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//Ancient India was a land of sages, saints and seers as well as a land of scholars and scientists. Rishis were the sages who built our great culture. They devoted their life, energy and experience for the welfare of people. They wrote Vedas - the manual of vibrations. Following this many field of science evolved in India. // This is typical hindutva propaganda, where they claim that anything and everything originate…
There is a lot of wonderful material to be absorbed in the ancient texts of India, but the text of that page has a strong Hindu religious nationalist tone (which in Indian languages is called "Hindutva", or "Hindu-ness").
The vast (in time and space), and diverse Indian culture that produced these works was far more tolerant and open to the world's ideas than the apparent mindset of the individual(s) who created this site.
So try to enjoy the actual linked texts, but observe, and then ignore the religious nationalism that seems to have inspired the site.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Agreed - why dig up ancient books that did not stand the test time? Just go forward with what is present and focus on future.
When these issues come up, there's always a vague "comes from india" contingent willing to riot and avenge their country over the fact they are the best at everything. (Don't bring up any discussions about infosys, else you'll be inundated with how great and expansive they are.) Maybe it's because such a huge population actually has an origin place and story going back quite far? I don't have an origin. I come from s…
Bhaskaracharya and the man who found zero:
http://jugad2.blogspot.in/2010/06/bhaskaracharya-and-man-who...
Interesting collection. Disappointed to see the typical Hindu apologist, revivalist nonsense in the description though. Edit: What I mean by typical: http://youtu.be/RSHFzZmQPj0
Agreed - why dig up ancient books that did not stand the test time? Just go forward with what is present and focus on future.
Interesting, will check the site out. Apropos: I had blogged this a while ago: Bhaskaracharya and the man who found zero: http://jugad2.blogspot.in/2010/06/bhaskaracharya-and-man-who...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lilavati
I noticed this at that page:
"Bhaskara II gives the value of pi as 22/7 in the book but suggest a more accurate ratio of 3927/1250 for use in astronomical calculations."
I also remembered reading somewhere that some ancient Indians had a simple formula for pi that was somewhat accurate; take the first 3 odd positive integers, twice each, as one single number, split it down the middle, and divide the right half by the left half, i.e. 113355 => 355/113 = ~pi.
So I checked, using Python:
$ python >>> from math import pi >>> pi 3.141592653589793
>>> print 3927.0/1250 3.1416
>>> print 355.0/113 3.14159292035
The approximation that uses 113355 matches pi (from Python) upto 6 decimal places.
Also see a previous HN post about a PNAS publication that talks about the people from current-day South India 4000 years ago (while South Indians' language is not based on Sanskrit, and 4000 years ago far predates the time period mentioned in the original post): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5078076
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Physics - Concepts of atom and theory of relativity were explicitly stated by an Indian Philosopher around 600 BC. Looks pretty accurate to me. All the best science comes from philosophers backed by feelings and visions instead of math.
he he. In fact every group claim that the "ancients" already knew "everything" but we just forgot about it and rediscovering it..
//Ancient India was a land of sages, saints and seers as well as a land of scholars and scientists. Rishis were the sages who built our great culture. They devoted their life, energy and experience for the welfare of people. They wrote Vedas - the manual of vibrations. Following this many field of science evolved in India. // This is typical hindutva propaganda, where they claim that anything and everything originate…
Yup, that link is definitely not propaganda.