The Indic Mathematical Tradition 6000 BCE To ?

[Husky]

^ The 'great' Newton. Should be made famous for that 'wonderful' character of his.





The following links are for archival purposes.





1. rajeev2004.blogspot.com/2014/02/quick-notes-calculus-crown-parallel.html

Restoring India’s calculus crown ([color="#0000FF"]telegraphindia.com/1140225/jsp/nation/story_18018921.jsp[/color]):



Madhava's work effectively laid the foundations for the later development of calculus and analysis, and either he or his disciples developed an early form of integration for simple functions. Some historians have suggested that Madhava's work, through the writings of the Kerala School, may have been transmitted to Europe ([color="#0000FF"]storyofmathematics.com/indian_madhava.html[/color]) via Jesuit missionaries and traders who were active around the ancient port of Cochin (Kochi) at the time, and may have had an influence on later European developments in calculus. PDF link to the book. [color="#0000FF"]jornalggn.com.br/sites/default/files/documentos/joseph-george-gheverghese-2011-the-crest-of-the-peacock-non-european-roots-of-mathematics-3rd-ed.pdf[/color]

2. [color="#0000FF"]rajeev2004.blogspot.com/2014/02/indian-contribution-to-world-mathematics.html[/color]

(also links to telegraphindia.com/1140225/jsp/nation/story_18018921.jsp)



The full article's at the link, but several things in the article by George Gheverghese Joseph stood out:

a. The most important bit:

Later, when I became interested in the work of the legendary Srinivas Ramanujan and had gone to Cambridge in this connection, I met an eminent Newton scholar, Tom Whiteside. He asked me if I had come across the Kerala school of mathematics. I said no. He then referred me to a footnote by him of an earlier Indian researcher who had with his collaborators written extensively on the work done in Kerala on the infinite series. Whiteside suggested that I explore it further and that’s how I discovered the work of Madhava and his disciples.

So the real persons who had pioneered the work of revealing this hidden part of the history of maths turns out to be ... "earlier Indian researchers". Who were no doubt Hindus, since non-Hindu Indians (including Joseph, as he admitted) did not even know about Madhava and his students.



I note no one wants to name the original researchers though, including Joseph, and only Joseph is becoming famous for "revealing" the matter.



b. There's a picture at the R2004 link labelled

A digital image of Madhava drawn up by the Madhava Ganitha Kendram, a voluntary association working to revive his works, with inputs provided by descendants of the mathematician-astronomer

People should look at that image for the weird way modern Indians perceive themselves and their ancestors.



A comment on the article notes:

Sujeev said...

The wrtiteup is good, but the picture is distracting. Is it just me, or does anyone else here think the picture kinda looks like Harvey Keitel dressed up as a Namboothiri? :-)

Sujeev hasn't noted what's really disturbing about the picture: it is of a man who has a hyper European skintone and the locks on top of his head are unmistakably golden hair. That is the extent of what modern Indians (wannabes) want Hindus to have looked like in the past. It's not enough that the 2D hand-drawn all-Indian-made animation from the last decade about Ramayanam showed both Sita and Rama with European skintone (actually more European than European; Rama was pink?), now they have to apply that to Madhava.

And golden locks?



One must be grateful I suppose that there are photographs of Ramanujan that at least prevent others from unrealistically depicting him: Raamaanujan just has typically black hair, and possesses an Indian colour that no doubt is sufficiently dark as would dissapoint the artist hired by the "Madhava Ganitha Kendram". Maybe they wanted to appeal to Europeans with this image of Madhava, as part of a plea for Europeans to include an acknowledgement for the contribution made to maths by Madhava and his students?

Ugh, yuck.



BTW, not even Harvey Keitel looks as Euro qua skintone let alone haircolour as the artist's rendering of poor Madhava. (And, as I recall, in Campion's "The Piano", Harvey Keitel was thought to look sufficiently like a Pacific-Islander to play the part of a native inhabitant.)





c. This bit was interesting in the interview with Georgh Joseph:

rajeev2004.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/indian-contribution-to-world-mathematics.html

Not just maths educators, even activists reviewed it. What particularly moved me was the extent to which African Americans and Blacks took up some of the things in it after they realised they had a very rich history. For instance, the earliest mathematical artefact is available right in the middle of Africa, but nobody knows. It’s called the Ishango bone which is a type of lunar calendar and dates back to 22,000 BC [color="#800080"](oh no, not BC-ism)[/color], much earlier than anything of that sort found anywhere in the world.

Phew, no one but Africans can claim the achievement of that lunar calendar. It's theirs and theirs alone. :cheer:

(* Since even the proto-proto-ancestors of the Oryans/PIE-ists had already moved to "EurAsia" well before then. Not even desperate Victor-Mair-type tactics can claim this for the oryans/oryanism syndrome. That's not to say they won't try tomorrow.)





d. This statement by George Joseph:

People who disappointed me were the Indians. Part of colonisation involves a form of brainwashing where you end up defending something because you think you have invested time and emotion in it. I was awarded a Royal Society Visiting Fellowship to deliver a series of lectures in Indian universities. But a number of those I met didn’t either want to know or were very critical. Subsequently, I also noticed that academics has been highly politicised in the country. So I suddenly find my views and conclusions either being approved by the Right who say, look here is a book that shows India is great, or being criticised by the Left, who claim that the book panders to the other side and contains not much of material analysis.

- Of course the Left doesn't want to acknowledge Madhava et al's contributions: they are Hindoos who made their contributions as Hindoos alone. They're not some "all-Indian" achievement ("Sorry"). Why is it that Hindoo achievements magically become "all-Indian" when everybody else wants to have a share in the cake?

At least the Left is honest in so far as recognising that these mathematical achievements are exclusively feathers in the crown of ethnic Hindoos and Hindoiism and have no bearing on others (and other idealogies), let alone seculars and leftists.



- And Joseph finds the only ones in India who were willing to listen to him were the Hindoo Right, but he dismisses their interest as beneath him: they are to be shunned (despite the Hindoo willingness to acknowledge the "Indian" contribution to maths instead of denying it, which last Joseph listed as a shortcoming in other Indians). The Hindoo Right's crime is to be nationalist, or even being Hindoo. Except Madhava and his students and all his forbears were all Hindoo onlee. Note: not some random "Indian", certainly not christian or Syrian christian or islamic - not any other alien or other minority religion, but Hindoo. As is even clear in one of the few representative details added by the artist's rendering: the hyper-Hindoo markings all over Madhava's body. (Ramanujan was another hyper-Hindoo: he straightforwardly admitted that Lakshmi Amman from his Narachimmam Kovil had whispered all his mathematical understanding to him in his sleep.)

So, contrary to Joseph's wishes, who *but* the Hindoos - such as the "Indian right" - should be the first to recognise such Hindoo achievements?



The unwillingness to accept the "Hindoo/Indian Right" as a fanbase is not only seen in Joseph. Rajeev Malhotra - otherwise considered a great champion by many Indians - showed his unease with Hindus yet again (wasn't it he who last time said that Hindoos were "obsessed" with fighting the AIT, right until Malhotra himself decided that the AIT ought to be fought - of course he decided it was not an obsession when he finally decided to enter the fray).



rajeev2004.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/fwd-do-western-religious-scholars-err.html

There's a fine line, some scholars say, between legitimate Hindu concerns and the right-wing political wave that has recently hit India. Although Malhotra, for example, condemns the violence and threats, he has acknowledged in a Washington Post article that the Hindu right has [color="#0000FF"]appropriated[/color] his arguments. Just as he points to certain Western academics, arguing they perpetuate what he calls the "caste, cows, curry, dowry" stereotypes, in India, says Vijay Prashad, AM'90, PhD'94, a Trinity College assistant professor of international studies, "the Hindu right has taken education as an important field of political battle," trying, for instance, to install conservative textbooks in schools.



Malhotra's goal is to "rebrand India," says Prashad, a self-described Marxist who studied history and anthropology, not religious studies, at Chicago, and who has debated Malhotra in online forums. But "scholars, to me, are not in the business of branding." Malhotra and others "have created the idea that there is one Indic thought," Prashad says, but "there are so many schools of thought within Hinduism."

- What's interesting is that Malhotra thinks every Hindoo to the "right" of him is the Indian Right (including any of Yesterday's Indians who didn't roll over to accept the AIT when he still thought that was no more than an "obsession") - since he clearly feels awkward about their "appropriating" his arguments and feels the need to distance himself from them by illegitimising their parroting of any ideas he may have articulated, as is apparent from his use of the word "appropriate" (that is, he wants to make it clear that the "Indian Right" did not have his permission and that he did not seek to inform *them* of his ideas: they merely "appropriated"), which seems to me to be a clear message to Hindoos/"the Indian right" that he'd rather they don't read and thereby appropriate his arguments: he doesn't want you to; obviously the intended audience for his writings is someone else.



- Meanwhile the leftist Vijay Prashad thinks that Malhotra - who is to the "right" of Prashad - IS the Indian Right/a representative vocalist of it and similarly denounces Malhotra. So denouncements all round. No Indian knows *how* fast to sell other Indians short as a means to curry favour with the western people they're conversing with (while denouncing other Indians). Rather appropriate that Vijay Prashad should have made Malhotra come off quite as untouchable as Malhotra has made the "Other Indians" aka the "Indian/Hindoo Right". (The nice thing is both are debarred from ever joining the "Indian right" or claiming they were ever part of it. Although Prashad types don't give the impression they may re-invent themselves as loyal natives tomorrow, remember that that other virulent anti-Hindu Yoginder Sikhand from the communist communalism-combat - who lied repeatedly and damnably for the purpose of brainwashing the masses against Hindus and Hindoo-ism - was last seen trying to slink back, now that old age had further rotted what passes for his brain. Sikhand should be shown the door, and preferrably kicked out.)





While George Joseph not feeling much for the "Indian Right" is perhaps understandable - he's not a Hindoo, as a Syrian christian he's at the top of the Indian food chain - I wonder who Malhotra viewed as the target audience for his ideas? Since one knows it is Not the Indian Right (the Hindoos), perhaps it's the Psecular Wrong or the Communist Left or the Christoislamic Black Hole Underneath Hindoos' feet? In any case, it's *not* any Hindoo. IIRC Sita Ram Goel identified himself as a "Hindoo communalist", so anyone who approves of SRG is clearly the "Indian Right" who has No Right to "appropriate" Malhotra's arguments (else Malhotra will feel embarrassed in front of western interviewers all over again and feel the need to "apologise" to them about the "Indian right" having "appropriated"/taken over "his ideas" without his intention/permission. Indian nationalists shouldn't do that to Poor Malhotra, else what would western people think of him?)

Amazing how often Malhotra slaps Hindoos right in their faces and they can't *wait* to run after him again.

Ugh, yuck. The treachery never ends.



[[color="#0000FF"]ADDED:[/color] Since I'm complaining anyway: fans keep crediting even those sections of the "Breaking India" book that are far more likely to have been researched and probably even written by Aravind Neelakandan - who is the co-writer of the work - to the "greatness" of Malhotra. I hear there are sections concerning Tamilnadu in Breaking India. And between the two of the authors, Aravind NeelakaNDdan - the one with the glorious surname - must surely be the expert on TN. Not to mention that NeelakaNThan was already highly aware about how US etc were trying to use evangelism etc to split India over a decade ago, and was moreover active about creating awareness on this. So active that even I had come across his name: the first I saw it was at Internet Infidels: Their Other "Dirty" Linen: Evangelism's Quest to Conquer the World. When I first heard that there was a book called Breaking India co-authored by Neelakanthan, I immediately concluded he was the primary mover in the germ of the idea behind the book and would have provided the case studies for it, since he was IIRC stated to work in a grassroots Hindoo organisation helping Vanavaasi Hindoos in India.]





Some 1700 years ago in Rome, the heathen Emperor protected even the highly desperate heathen activists who had wanted to forcibly retake heathen temple sites from evil christian usurpation. Though Julian was a man who did not approve of violence within Rome's civil society, he refused to let the heathens be punished when christian law would have thrown them into jail or sentenced them to worse. (Just like Constantine and his christian successors before Julian regularly had christians selectively acquitted for crimes against heathens and heathenism.)

Julian knew that the loyal heathen activists had been reduced to great desperation in their defence of heathenism and were acting with the sole thought of the restoration of their dear heathen religion/the heathen empire - something Julian understood very well himself, this being his own primary priority. Except that while his ends and objectives were the same as theirs, his means could be and thus were different: being Emperor now he was in the perfect position to strike devastatingly at christianism while still coming off looking as the perfectly-composed, faultlessly noble person he was. Yet for all his dislike of violence in civil society, he would not have heathens punished for taking back temple materials or evicting christians squatting on temple lands, nor did Julian ever pretend he was ultimately not one of them (that his ends were different). He protected the heathens who would have been sentenced to severe punishment - another advantage to being emperor (what else is the use of any position of power to heathens if not to protect other loyal heathens, after all?) and he knew that their intentions were blameless (and were nothing compared to the extreme violence of christian crimes against heathens and heathenism). And if Julian had not been emperor, I am beyond certain that he'd have resorted to whatever means were within his power to restore heathenism too. It was simply that as emperor he could finally choose less desperate measures. He knew that his heathens' hearts were breaking, and he plotted all the while to make sure that they would never have reason to cry again.



Christian and cryptochristian historians continue to screech about Julian's partiality towards the heathen "criminals" who tried to use 'force' against christian thieves in getting heathen sites returned to them (except the hysterians don't dare to compare it to the kind of violence christians employed against heathens, heathen sites and heathenism). Christian hysterians are correct in so far that Julian was not remotely impartial: he was a Super Heathen Communalist - and that is *exactly* what scared christians witless then and now. He was not secular and he aimed fully to permanently end the life of the canker that was christianism. And he knew who his trustworthy allies were: all the heathens who showed their loyalty to the same Gods despite any desperate measures they had by then been reduced to (and in hindsight, who could blame them for trying, I wish they had tried harder and succeeded). Julian would *never* have sold them down the river for all the world, not to bolster any reputation of "impartiality" among christos and seculars. [The emperor was nothing if not the most calculating and most dangerous mind of all. He puts everyone to shame now. "The most dangerous man" - from the POV of the christoclass virus - of all time.]



And that's one of the things one most admires about Julian: he never sold other heathens off (from from it, he was most consciously their great protector and benefactor) nor pretended that he was separate from them - he was *exactly* what they were, but with power to make the difference and a Plan. But then, that's just yet another difference between an arch-heathen - as Julian was - and modern Indian activists - who don't know *how* fast to sell off the "Hindu right". But the emperor did himself say "There's only one Julian", after all (bottom). In contrast, there are a great many Malhotras and Vijay Prashads. Each one the same as the last, and all of them interchangeable and replaceable. And utterly un-memorable. Meanwhile, Emperor Julian - the Heathen Super Communalist - is fondly remembered some 1700 years after his death by all heathens across the globe who have ever heard of what he did and what kind of man he was. He was right then and he remains right now (and right for all time). The Roman Right. The Hellenistic Right.

The much put-upon and castigated Indian Right actually comes off looking like a wussy Left (or left-lib) compared to him and his kind. The Indian Right after all has No Intentions - "banish the thought" - to put an end to christianism/christoclass mindvirus once and for all. And that's why the Indian Right has No Hope of winning. What to speak of the Malhotra-s who are - from their own POV - to the left of the Indian Right, and who always make the point that their problem is not with christianism (and one never doubts that is exactly what they mean)?





[color="#0000FF"]The links to the actual stuff worth reading were:[/color]

- rajeev2004.blogspot.com/2014/02/quick-notes-calculus-crown-parallel.html (with PDF of book)

- rajeev2004.blogspot.com/2014/02/indian-contribution-to-world-mathematics.html