Very old, very sophisticated tools found in India • Hacker News Board

Re: Very old, very sophisticated tools found in India

#71

Post by kumarvvr » Sun, Feb 04, 2018, 9:37 AM UTC

pritishc wrote: post #19

000000000000001 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it an irony, that the parent posts this long comment, supposedly to glorify the ancient texts of the East, attempting to assert an innate superiority of the scientific thought achieved in the past by their culture and yet s/he uses a device invented more or less in the West using science ( math, physics, chem) developed by western minds in no more than last 300-400 years. I suppose it is in our nature to beam i…

FWIW, I found this after digging into the comments on the Quora link - https://arxiv.org/pdf/physics/9804020v3.pdf . It explains the context of Puranic cosmology. I, too, am an Indian, and a healthy dose of skepticism is warranted. However, it is admittedly enjoyable for me to read about Indian history and ancient science.

Perhaps the skepticism is true, perhaps not.

For me, the take away is not the accuracy in the speed of light.

It's the fact that there was recognition that light is something that has a finite speed that can be measured, and the recognition that that speed is a very high value, measured in thousands of distance units in half of a time unit.

This is extremely remarkable in itself.

Re: Very old, very sophisticated tools found in India

#72

Post by mpreiss111 » Sun, Feb 04, 2018, 9:38 AM UTC

Good

Re: Very old, very sophisticated tools found in India

#73

Post by kumarvvr » Sun, Feb 04, 2018, 9:45 AM UTC

000000000000001 wrote: post #11

kumarvvr wrote: post #2

The fourth verse of the Rigvedic hymn 1:50 (50th hymn in book 1 of rigveda) is as follows: तरणिर्विश्वदर्शतो जयोतिष्क्र्दसि सूर्य | विश्वमा भासिरोचनम | taranirviśvadarśato jyotishkridasi sūrya | viśvamā bhāsirocanam || This means “Swift and all beautiful art thou, O Surya (Sun), maker of the light, illuminating all the radiant realm.” Exlpaining this verse in his Rig Veda commentary, Sayana, who was a minister in the…

Isn't it an irony, that the parent posts this long comment, supposedly to glorify the ancient texts of the East, attempting to assert an innate superiority of the scientific thought achieved in the past by their culture and yet s/he uses a device invented more or less in the West using science ( math, physics, chem) developed by western minds in no more than last 300-400 years. I suppose it is in our nature to beam i…

There is glory. So? Is it wrong to glorify something that is unique, astounding and clearly thought inducing as to the methods, reasoning, mathematics and observational strengths of ancient Indians?

Glorifying something does not automatically imply "asserting innate superiority". That is just a juvenile view.

So, using a modern device to point out meanings in olden texts implies just what you are saying - "asserting innate superiority of western science"

> "I suppose it is in our nature to beam in the artificial yet comforting light of the (false) understanding that we once were at the foremost of scientific thought, thus helping us in ignoring or god forbid, forgetting, the follies of our past or pathetic state of our current affairs."

Civilizations rise and fall, societies become good, go bad, times always change. Mentioning an advanced scientific achievement of our culture, in my view, sets out an ideal to which we have to collectively strive for, from the present state of affairs. This is true of anyone. There must be a lofty goal, to which the society must strive for. Pointing out an already achieved state is a better stepping stone as it does not give the voices of naysayers any strength.

NOTE : The achievement in this case is that ancient Indians recognized that light has a finite measurable speed and that it is a very high value. To me, this revelation is proof of the advancement of ancient Indian thought.

Re: Very old, very sophisticated tools found in India

#74

Post by kumarvvr » Sun, Feb 04, 2018, 9:57 AM UTC

bloak wrote: post #51

pacala wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Accepted answer: > This looks very much as if the units may have been converted to obtain the desired result. Indeed the different conversion factors but similar result in your second link increase the likelihood that there may cognitive bias involved > For example, your distance conversions lead to 1 yojan being 29.2608 kilometres. Compare this with Wikipedia's 12–15 km and your second link's 9.09 miles (about 14.5…

True, but an ancient text giving the speed of light even within an order of magnitude is ... interesting. Though it's not clear that the author was really talking about the speed of light and not the speed of the sun. The 2202 is intriguing. To me, unfamiliar with Indian mythology and numerology, it looks like the result of a measurement or a calculation rather than a "magic" number. Is it possible that they calculat…

In most ancient Indian texts, the meaning of Sanskrit verses refer to light, rather than the sun.

> it looks like the result of a measurement or a calculation rather than a "magic" number

That is because in Sanskrit, numbers are represented in form of "value" "qualifier" "qualifier", "value" "qualifier".. and so on.

For example

"sahasra" means 1000 (can be thousand anything), "sata" means 100, "dasa" means 10, & "varsha" means year (this year, that year, a year, next year, etc)

To quote the famous Ramayana, to represent 11,000 years, it was written in the book as

"dasa varsha shahasrani, dasa varsha sata nicha"

meaning 10 x 1000 years + 10 x 100 years = 11000 years.

One number placed after the other, without any conjunction implied addition.

Elsewhere in the same epic, Rama goes to live in the jungle for

"nava pancha cha varshani"

meaning 9 + 5 years = 14 years, "nava" is 9 and "pancha" is 5

Note : "cha", "nicha" etc are similar to filler words in english

Re: Very old, very sophisticated tools found in India

#75

Post by perl4ever » Sun, Feb 04, 2018, 11:30 AM UTC

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #23

Did that find seem awfully pat? A neat layering of all know tool types found in one site. Its what you'd find if somebody was constructing a myth. Is this actually atypical? What other sites worldwide compare with this complete history in one plot?

I know that there are ancient sites with an incredible number of layers due to a very long history of habitation. I was just reading about Mount Megiddo which is a so-called mountain because of the accumulated layers (something like 26) of ruins. Human history is long enough that it has happened more than once that a site was appealing for thousands of years, but then it was abandoned thousands of years before the present, perhaps due to climate or technological change.

Re: Very old, very sophisticated tools found in India

#76

Post by d13 » Sun, Feb 04, 2018, 2:49 PM UTC

AdmiralAsshat wrote: post #49

d13 wrote: post #45

Hiking in the hills outside of Bangalore I found some absolutely ancient stone dwellings completely covered in thick shrub. The villagers down below told me that they "belonged to an ancient race of dwarves." And a few km away, I stumbled across an obviously very old cave painting in a style I've never seen before anywhere in the world. Not soul in sight and miles from the road. My guess is that there are huge archae…

"Dwarves"? Is that just the closest word you have for the rendering, or is that really a thing in their local mythology? I thought they were strictly a Germanic/Norse staple. I've never seen them mentioned in Hinduism.

Yes, I was told, in English, "an ancient race of dwarves."

Re: Very old, very sophisticated tools found in India

#77

Post by ahamedirshad123 » Mon, Feb 05, 2018, 7:12 AM UTC

lappet wrote: post #43

rrrazdan wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I had to guess the conspiracy is that Central government does not want to excavate sites that prove that Sangam culture was greater and earlier than the Northern Indian culture.

I have never heard of this, but knowing the mistrust for the Centre in the Southern states I can believe how it is accepted.

It's simple. Remains from Keezhadi tell that Tamil ancestors had no religion. If it is true, they need to start finding the origin of Sanskrit.