The Soccer World Cup 2010 shall not be remembered only for the victory of the Spanish Team in the finals, but also for the 8 right predictions made by Octopus Paul Allen in the FIFA World Cup 2010. While every World Cup produces a champion, there had never been such a predictor of the result in the history. Paul has already created many enemies and friends like any great person. While the Germans fans want the octopus to be killed and served as Sushi, the Spanish Prime Minister called for body guard for Paul.

The predictions by Paul are difficult to understand logically. Paul has no knowledge of soccer and he has no chance of making the prediction based on any logic, reason or facts. If we use the probability theory in the prediction, the chances of making eight right predictions are less than 0.5 percent. Therefore, it is also not easy to say that anyone can make 8 right predictions purely on random basis. The believers of fate and destiny would like to believe that everything is predestined. These predictions only reaffirmed their belief that however hard we try, we cannot change our destiny.

Even in the present age, we all have limited capability to grasp the full facts of the case and make a correct prediction. If we have the full knowledge of the facts, then it should be possible to predict any event. The scientists have been predicting the sun and lunar eclipses with the accuracy of seconds many hundred years in advance. Yet the same science is finding impossible to predict the weather even few days in advance. It is not that weather has any randomness in it, but the limitation lies in the human knowledge. If in future, when scientists could understand all the facts about weather, they should be able to predict the weather years in advance.

Einstein was a great believer in predictability and hated the concept of uncertainty. His famous quote “God does not play dice in the world” affirms his view that everything is predictable given the full knowledge of the facts and events. Even the 9/11 was predicted by Nostradamus, the 16th century French soothsayer, hundreds of years in advance. Yet the predictions could not be understood due to its mysterious method of writing. Yet everyone could understand it as soon as the event occurred as evident from the following lines

In the city of York there will be a great collapse,

two twin brothers torn apart by chaos

while the fortress falls the great leader will succumb

third big war will begin when the big city is burning

However, octopus is not likely to live ling nor can it maintain its streak of flawless predictions. The time shall come soon when its predictions shall be proven false. Yet this incident indicates that man has miles to go to understand complete mysteries of nature. All great leaders, scientists, artists in some part of their life, get connected with divinity through some mysterious force which made them divine for that period of time. It is in this time that Einstein wrote his four greatest papers including photoelectric effect and theory of relativity at the age of mere 25 years in 1905. He could never repeat the magic again in his life.

Yet there are many people who would like to dismiss the intuitive knowledge as mere speculations. We are reminded by the words of Bertrand Russell English philosopher, mathematician.

We know very little, and yet it is astonishing that we know so much, and still more astonishing that so little knowledge can give us so much power.