Indian firm launches computer service that can predict birth, death and marriages

The computer: Programmed according to the Hindu calendarAt last crystal-ball gazing has come of age. This fortnight, an Indian firm launches a computer service that will predict birth, death and marriages, job opportunities and investment prospects, individual life analyses and general characteristics in digital signs and fast printouts. This will ensure the entry of the latest generation of computer technology into a field hitherto dominated by occult sciences and people claiming mystic power.The software firm, International Systems Services, was started by two Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) graduates, Pradeep Gupta, 26, and Kulmohan Singh, 27, a year and a half back. This year, Gupta and Singh approached the public sector Hindustan Computers Limited (HCL) to loan them a minicomputer which could be programmed for astrological predictions. It will be displayed and put to commercial use at the International Trade Fair in New Delhi between November 14 and December 4.Designated unromantically as HCL 8C2, the computer is programmed entirely in accordance with the Hindu system of astrology, which is lunar as opposed to the solar system of Western astrology. It also adheres to the Hindu concept of a rotatory zodiac which shows a difference of approximately 23 degrees from the zodiac of the Western system. Explaining the crux of his systems astrology, an earnest-looking Gupta recalled how he got the shlokas of Jatak Parijat, an astrology manual, translated - bit by bit - into the microchip's language. Ten technologists spent over five weeks in ciphering about 10,000 combinations into the computer's memory vault.The queries have to be fed into HCL 8C2 together with the time and place of the questioner's birth. When properly processed, these are referred straight to the memory vault which is equipped to churn out the replies by sifting through its 64,000 'bytes' or characters. The computer has an associated memory vault which has a modest capacity of 1 million bytes (large business computers can have 500 million bytes, or more). The answers come on a line printer which can clatter away at the speed of 300 lines per minute.No Sugar-coating: Gupta said the cost of the computer would work out to Rs 4 lakh and the cost of getting a single query answered in six to eight printed pages may be Rs 40. "That's not too expensive," he said, "considering the level of objectivity of a computer prediction. While the pundits tend to gloss over unsavoury facts in a man's life, the computer doesn't hide anything."The HCL 8C2 will process the answers only in English and will use "concise expressions," thus cutting off the extra mystic fat of the pundits' oracle. The computer is still unlikely to possess the finesse of the most reliable branch of Hindu astrology - the Bhrigu - which predicts events in an individual's life with clockwork precision. But then, admitted Gupta, "our device is purely statistical, interpreting astronomical data just as Jatak Parijat had done it". The quality of its predictions notwithstanding. HCL 8C2 is likely to succeed at the cash register. A terse prediction of the computer on itself might be: "Excellent business opportunity ahead".Published By: AtMigration Published On: Oct 25, 2013 11:01 IST--- ENDS ---

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Indian firm launches computer service that can predict birth, death and marriages

At last crystal-ball gazing has come of age. This fortnight, an Indian firm launches a computer service that will predict birth, death and marriages, job opportunities and investment prospects, individual life analyses and general characteristics in digital signs and fast printouts.

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