
DR70 – A dedicated machine for astrologers - sohkamyung
https://plus.google.com/108984290462000253857/posts/PjnzSytQkWj
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Jedd
There are also circuit diagrams for 'e-meters' ... presumably targeted at a
similar crowd.

[http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/E-Meter/](http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/E-Meter/)

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anfractuosity
Haha, these kind of quack science devices really annoy me.

Looking on eBay, there's some e-meters for £300. I'm sure a £3 multimeter
would do a better job of measuring resistance ;)

I'm really curious as to whether the people that produce/sell these things,
know they're crap, or whether they believe they work.

In a slightly similar vein -
[https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2009/nov/14/bad-
sc...](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2009/nov/14/bad-science-iraq-
ben-goldacre)

(A bomb detector, which is basically a glorified dowsing rod)

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ScottBurson
There's a very good star-chart program that's been around for many years,
called Astrolog [0].

Although it's obviously intended for astrologers, you don't have to believe in
astrology to find it useful. Maybe you just want to know whether that bright
light near the moon is Venus or Jupiter, or when is the next time Mars will be
easily visible.

[0]
[http://www.astrolog.org/astrolog.htm](http://www.astrolog.org/astrolog.htm)

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kaffeemitsahne
I was always a bit puzzled by the ubiquity of astrology and other superstition
in old scifi (PKD, Heinlein to name a few), but I guess if even Reagan used
things like this that explains where the trope came from.

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Avshalom
There was in the US, in about the early 80's I think, a sort of mass
abandonment of telekinesis/ESP/astrology/ghosts...all sorts of stuff.

Part of it may have come from the same rise in evangelical political
engagement as the Republican party weaponized them, definitely some of it was
a push back against the perceived failure of Hippy culture.

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fusiongyro
Very curious find! I wonder what sort of calculations it's doing. Anything
that would be useful to an astronomer? Or just weird bunko? Are the
calculations deterministic?

There's a great book called _Practical Astronomy with your Calculator_ ; I
wonder what the astrological analog would be.

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Brockenstein
Since Astrology is bunk, it might be interesting just to see what they're
doing/claiming with this.

It's very unlikely astrologers have created or added anything that's useful or
applicable to astronomy. It's more likely that they've taking things
astronomers have discovered and used and worked that into their quackery to
make slicker quackery.

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jawbone3
Astronomy now is a science, but historically there wasn't any distinction and
much astronometry (measurements of the sky) was done to increase the accuracy
of the predictions.

It could well be they are doing epicycles caculations to determine stellar
positions etc

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msla
Right: Astronomy is astrology which advanced beyond the pre-scientific
mindset, and made progress, as opposed to stagnating. We can see similar
progressions in the medical world, and we can see that one thing holds true:
The scientific version of the field became useful to society as a whole,
whereas the non-scientific one remains only useful to the practitioners, and
then only to the extent they charge for their services.

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kelvin0
Nice to know the (ex-) leader of the most powerful military machine and
protagonist in the cold war used this to make 'better' decisions.

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gcoda
I once was hired on basis of my "Uranus in Mercury"... I declined instantly.
But it's a job, I can not imagine living under astrology based decision making
government, that's nightmare realization

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kmill
> This is the same Digicomp which made two mechanical "computer" models, or
> toys

I doubt it is the same company. Those toys were made by E.S.R., Inc., whereas
the DR70 is by Digicomp Research Corporation, which apparently still exists. A
cursory search didn't reveal any connection between the companies.

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alien1993
I wonder which key switches it uses.

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cpr
Microswitch, no doubt, from the looks of it. The best key mechanisms ever
made. (Think MIT AI/LISPM keyboards.)

