Shakuntala Devi

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Shakuntala Devi (November 4, 1929 April 21, 2013), popularly known as the "Human Computer", was a child prodigy and mental calculator.[1][2][3][4][5] Her talents earned her a place in the 1982 edition of The Guinness Book of World Records.[1][2][3]

Shakuntala Devi

Contents
1 Biography 2 Achievements 3 Death 4 Books 5 References 6 External links
Shakuntala Devi, May 19, 2006 Born Died November 4, 1929 Bangalore, India April 21, 2013 (aged 83) Bangalore, Karnataka, India

Cause of death Respiratory and cardiac problems

Biography

Nationality Other names

Indian Human computer

Shakuntala Devi was born in Bangalore, India,[2][3] to an orthodox Kannada Brahmin family.[1][6][7] Her father rebelled against becoming a temple priest[3] and instead joined a circus where he worked as a trapeze artist, lion tamer, tightrope walker and magician.[1][2][5][8] Devi's father discovered her ability to memorize numbers while teaching her a card trick when she was about three years old.[1][2][5] Her father left the circus and took her on road shows that displayed her ability at number crunching.[2] She was able to do this without any formal education.[1][3] By age six she demonstrated her calculation and memorization abilities at the University of Mysore.[2][3] In 1944 Devi moved to London with her father.[9] She returned to India in the mid-1960s and married Paritosh Bannerji, an officer of the Indian Administrative Service from Kolkata.[9] She and her husband were divorced in 1979.[9] Devi returned to Bangalore in the early 1980s.[9] Devi travelled the world demonstrating her arithmetic talents, including a tour of Europe in 1950 and a performance in New York in 1976.[2] In 1988 she returned to the US to have her abilities studied by Arthur Jensen, a professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley. Jensen tested her performance at several tasks, including the calculations of large numbers; Examples of the problems presented to Devi were calculating the cube root of 61,629,875, and the seventh root of 170,859,375.[3][4] Jensen reported that Devi was able to provide the solution to the aforementioned problems (the answers being 395 and 15 respectively) before Jensen was able to copy them down in his notebook.[3][4] Jensen published his findings in the academic journal Intelligence in 1990.[3][4] In addition to her work as a mental calculator, Devi was an astrologer and an author of several books, including cookbooks and fictional novels.[2][5][8]

Achievements

In 1977 in USA she competed with a computer to see who gives the cube root of 188138517 faster, she won. That same year, at the Southern Methodist University she was asked to give the 23rd root of a 201-digit number; she answered in 50 seconds.[1][4] Her answer546,372,891was confirmed by calculations done at the U.S. Bureau of Standards by the Univac 1101 computer, for which a special program had to be written to perform such a large calculation.[10] On June 18, 1980, she demonstrated the multiplication of two 13-digit numbers 7,686,369,774,870 2,465,099,745,779 picked at random by the Computer Department of Imperial College, London. She correctly answered 18,947,668,177,995,426,462,773,730 in 28 seconds.[2][3] This event is mentioned in the 1982 Guinness Book of Records.[2][3]

Death
In April of 2013, Devi was admitted to a hospital in Bangalore, India with respiratory problems.[1] Over the following 2 weeks she suffered from complications of the heart and kidneys.[1][2] Devi died in hospital on April 21, 2013.[1][2] She was 83 years old.[2][3] Devi is survived by her daughter, Anupama Banerji.[3][8]

Books
Some of her books include: Puzzles to Puzzle You (New Delhi: Orient, 2005). ISBN 978-81-222-0014-0 More Puzzles to Puzzle You (New Delhi: Orient, 2006). ISBN 978-81-222-0048-5 Book of Numbers (New Delhi: Orient, 2006). ISBN 978-81-222-0006-5 Perfect Murder (New Delhi: Orient, 1976), OCLC 3432320 (http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/3432320) The World of Homosexuals (Vikas Publishing House, 1977), ISBN 978-0706904789 Figuring: The Joy of Numbers (New York: Harper & Row, 1977), ISBN 978-0-06-011069-7, OCLC 4228589 (http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/4228589) In the Wonderland of Numbers (New Delhi: Orient, 2006). ISBN 978-81-222-0399-8 Super Memory: It Can Be Yours (New Delhi: Orient, 2011). ISBN 978-81-222-0507-7; (Sydney: New Holland, 2012). ISBN 978-1-74257-240-6, OCLC 781171515 (http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/781171515) Mathability: Awaken the Math Genius in Your Child (New Delhi: Orient, 2005). ISBN 978-81-2220316-5 Astrology for You (New Delhi: Orient, 2005). ISBN 978-81-222-0067-6

References
1. ^ a b c d e f g h i j "Shakuntala Devi strove to simplify maths for students" (http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/karnataka/mathematical-genius-shakuntala-devi-nomore/article4640134.ece?homepage=true). The Hindu. April 21, 2013. Retrieved July 9, 2013. 2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Pandya, Haresh (April 21, 2013). "Shakuntala Devi, Human Computer Who Bested the Machines, Dies at 83" (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/24/world/asia/shakuntala-devi-human-computerdies-in-india-at-83.html). The New York Times. Retrieved July 9, 2013. 3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m "Obituary: Shakuntala Devi" (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/10011281/Shakuntala-Devi.html). The Telegraph. April 22, 2013. Retrieved July 9, 2013.

4. ^ a b c d e Jensen, Arthur R. (JulySeptember 1990). "Speed of information processing in a calculating prodigy" (http://stepanov.lk.net/mnemo/jensen.html). Intelligence (University of California, Berkeley, USA) 14 (3): 259 274. Retrieved July 9, 2013. 5. ^ a b c d "Obituary: India's 'human computer' Shakuntala Devi" (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india22244118). BBC News. April 22, 2013. Retrieved July 9, 2013. 6. ^ "Science: Numbers Game" (http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,822325,00.html). Time. July 14, 1952. Retrieved July 9, 2013. 7. ^ IBTimes Staff Reporter (April 22, 2013). "Math Genius and Guinness Record Holder Shakuntala Devi Passes Away at Age 83" (http://www.ibtimes.co.in/articles/459844/20130422/shakuntala-devi-mathematician-guinnessrecord-holder.htm). International Business Times. Retrieved July 23, 2013. 8. ^ a b c Aditi Mishra; Siddarth Kumar Jain (April 22, 2013). "She made learning maths as thrilling as magic" (http://www.bangaloremirror.com/bangalore/others/She-made-learning-maths-as-thrilling-asmagic/articleshow/21204048.cms?&subsite=). The Bangalore Mirror. Retrieved July 9, 2013. 9. ^ a b c d "India's math wizard, Shakuntala Devi" (http://in.news.yahoo.com/india-s-math-wizard--shakuntaladevi-102612575.html). Yahoo! India News. April 22, 2013. Retrieved July 9, 2013. 10. ^ Smith, Steven Bradley (1983). The Great Mental Calculators: The Psychology, Methods, and Lives of Calculating Prodigies, Past and Present. Columbia University Press. ISBN 0231056400.

External links
Chips no match to grey cells: Shakuntala Devi Times of India (http://www1.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/19707497.cms) Interview with Know Your Star (http://knowyourstar.com/the-human-computer-shakuntala-devi/) Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Shakuntala_Devi&oldid=576010953" Categories: 1929 births 2013 deaths Indian Hindus Indian astrologers Mental calculators People from Bangalore This page was last modified on 6 October 2013 at 16:30. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Wikipedia is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., a non-profit organization.