clearly most people, including me, think astrology is entertaining but not something to believe in. Whether you believe it or not, however, astrology may have helped advance science and culture.

Astrology is the study of how the positions and movements of the Sun, Moon, planets and stars influence human behavior and events on Earth. Although most astrologers don't believe that celestial bodies cause your fate, they believe the two are linked, that you can understand what will happen to you by reading your chart. (Unlike those little newspaper horoscopes that are based solely on your Sun sign, a full astrological reading will chart the positions of all of the planets at the time and place of your birth.)

Researchers have traced the history of astrology back 3,000 years to Babylonia, an ancient nation centered in what is now Iraq. The Chinese, Native Americans, and Maya also practiced their own versions. In ancient times, though, the question wasn't "Is this a good love match?" as much as it was "How do I steer my ship back to dry land?" or "When should we plant the wheat?"

The stars and planets were useful tools for anticipating the seasons, and it's understandable that ancient people thought the sky might reveal more than this. Inspired by the possibility of foreseeing the future, early astrologers developed mathematical schemes to predict the motion of the planets. Some experts believe these efforts may have advanced the real science of the stars, astronomy.

Because of the math involved in crafting astrological readings, many believers claim astrology is a science--but it really isn't. Real science works because it deals with assertions that can be proven using careful experiments. Scientists start with a theory--known as a hypothesis--about why something may be the case, then carefully test this theory. Astrology doesn't really work that way; it pretty much stops at the theory part. Even if you get a reading based on your specific astrological chart, the result is going to be a generalization that you can easily apply to some aspect of your life. If you hear, for example, that you're likely to have financial success without having to expend extraordinary effort, you might recall that you recently found a $20 bill on the sidewalk. And you might think, "Wow. That reading was eerily accurate."

To a real scientist, on the other hand, this would definitely not prove that you're a money magnet. Generalizations don't make science; specific experiments that can be repeated (and that reach the same results) do. A scientist would devise a careful experiment to measure your financial prowess.

That said, it can be hard to resist looking to the stars for answers about life's most important issues--especially at this time of year, when many of us have love and romance on our minds.

I have a recommendation: After you check your horoscope, go outside and look at the actual night sky. During February, Venus will be the brightest planet you can see. And if you take the right person with you, gazing at the planet named for the goddess of love might do more to spark a romance than the zodiac ever could.