The Origin of Binary Computation in India

With the advent of Binary numbers, Binary computation and their application to logical circuitry in Computers have focussed importance to the history of Binary Numbers and modern scholars have traced them to Pingala, the ancient Prosody expert of India. Indian Prosody is not just versification or speech-rhythms, but the complete technology of poetry with metrics, metre with syllables, syllables with sound, sound with vibration, vibration with desired effect and the effect useful to man and the rules made thereof. At one side, Indians have been accused of lack of historical sense, not having script, not keeping historical records, and so on, but at other side, some times, they are also praised. Here, the basis of Prosody and its connection with music and mathematics and the evolution of binary numbers thereof are analyzed based on the Chanda sutras. As chronology is the connected factor, it is also linked with the evolution of Indian thinking, thought processes, philosophy, mathematical methodology adopted behind such operations. The English translation of Anunduram Borooah (1850-1889) of Pingala Chanda Sutras (1877) is used in this paper, wherever quoted and adopted