1

Contributions of Bharatam Janam to science, technology, perspectives

on cosmology, consciousness studies of knowledge society

Two magnificent perspectives presented by Prof. Subhash Kak are included to constitute the

central theme of this monograph:

1. Conflicting narratives of Indian Science (An essay on decolonizing Indian science

studies) (Presented in Experts meeting of the Uberoi Foundation for Religious Studies in

Denver, Colorado on October 9, 2010).

2. Commencement Speech - Graduate College, Oklahoma State University, Stillwater

(December 12, 2014)

What Subhash Kak’s insights postulate will be a contribution to the advancement of the history

of science and technology, leading the knowledge society to the cutting edge frontier of

consciousness studies, (Trans. truth, consciousness, bliss), in particular:

(cosmos, miniscule particle, consciousness).

Thanks to Subhash Kak for providing a roadmap for the present and future generations of

inquirers in every knowledge society, to provide for nihśrḗyas (bliss) and abhyudayam (welfare) which constitute the twin purport of Dharma as cosmic-

consciousness- order. Such a purport makes science and technology meaningful in the day-to-

day lives of all people endeavouring to realize their full potential in their lives and living,

moving from being to becoming.

We have to restate Itihaasa of Bharatam Janam, the eloquent phrase of Maharishi Visvamitra in

Rigveda: [Trans. This mantra (brahma) of Visvamitra

protects the Bharatam People]. See: http://bharatkalyan97.blogspot.in/2014/12/a-review-of-dr-s-

kalyanaramans-trilogy.html A review of Dr S. Kalyanaraman’s trilogy by Dr Shrinivas Tilak

Mirror: https://www.academia.edu/9643316/A_review_of_Dr_S._Kalyanaraman_s_trilogy_by_

Dr_Shrinivas_Tilak The trilogy is a contribution to the History of Bharatam Janam using Indus

script inscriptions. The trilogy is composed of the following books: Kalyanaraman, S.

2010. Indus Script Cipher-Hieroglyphs of Indian Linguistic Area.Herndon: Sarasvati Research

Center. Kalyanaraman, S. 2014. Indus Script: Meluhha Metalwork Hieroglyphs. Herndon, VA:

Sarasvati Research Center. Kalyanaraman, S. 2014. Philosophy of Symbolic Forms in Meluhha

Cipher. Herndon: Sarasvati Research Center. Bharatam Janam, ‘people of the nation of

Bharatam’ is a phrase used in Rigveda by Rishi Viswamitra. Kalyanaraman sees a link with the

word bharatha which occurs in Indus Script denoting an alloy of copper, pewter, tin and zinc.

The decipherment of Indus Script inscriptions sees the corpora as metalwork catalogs

representing Meluhha (Mleccha) words by the use of rebus principle for hieroglyphs which

constitute both pictorial motifs and signs of the Indus Script. Thus, the work of decipherment

constitutes a contribution to the history of science and technology in Ancient India that is

2

Bharatam. Thanks to Prof. Shrinivas Tilak for a comprehensive review of the trilogy which is a

contribution to the History of Bharatam Janam. The narrative is yet to be told.

I suggest that the imperative of narrating the History of Bharatam Janam is implicit in Subhash

Kak’s comments on the way a colonial regime suffocated the traditional knowledge systems of

Bharatam.

I suggest further that Subhash Kak’s two presentations provide significant perspectives on

contributions of Sarasvati-Sindhu (Hindu) civilization and Vedic tradition to advance further

researches in areas of knowledge such as astronomy, medicine, logic, philology, neurosciences

(consciousness studies).

Will the new state dispensation after a revolutionary expression of democratic will through

elections, anointing Shri Narendra Modi as Prime Minister of India take note of these

presentations to provide for a renaissance in knowledge systems for Bharatam Janam, who are

over one billion people constituting the youngest nation on the globe with 65% of the population

less than 35 years of age?

The state as also leaders of industry can certainly provide an impetus to the youth to embark on

the adventure of education, skill development and take the Rashtram, nation, forward as

an integral part of United States of Indian Ocean which can be a counterpoise to European

Community and provids new avenues for protecting dharma through abhyudayam, general

welfare which is the very raison d’etre of dharma, the cosmic-consciousness-order.

A note on Rahmanheri amulet:

Seal impession from Ur showing a squatting

female. L. Legrain, 1936, Ur excavations,

Vol. 3, Archaic Seal Impressions. [cf.

Nausharo seal with two scorpions flanking a

similar glyph with legs apart – also looks

like a frog]. kuṭhi ‘pudendum muliebre’ (Mu.) khoḍu m. ‘vulva’ (CDIAL 3947). Rebus: kuṭhi

‘smelter furna e’ (Mu.) kh ḍ m. ‘pit’, kh ḍü f. ‘small pit’ (Kashmiri. CDIAL 3947). bica

‘s orpion’ (Assamese) Rebus: bica ‘hematite stone ore’ (Munda). Thus the seal denotes smelter

used for (smelting) hematite stone ore.

There are five hieroglyphs on the ylinder seal (Figure 270): ‘dishevelled

hair’, ‘pudendum muliebre’, ‘ ro odile’, ‘s orpion’, ‘woman’. A crocodile

is also shown in the field together with a scorpion (bica).

karāvu ‘crocodile’ Rebus: khar ‘blacksmith’ (Kashmiri)

bica ‘scorpion’ (Assamese) Rebus: bica ‘hematite stone ore’ (Munda)

<raca>(D) {ADJ} ``^dishevelled'' (Munda) rasāṇẽ n. ʻglowing embersʼ (Marathi).

raca ‘dishevelled’ Rebus: rāca (adj.) Pertaining to a stone (ore) (bica ‘hematite tone ore’).

kola ‘woman’ (Nahali) Rebus: kol ‘working in iron’ (Tamil)

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Thus, the seal denotes a smith working in iron, hematite stone ore.

In his first presentation, Subhash Kak

discusses this Rahman-dheri seal and

indicates the possibility that this is evidence

of a long tradition of astronomical

observationin ancient India. He suggests that

mṛgaśiras nakṣatra (orion, antelope head) and

rohini nakṣatra (scorpio) may be connoted by

the amulet. Obverse: Two scorpions. Two holes. One T glyph. One frog in the middle flanked by

two scorpions. Reverse: two rams looking back. One sloping stroke + one notch (between the

horns of the rams). One T glyph.

Who knows? Subhash Kak’s insight cannot be easily brushed aside, given the hieroglyphic

nature of Indus writing. In a material context, I had deciphered the Indus writing as a catalog of

metalwork of the bronze age artisans, further explaining the use of pairs of hieroglyphs (in this

case, a pair of scorpions and a pair of rams or ibexes) is to denote Meluhha gloss dula ‘pair’ read

rebus: dul ‘cast metal’. Kak’s observations made in the context of astronomical knowledge

which dates back to R gvedic times –removed in time by at least two millennia from the days of

Sarasvati-Sindhu Civilization -- such possible interpretations have to be investigated further for

consistency in recording astronomical observations, in the context of 7000 other objects with

Indus writing in the Indus Script corpora of seals or copperplate or tablets or potsherds.

Alternatively, a method has to be evolved to differentiate and identify Indus artifacts with

hieroglyphic writing used for trade purposes and categorise them apart from artifacts using

hieroglyphs to record astronomical observations.

(Based on my decipherment of Mlecchita vikalpa – Meluhha cipher):

Obverse hieroglyphs of Rahmandheri seal

1. mūxā ‘frog’. Rebus: mũh ‘( opper) ingot’ (Santali) Allograph: mũhe ‘fa e’ (Santali)

2. bica ‘s orpion’ (Assamese) Rebus: bica ‘hematite stone ore’ (Munda) Two scorpions: dula

‘pair’ Rebus: dul ‘ ast metal’ (Santali). Thus, hematite stone ore metalcasting.

3. T-glyph may denote a fire altar like the two fire-altars shown on Warrka vase below two

animals: antelope and tiger. kand ‘fire-altar’ (Santali)

Reverse hieroglyphs of Rahmandheri seal

4. tagaru ‘ram’ (Tulu) Rebus: tagaram ‘tin’ (Kota). damgar ‘mer hant’ (Akk.) Looking back:

krammara ‘look ba k’ (Telugu) Rebus: kamar ‘smith’ (Santali) Two rams: dula ‘pair’ Rebus: dul

‘ ast metal’ (Santali). Thus tin metalcasting.

5. ḍhāḷ = a slope; the inclination of a plane (Gujarati) Rebus: : ḍhāḷako = a large metal ingot

(Gujarati) PLUS kānḍa ‘notch’ Rebus: kānḍa ‘metalware, tools, pots and pans’ (Marathi)

6. T-glyph may denote a fire altar. kand ‘fire-altar’ (Santali)

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Two holes may denote ingots. dula ‘pair’ Rebus: dul ‘ ast metal’ (Santali) [The two holes might

have beeen used to take a thread through them so that the seal could be strung like a pendant

from the neck of the artisan (smith).]

http://bharatkalyan97.blogspot.in/2014/04/representations-of-metallurgical.html

(Felicitations) to Prof Subhash Kak. Jeevema śaradah śatam, may you live a hundred

autumns.

Kalyanaraman

Sarasvati Research Center

December 14, 2014

Conflicting Narratives of Indian Science

Subhash Kak (2010)

Abstract

There exist onfli ting narratives on India’s s ientifi ontributions. One of these narratives that

arose in the period of colonial historiography is that the scientific attitude is generally absent in

Indian culture and Indian science itself is derivative. This narrative has been internalized by the

Indian elite and it informs India’s edu ational system. The paper will examine this narrative in

light of recent research in India and the West.

http://www.uberoireligiousstudies.org/reports/UFRS-Annual-Report-2010.pdf

Introduction

Narratives of Indian science as related to logic, mathematics, medicine, and astronomy changed

as colonial historians developed their view of Indian civilization. The standard view taught in

school textbooks is that India did not have a scientific tradition and its astronomy, logic,

geometry, medicine, and perhaps mathematics were obtained from the West. Influential Western

scholars insisted that Indian astronomers did not make their observations and they had borrowed

their tables from the Babylonians and the Greeks. Indian culture was viewed as emphasizing

religion and mysticism (parāvidyā) at the expense of the empirical (aparā) sciences.1 This view

was rejected by scholars in India who claimed that the absurdity of the larger point was evident

from the existence of the empirical science of medicine in India2 and that there were, in fact, a

whole host of astronomical observations in Indian books.3 In recent years, the understanding of

Indian mathematical and astronomical sciences has improved an example of which is the re-

assessment of Indian mathematics.4 The view that India had no science is no longer held by

scholars, but the process to get the textbook accounts corrected has turned out to be slow,

especially in

India.

The prin ipal diffi ulty in the study of Indian s ien e in India owes to the nomen lature “Hindu

s ien e” by whi h it is labeled causing it to be left out of educational curricula. It should be

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remembered that edu ation is tightly ontrolled by the government and study of “ ommunal”

subjects is discouraged. History of science as a subject is generally not taught or researched in

Indian universities and a few centers that do research on history of science are focused on British

India or on modern science.

Indian academics from the quantitative sciences who have attempted a dialogue between

Western sciences and Vedānta and Yoga have a superficial knowledge of the Indian texts and

little understanding of the material. Indian doctors who have studied yogā -s have not contributed

to the bridging of the divide between the insights of Yoga and Tantra and that of neuroscience.

In this article we will first review current scholarly opinion on some scientific subjects related to

physical and mathematical sciences. Indian epistemology is different from that of mainstream

Western science for it privileges consciousness as an independent entity and this makes the

Indian system much too radical for the materialists. Nevertheless, Indian ideas of cosmology and

consciousness remain influential in many circles.

Logic and Grammar

The question of the origins of logic as a formal discipline is of special interest to the historian of

physics since it represents a turning inward to examine the very nature of reasoning and the

relationship between thought and reality. In the West, Aristotle (384-22 BCE) is generally

credited with the formalization of the tradition of logic and also with the development of early

physics.

In India, the †g-Veda itself in the hymn X.129 suggests the beginnings of the representation of

reality in terms of various logical divisions that were later represented formally as the four

circles of catuṣkoṭi: “A,” “not-A,” “A and not-A,” and “not A and not not-A.”

Causality as the basis of change was enshrined in the early philosophical system of the Sānkhya.

According to Purāṇic accounts, Medhātithi Gautama and Akṣapāda Gautama (or Gotama), which

are perhaps two variant names for the same author of the early formal text on Indian logic,

belonged to about 550 BCE.

Philosophy and physics were considered part of the same intellectual enterprise until

comparatively recent times.

McEvilley in his The Shape of Ancient Thought (2001) does an excellent comparative analysis

of Greek and Indian philosophy, stressing how there existed much interaction between the

twocultural areas in very early times, but he argued that they evolved independently. Some

scholars believe that the five part syllogism of Indian logic was derived from the three-part

Aristotelian logic. On the other hand, there is an old tradition preserved by the Greeks and the

Persians which presents the opposite view. According to it, Alexander was the intermediary who

brought Indian logic to the Greeks and it was under this influence that the later Greek tradition

emerged.5

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Another noteworthy contribution to logic was by the school of New Logic (Navya-Nyāya) of

Bengal and Bihar. At its zenith during the time of Raghunātha (1475–1550), this school

developed a methodology for precise semantic analysis of language. Its formulations are

equivalent to mathematical logic.6

Pāṇini’s grammar (5th entury BCE) provides 4,000 rules that describe the Sanskrit of his day

completely. This grammar is acknowledged to be one of the greatest intellectual achievements of

all time. The great variety of language mirrors, in many ways, the complexity of nature and,

therefore, success in describing a language is as impressive as a complete theory of physics. It is

remarkable that Pāṇini set out to describe the entire grammar in terms of a finite number of rules.

Scholars have shown that the grammar of Pāṇini represents a universal grammatical and

computing system.7 Binary numbers were known at the time of Pingala’s Chandahśāstra of

about the fifth century BCE and they were used to classify Vedic meters.

Geometry

Indian geometry began very early in the Vedic period in altar problems as in the one where the

circular altar (earth) is to be made equal in area to a square altar (heavens).8 Two aspects of the

“Pythagoras” theorem are described in the texts by Baudhāyana and others.9 The geometric

problems are often presented with their algebraic counterparts. The solution to the planetary

problems also led to the development of algebraic methods.

In the historical period, astronomical observatories were part of temple complexes where the

king was consecrated. Such consecration served to confirm the king as foremost devotee of the

chosen deity, who was taken to be the embodiment of time and the universe. For example,

Udayagiri is an astronomical site connected with the Classical age of the Gupta dynasty (CE

320–500).

Indian Physics

In the Vedic world-view, the processes in the sky, on earth, and within the mind are connected.

The Vedic seers insist that all rational descriptions of the universe lead to logical paradox.

The one category transcending all oppositions is Brahman. Understanding the nature of

consciousness is of paramount importance in this view but this does not mean that other sciences

are ignored. Vedic ritual is a symbolic retelling of this world-view. Knowledge is classified in

two ways: the lower or dual, and the higher or unified. The seemingly irreconcilable worlds of

the material and the conscious are taken as aspects of the same transcendental reality.

The Vaiśēṣika system considers nine classes of substances, some of which are non-atomic, some

atomic, and others allpervasive. The non-atomic ground is provided by the three substances

ether, space, and time, which are unitary and indestructible; a further four: earth, water, fire, and

air are atomic composed of indivisible and indestructible atoms; self (ātman), which is the

eighth, is omnipresent and eternal; and, lastly, the ninth, is the mind (manas), which is also

eternal but of atomic dimensions, that is, infinitely small.10 Indian physics is different from

Western physics in the manner it considers mind to be a separate category.

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The atoms combine to form different kinds of molecules that break up under the influence of

heat. The molecules come to have different properties based on the influence of various

potentials (tanmātras). Heat and light rays are taken to consist of very small particles of high

velocity. The gravitational force is perceived as a wind. The other forces were mediated by

atoms of one kind or the other.

The mystery of reality may be seen through the perspectives of language (because at its deepest

level it embodies structures of consciousness) and logic (Nyāya), physical categories (Vaiśēṣika),

creation at the personal or the psychological level (Sānkhya), synthesis of experience (Yoga),

structures of tradition (Mimāṁsá), and cosmology (Vedānta). These are the six Darśanas of

Indian philosophy. Each of these ways of seeing takes us to different kinds of paradox that

prepares us for the intuitive leap to the next insight in the ladder of understanding.

Sacred architecture in many cultures replicates conceptions of the universe. The cathedral is a

representation of the heavens of the Christian cosmos. In India, it was concluded using

elementary measurements that the relative distance to the sun and the moon from the earth is

approximately 108 times their respective diameters. The diameter of the sun is

likewiseapproximately 108 times the diameter of the earth, and this fact could have been

established from the relative durations of the solar and lunar eclipses.

The number 108, taken as a fundamental measure of the universe, was used in ritual and sacred

geometry. Each god and goddess was given 108 names; the number of dance poses in the Nyāya

śāstra, an ancient text on theater, dance, and music, was taken to be 108, as was the number of

beads in the rosary. The Hindu temple had the circumference to the measure of 180 (half of the

number of days in the year) and its axis had the measure of 54 (half the number 108).11 The

body, breath, and consciousness were taken to be equivalent on the cosmic plane to the earth, the

space, and the sun, respectively.

Astronomy

Western astronomy begins with the Babylonians. There are intriguing similarities between

Babylonian and Indian systems of astronomy. The similarities between the two systems include:

the use of 30 divisions of the lunar month; the 360 divisions of the civil year; the 360 divisions

of the circle; the length of the year; and the solar zodiac. Some have wondered if the Babylonian

planetary tables might have played a role in the theories of the siddhāntas.

It is important to note that the key ideas found in the Babylonian astronomy of 700 BCE are

already present in the Vedic texts, which even by the most conservative reckoning are older than

that period. Furthermore, the solar zodiac (rāśis) was used in Vedic India and there exists a

plausible derivation of the symbols of the solar zodiac from the deities of the segments.

In view of the attested presence of the Indic people in the Mesopotamian region prior to 700

BCE, it is likely that if at all the two astronomies influenced each other; the dependence is of the

Babylonian on the Indian. It is of course quite possible that the Babylonian innovations emerged

independent of the earlier Indic methods.

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The Indic presence in West Asia goes back to the second millennium BCE in the ruling elites of

the Hittites and the Mitanni in Turkey and Syria, and the Kassites in Mesopotamia. The Mitanni

were joined in marriage to the Egyptian pharaohs during the second half of the second

millennium and theyappear to have influenced that region as well. The Ugaritic list 33 gods just

like the count of Vedic gods. Although the Kassites vanished from the scene by the close of the

millennium, Indic groups remained in the general area for centuries, sustaining their culture by

links through trade. Thus Sargon defeats one Bagdatti of Uisdis in 716 BCE. The name Bagdatti

(Skt. Bhagadatta) is Indi and it annot be Iranian be ause of the double ‘t’. The Indo-Aryan

presence in West Asia persisted until the time of the Persian kings like Darius and Xerxes. It is

attested by the famous daiva inscription in which Xerxes (ruled 486-65 BCE) proclaims his

suppression of the rebellion by the daiva worshipers of west Iran.

These Indic groups most likely served as intermediaries for the transmission of ideas of Vedic

astronomy to the Babylonians and other groups in West Asia. Since we can clearly see a gap of

several centuries in the adoption of certain ideas, one can determine the direction of

transmission. The starting point of astronomical studies is the conception of the wheel of time of

360 parts. It permeates Vedic writing and belongs to second millennium or the third millennium

BCE or even earlier, and we see it used in Babylon only in the second part of first millennium

BCE.

Recent archaeological discoveries show that the Sarasvati River ceased reaching the sea before

3000 BCE and dried up in the sands of the Western desert around 1900 BCE, but this river is

praised as going from the mountain to the sea in the R gveda. This is consistent with

astronomical evidence indicating third millennium epoch for the R gveda.

The discovery of an astronomical code in the organization of the ṛgveda is relevant for the

understanding of Vedic astronomy. The archaeological finds of the Harappan era12 also

establish that there was a long tradition of astronomical observation in India. An amulet seal

from Rahmandheri (2400 BCE) shows a pair of scorpions on one side and two antelopes on the

other. It has been argued that this seal represents the opposition of the Orion ( mṛgaśiras, or antelope head) and the Scorpio ( rōhiṇī) nakṣatras and, therefore, the

nakṣatra system is very old.

There exists another relationship between Orion and rōhiṇī, this time the name of alpha

Tauri, Aldebaran. The famous Vedic myth of Prajāpati as Orion, as personification of the year,

desiring his daughter (rōhiṇī) (for example Aitareya Brāhmaṇa 3.33) represents the age when the

beginning of the year shifted from Orion to rōhiṇī. For this transgression, Rudra (Sirius,

mṛgavyādha) cuts off Prajāpati’s head. It has been suggested that the arrow near the head of one

of the antelopes represents the decapitation of Orion, and this seems a very reasonable

interpretation of the iconography of the seal.

It is likely then that many constellations were named in the third millennium BCE or earlier. This

would explain why the named constellations in the ṛgveda and the Brāhmaṇas, such as the ¦kÈas

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(the Great Bear and the Little Bear), the two divine dogs (Canis Major and Canis Minor), the

twin asses (in Cancer), the goat (Capricornus) and the heavenly boat (Argo Navis), are the same

as in Europe. Other constellations described parallel mythical events: Prajāpati as Orion upon his

beheading; Osiris as Orion when he is killed by Seth.

It was held by some that the Siddhāntic astronomy of Āryabhaṭa to be based mainly on

mathematical ideas that originated in Babylon and Greece. This view was inspired, in part, by the

fact that two of the five pre-Āryabhaṭa siddhāntas in Varāhamihira’s Pañcasiddhāntikā (PS),

namely Romaka and Paulisa, appear to be connected to the West through the names Rome and

Paul. But the planetary model of these early siddhāntas is basically an extension of the theory of

the orbits of the sun and the moon in the Vedānga Jyōtiṣa. Furthermore, the compilation of the

Pañ asiddhāntikā occurred after Āryabhaṭa and so the question of the gradual development of

ideas can hardly be answered by examining it.

Scholars who suggest that Āryabhaṭa and other Indian astronomers borrowed mathematical

techniques and observations from Greek and Babylonian astronomy use Almagest, the twelfth-

entury Arabi version of Ptolemy’s astronomi al text of whi h the original Greek text is lost,

forcomparison. This late Arabic text which was later translated back into Greek is bound to have

an accretion of Islamic material, which is especially true of the sections concerning star locations

that were given much attention by Islamic astronomers. As a point of comparison, the Sūrya

Siddhānta of which we have a summary from sixth century by Varāhamihira is quite different

from the later version that has come down to us.

In the revisionist view of Indian astronomy, elements of the Indian texts of the first millennium

ce are taken to be borrowed from a text that dates only from twelfth century ce. Critics see this is

as example of the Eurocentric view that asserts science arose only in Greece and Europe, with

the Babylonians credited with accurate observations, and any novel scientific models

encountered outside of this region are taken to be borrowed from the Greeks. If evidence in the

larger Greek world for a specific scientific activity is lacking then the presence of it outside that

region is termed a remnant of Greco-Babylonian science. Such material is gathered together in

what is alled “re overy of Gre o-Babylonian s ien e.”

The second-millennium text Vedānga Jyōtiṣa of Lagadha went beyond the earlier calendrical

astronomy to develop a theory for the mean motions of the sun and the moon. This marked the

beginnings of the application of mathematics to the motions of the heavenly bodies. An epicycle

theory was used to explain planetary motions. Later theories consider the motion of the planets

with respect to the sun, which in turn is seen to go around the earth.

Histories of Indian Astronomy

The early Western studies of Indian texts duly noted the astronomical references to early epochs

going back to three or four thousand BCE. As the Indian astronomical texts were studied it was

discovered that the Indian methods were different from those used in other civilizations. The

French astronomer M. Jean Sylvain Bailly in his classic Traité de l’Astronomie Indienne et

Orientale (1787) described the methods of the Sūrya Siddhānta and other texts and expressed his

10

view that Indian astronomy was very ancient. Struck by the elegance and simplicity of its rules

and its archaic features, Bailly believed that astronomy had originated in India and it was later

transmitted to the Chaldeans in Babylon and to the Greeks.

As against this, John Bentley in 1799 in a study in the Asiatick Researches suggested that the

parameters of the Sūrya Siddhānta were correct for ce 1091. But Bentley was criticized for

failing to notice that the Sūrya Siddhānta had been revised using bīja corrections, and therefore

his arguments did not negate the central thesis of Bailly.

In the next several decades Indian astronomy became a contested subject. Part of the difficulty

arose from a misunderstanding of the Indian system due to the unfamiliar structure of its luni–

solar system. Later, it became a hostage to the ideas that the Vedic people had come as invaders

to India around 1500 BCE, and that Indians were other-worldly and uninterested in science and

they lacked the tradition of observational astronomy until the medieval times. The inconvenient

astronomical dates were brushed aside as untrustworthy. It was argued that astronomical

references in the texts either belonged to recent undatable layers or were late interpolations.

But Ebenezer Burgess, the translator of the Surya Siddhānta, writing in 1860, maintained that the

evidence, although not conclusive, pointed to the Indians being the original inventors or

discoverers of: (i) the lunar and solar divisions of the zodiac, (ii) the primitive theory of

epicycles, (iii) astrology, and (iv) names of the planets after gods.

The view that early Indian astronomy may represent lost Babylonian or Greek inspired systems

creates many difficulties, anticipated more than 100 years earlier by Burgess, including the

incongruity of the epochs involved. This only thing that one can do is to lump all the Indian texts

that are prior to 500 BCE together into a mass of uniform material, as has been proposed by

some scholars. But such a theory is considered absurd by Vedic scholars.

The Vedānga Jyōtiṣa is a late Vedic text, whose internal evidence points to the second

millennium BCE. Although Sankara Balakrishna Dikshita’s Bhāratīya Jyōtiṣa, published in the

closing years of the nineteenth century,13 contained enough arguments against looking for any

foreign basis to the Vedānga Jyōtiṣa, the issue was reopened in the 1960s. The idea that India did

not have a tradition of observational astronomy was refuted convincingly by Billard.14 In his

book on Indian astronomy, he showed that the parameters used in the various siddhāntas actually

belonged to the period at which they were created giving lie to the notion that they were based on

some old tables transmitted from Mesopotamia or Greece. For the pre-siddhÀntic period, the

discovery of the astronomy of the R gveda establishes that the Indians were making careful

observations in the Vedic period as well.

Sociology of Public Discourse

This current phase of globalization has some parallels with the earlier globalization unleashed by

the industrial revolution of the early nineteenth century, and the spread of colonialism. But

ultimately, more than the knowledge of science and technology, the British Raj was based on its

superiority of organization and control of the public discourse and education. The East India

11

Company used several stratagems to annex Indian territories, such as the doctrine of lapse for

rulers who died without male heirs.

The idea of British superiority, drummed into the students at school, was used to keep out

Indians from the superior positions in law, medicine, science, and administration until 1910.

The British used Western s ien e, “and astronomy in parti ular, to reinfor e so ial

dominan e.”15 Bayly quotes further from a 1844 arti le that asserts that the “me hani al

apparatus in one of our great factories was as superior to the rude implements of the Bengal

spinners and weavers as modern algebra was to the cumbrous diction of the medieval

astronomer, Brahmagupta.”

The fundamental short oming of India’s entralized system of edu ation ompared to the non-

centralized Western one explains the persistence of old attitudes. If we consider the

representations of Indian culture as a struggle between the hegemonic West with its imperialist

moorings and India, with its lived experience that is at odds with the Western narratives, the

upper hand remains with the West.

A tightly controlled centralized system is like a blind elephant, since the persons at the top

cannot have the resources to process all the information being generated. (As an aside, such

information overload is the reason that the Soviet Union collapsed because no economist,

howsoever competent and patriotic, could have the capacity to deal with the massive information

of the marketplace to set rational prices for the goods produced in the government factories.) If

there is a lesson here, it is that fully autonomous and even private universities must emerge to

provide the necessary churning that leads to reform.

Academic institutional power is now used by the Western academy to foster its constructs of

India. Just a few West-based journals control intellectual output in Indian studies, directly or

indirectly, promoting ideas that support Western interests. Indian academic scholars, wishing to

partake of Western material comforts, are part of the bandwagon of this critique.

It is amusing, but not surprising, that the fiercest opposition to reform in education comes from

the academy in India. Indian curriculum remains West-centric. Take, for example, °yurveda, for

which a few years ago the US National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine

decided to establish an Ayurvedic Center of Collaborative Reserch to study medicine as it is

practised in India. It is hard to imagine that the Indian medical establishment would approve of

such a center in a mainstream medical college. Or consider the long battle that had to be fought

for years to establish a Sanskrit department at Jawaharlal Nehru University, or how there is no

required teaching of the history of Indian science and technology at the Indian Institutes of

Technology, or the history of Indian business at the Indian Institutes of Management.

In a new stage in the economy of the knowledge industry, there is now a direct recruitment by

Western universities of scholars of Indian origin who have internalized Western constructs. In

this sense, it may not be a loss. On the other hand, the graduate of the India university who

stayed back to teach in India may not have known Indian texts in original (since he does not

know Indian languages), and he may have simply adopted Western theories, but by living in

12

India there was always the possibility of absorbing Indian culture by osmosis, perhaps from the

office clerk or the barber. The Indian professor in the West will not have the opportunity for this

learning of India by living it. India’s ontributions to s ience, technology and crafts are well

documented, if not widely known. For example, before the British arrived, Indians had a system

of inoculation against smallpox; year-old live smallpox matter was used, and it was very

effective. ṭīkādārs would fan out into the country before the smallpox season in the winter. The

British doctor J.Z. Holwell wrote a book in 1767 describing the system and how it was safe.

European medicine did not have any treatment against this disease at that time. Inoculation

against smallpox using cowpox was demonstrated by Edward Jenner in 1798 and it became a

part of Western medicine by 1840. No sooner did that happen that the British in India banned the

older method of vaccination, without making certain that sufficient number of inoculators in the

new technique existed. Smallpox in India became a greater scourge than before.

India’s te hnology was flourishing before the British. It has been estimated that India’s share of

world trade in 1800 was about 20 per cent (equal to America’s share of world trade in 2000). The

ships built at Mumbai in its heyday were amongst the best in the world. According to

Dharampal,16 there were 10,000 iron and steel furnaces operating in the eighteenthcentury India.

The story of the destruction of India’s textile industry by the British is too well known to need

repeating. The British became masters of India at a very opportune time. First, they cut off

India’s export markets. Soon the innovations of the dawning industrial revolution gave their

products a cost advantage that became permanent in the absence of new investments to upgrade

Indian factories. As India became de-industrialized, it turned into a huge monopoly market for

British products. British Raj made token investments in science and technology.

In 1920, India’s s ientifi servi es had a total of 213 s ientists of whom 195 were British.17 But

this story of India’s e onomi de line (and the loss of memory of its previous ondition) is a

complex one. Suppose you were offered a history of the English without reference to Newton,

Faraday, and Maxwell or of the Americans without mention of Edison, Michelson, or Feynman,

you would say it overlooks the real genius of these nations. Youth in these countries brought up

without the stories of these masters would not be quite English or American in spirit. Given this,

why is it that Indian s hools leave out mention of India’s s ientists from its textbooks? Most

educated Indians have heard only one or two names of the greatest Indian scientists and

mathematicians: Lagadha, Baudhāyana, Pāṇini, Pingala, Āryabhaṭa, Bhāskara, Mādhava, and

Nīlakaṇṭha.

The last two names belong to the Kerala school of mathematics and astronomy. Mādhava (c.

1340–1425) and Nīlakaṇṭha (c. 1444–1545), who made fundamental contributions to power

series, calculus and astronomy. Their invention of calculus came 200 years before Newton and

Leibnitz.18

Historians of mathematics have recently suggested that Kerala mathematics may have provided

key ideas for the scientific revolution in Europe. The need for clocks to keep accurate time on

ships became of critical importance after the colonization of America. There were significant

financial rewards for new navigation techniques. These historians argue that information was

sought from India due to the prestige of the eleventh-century Arabic translations of Indian

13

navigational methods. They suggest that Jesuit missionaries were the intermediaries in the

diffusion of Kerala mathematical ideas into Europe.

Cosmology

The doctrine of the three constituent qualities – sattva, rajas, and tamas – plays an important role

in the Sānkhya physics and metaphysics. In its undeveloped state, cosmic matter has these

qualities in equilibrium. As the world evolves, one or the other of these become preponderant in

different objects or beings, giving specific character to each.

The recursive Vedic world-view requires that the universe itself go through cycles of creation

and destruction. This view became a part of the astronomical framework and ultimately very

long cycles of billions of years were assumed. Indian evolution takes the life forms to evolve into

an increasingly complex system until the end of the cycle. The categories of Sānkhya operate at

the level of the individual as well. Life mirrors the entire creation cycle and cognition mirrors a

lifehistory.

Cosmological speculations led to the belief in a universe that goes through cycles of creation and

destruction with a period of 8.64 billion years. Three kinds of motion are alluded to in the Vedic

books: these are the translational motion, sound, and light whi h are taken to be “equivalent” to

earth, air, and sky. The fourth motion is assigned to consciousness; and this is considered to be

infinite in speed.

It is most interesting that the books in this Indian tradition speak about the relativity of time and

space in a variety of ways. Universes defined recursively are described in the famous episode of

Indra and the ants in Brahmavaivarta PurÀõa 4.47.100-60, the Mahābhārata 12.187, and

elsewhere. These flights of imagination are to be traced to more than a straightforward

generalization of the motions of the planets into a cyclic universe. They must be viewed in the

background of an amazingly sophisticated tradition of cognitive and analytical thought.

The Mahābhārata has a very interesting passage (12.233), virtually identical with the

corresponding material in theYoga-Vāsiṣṭha, which describes the dissolution of the world.

Briefly, it is stated how a dozen suns burn up the earth, and how elements get transmuted until

space itself collapses into wind (one of the elements). Ultimately, everything enters into primeval

consciousness.

If one leaves out the often incongruous commentary on these ideas which were strange to him,

we find al-Biruni in his encyclopaedic book on India written in 1030 speaking of essentially the

same ideas. Here are two little extracts: The Hindus have divided duration into two periods, a

period of motion, which has been determined as time, and a period of rest, which can only be

determined in an imaginary way according to the analogy of that which has first been

determined, the period of motion. The Hindus hold the eternity of the Creator to be determinable,

not measurable, since it is infinite.

14

They do not, by the word creation, understand a formation of something out of nothing. They

mean by creation only the working with a piece of clay, working out various combinations and

figures in it, and making such arrangements with it as will lead to certain ends and aims which

are potentially in it.19

This was a framework consisting of innumerable worlds (solar systems), where time and space

were continuous, matter was atomic, and consciousness was atomic, yet derived from an all-

pervasive unity. The material atoms were defined by their subtle form (tanmātra) visualized as a

potential, from which emerged the gross atoms. A central notion in this system was that all

descriptions of reality are circumscribed by paradox.

Cosmology and Consciousness

There are two essential parts to understanding the universe: its representation in terms of material

objects, and the manner in which this representation changes with time. In philosophy, these are

the positions of two different schools, one believing that reality is being, and the other that it is

becoming.

The conception of the cosmos, consisting of the material universe and observers, has been

shaped by ideas that belong to these two opposite schools. Its conception as being is associated

with materialism, while that of becoming is associated with idealism. In the materialist view,

mental experience is emergent on the material ground and contents of the mind are secondary to

the physical world. Conversely, in the idealist position consciousness has primacy.

The question of consciousness is connected to the relationship between brain and mind.

eductionism considers them to be identical – with mind representing the sum total of the activity

in the brain – at a suitable higher level of representation. Opposed to this is the view that

although mind requires a physical structure, it ends up transcending that structure. Just as there

exists the outer cosmos – the physical universe – there also exists the corresponding inner

cosmos of the mind. The mind processes signals coming into the brain to obtain its

understandings in the domains of seeing, hearing, touching, and tasting using its store of

memories. But a cognitive act is an active process where the selectivity of the sensors and the

accompanying processing in the brain is organized based on the expectation of the cognitive task

and on effort, will, and intention. Intelligence is a result of the workings of numerous active

cognitive agents.

The structure of the inner cosmos belongs to the domain of psychology, but it is fair to assume

that at some level it mirrors the outer cosmos. The inner cosmos is physically located in

the brain. But we cannot speak of where in the brain the perceiving self resides, because that

would amount to a homunculus argument. Thus the conscious self can neither be localized to a

single cell, nor assumed to be distributed over the entire brain or a part of it. We cannot speak of

where the self is, but rather how the self obtains knowledge. Since the self is associated with the

brain it has the brain as the lens through which it perceives the world. Our knowledge, therefore,

is tied up to the very nature of the neurophysiologic structure of the brain. We make sense of the

world for we are already biologically programmed to do so and we have innate capacity for it.

This idea is expressed in the slogan that the outer is mirrored in the inner. In an elaboration of

15

this idea it is assumed that patterns seen in the outer world characterize the inner world as well.

This is essentially the Indian view and as evident it provides a bridge between materialism and

idealism.

The Śrī Cakra (also called Śrī Yantra) is an iconic representation of the Indian approach to

consciousness.20 According to the Vedic view, reality, which is unitary at the transcendental

level, is projected into experience that is characterized by duality and paradox. We thus have

duality associated with body and consciousness, being and becoming, greed and altruism, fate

and freedom. The gods bridge such duality in the field of imagination and also collectively in

society: Víṣṇu is the deity of moral law, whereas Śiva is Universal Consciousness. Conversely,

the projection into processes of time and change is through the agency of the Goddess.

Consciousness (Puruṣa) and Nature (Prakṛti) are opposite sides of the same coin.

Conclusion

The educational system created by the British in India in the nineteenth century was to estrange

Indians from their culture21 so that they could rule India effectively. This program has been so

successful that most textbook authors are not even aware of the Kerala S hool, or of Piôgala’s

and Pāṇini’s s ientifi ontributions. Many who are passionate in their love for India are so

misguided by the prestige of the Orientalist narratives that they believe that Mādhava and

Nīlakaṇṭha are fictional characters, product of a conspiracy to create an imagined greatness for

ancient India.The discussion of the Kerala School was minimized in many Western books on

Indian astronomy.22

Indian texts present a recursive cosmology in which material world and sentient beings both have

a part. The material part of this cosmology is entirely governed by physical law and sentient

beings are taken to be free. Working within this framework, Indian seers and scholars developed

several remarkable insights into the nature of reality as well as specific advances in the

mathematical and empirical sciences. This framework included material on the nature of

intuition itself. The materialist who reads these texts is repelled by the postulation of

consciousness as an independent entity. For a convinced materialist, Indian cosmology is a trap

from which young should be protected. This is the reason why the ideological left, which

dominates education and the media, takesa hard line against it.

1 Bayly, C.A., 1996, Empire and Information, Cambridge University Press.

2 Kak, S., 2005, “Āyurveda” in En y lopedia of India, ed. Stanley Wolpert, New York:

S ribner’s/Gale.

3 Dikshit, S.B., 1969, Bharatiya Jyotish Shastra, Calcutta: Government of India Press.

4 Pear e, I.G., 2001, “Indian Mathemati s: Redressing the Balan e,” http://www-history.mcs.st-

andrews.ac.uk/history/Projects/Pearce/index.html; Ramasubramanian, K., and M.D. Srinivas,

2010, “Development of Cal ulus in India,” in Studiesin the History of Indian Mathematics, ed.

C.S. Seshadri, Gurgaon:Hindustan Book Agency.

5 Kak, S., 2009, “Logi in Indian Thought,” in Logi in Religious Dis ourse, ed. A. S humann,

Frankfurt and Paris: Ontos Verlag.

6 Matilal, B.K., 2005, Epistemology, Logic and Grammar in Indian Philosophical Analysis,

Oxford: Oxford University Press.

16

7 E.g., Staal, F., 1988, Universals: Studies in Indian Logic and Linguistics, Chicago: University

of Chicago Press.

8 Kak, S., 2011b, “[Ar haeoastronomy in] India,” in Heritage Sights of Astronomy and

Archaeoastronomy, C. Ruggles and M. Cotte (eds.), Paris: ICMS.

9 Rao, S. Balachandra, 1994, Indian Mathematics and Astronomy, Bangalore: Jnana Deep

Publications, 1994.

10 Kak, S., 2011c, The Nature of Physical Reality (25th Anniversary Edition), Stillwater:

Oklahoma State University.

11 Kak, S., 2011a, The Astronomi al Code of the †g-Veda (3rd edn.),Stillwater: Oklahoma State

University.

12 Kak, 2011b.

13 Dikshit, S.B., 1969

14 Billard, R., 1971, L’astronomie Indienne, Paris: Publi ations de l’e ole fran aise d’extreme-

orient.

15 Bayly, 1996, op. cit., p. 255.

16 Dharampal, 1983, The Beautiful Tree: Indigenous Indian Education

in the Eighteenth Century, New Delhi: Biblia Impex.

17 Arnold, D., 2000, Science, Technology and Medicine in Colonial India, Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press.

18 Ramasubramanian and Srinivas, 2010.

19 Sa hau, E.C., 1910, Al beruni’s India, London: Kegan Paul, Fren h,Trubner & Co., pp. 321-

22.

20 Kak, S., 2008-09, “The Great Goddess Lalitā and the Śrī Cakra,”Brahmavidyā: The Adyar

Library Bulletin, 72-73: 155-72.

21 Dharampal, 1983.

22 E.g., Pingree, D., 1981, Jyōtiṣa śāstra, Harrassowitz.

Commencement Speech - Graduate College, Oklahoma State University,

Stillwater

December 12, 2014

by Subhash Kak

Today’s eremony is not only to mark with satisfaction the fruits of the labors of the past few

years that got you the graduate college degree, it is also to look at the larger question of the

meaning of this journey and where does one go from here.

You are stepping into an uncertain world. There is a demographic crisis in the rich countries that

is currently mitigated by unprecedented migration from the southern countries to the north.

Meanwhile, robotics, automation and the use of information technology is causing the

disappearance of many jobs. To give one example, the technology for driverless cars has been

developed and several states, including California and Florida, have modified law to make the

operation of such vehicles legal. The British government has announced that driverless cars will

be allowed on public roads from January 1, 2015.

17

Meanwhile, experts agree social welfare services in the richest countries cannot be sustained at

current levels. Much of the bookkeeping for services even in the United States is pure make

believe as, for example, in health care. In the education field, people are fearful of the disruptions

MOOCS (massive open online courses) might cause to brick and mortar colleges and

universities.

Individual ingenuity is what counts in a period of uncertainty. No one can predict what the future

will be. The jobs that you may be doing in 5 or 10 years will be very different from what you

have trained for. This means that you will have to keep on learning and looking for opportunities

for which your temperament and passion is most suitable.

But in addition to learning new things, you will have to unlearn much of what was taught here at

OSU. The other day I was talking to a world-famous musician and she said that she spent a

lifetime learning rules and once she was on her own trying to be creative she has had to spend

another lifetime unlearning the rules she had learnt before.

In short, creativity, essential to succeed in an unpredictable world, requires breaking the rules

and thinking outside the box. This is something that your professors wished to tell you but

perhaps did not since it appeared too complicated and since they thought the best time to let you

know is when you have received your degree.

The other important idea is that education is not information. We teach you intricate details of

subjects and you have to remember many things to get good grades and then, of course, it is

mostly forgotten in two or three weeks. Yet a good course provides discipline and general

familiarity with the subject. On the other hand, information is freely available on the Internet and

there are other ways to embrace rules. If need arose, and one really cared, one can, given good

connectivity, learn for free and in time become an expert. This assumes that the person has the

wisdom to separate what is misleading and wrong from the right. So what we hope we taught

you is this wisdom.

In my view the purpose of edu ation is to a tualize Plutar h’s famous observation: “Mind is not

a vessel to be filled; it is a flame to be kindled.”

The challenge for the educator is how to light this flame. There is no direct way to do it. No

formula, no definite process, and the method works differently for each person. The teacher can

only be the example to inspire the student. If the student has passion for learning and is true to

himself, the flame does get lit.

There is a famous story about how great leaders have instinctively known about the effectiveness

of setting an example. A family came to Mahatma Gandhi for help for they were worried about

their sick son, recently diagnosed with diabetes, who was refusing to give up sugar. Gandhi was

their last resort for the boy had promised to give it up if so instructed by Gandhi, who was his

idol. Gandhi heard them out and then he asked them to come back in two weeks.

So, two weeks later, the parents and the son are back. Gandhi looks at the boy kindly and says,

“Son, give up sugar, be ause it is not good for you.” The boy gives his word. The parents are

18

grateful and happy but also perplexed. They ask Gandhi, but why didn’t you say these same

words two weeks ago? Gandhi explains: two weeks ago I was eating sugar so I was not qualified

to give this advice. Now that I have given it up I could say what I said with conviction.

Another thing about your experience here at OSU: We were teaching you small things in courses

but our objective was to teach you something much bigger. We were doing this by a clever

opening of doors to lead you to a space where you learn by yourself. Small ideas are taught

directly, but big ideas can only be taught indirectly.

Education is not just teaching what the teacher knows but making it possible to go beyond that. If

the teacher has not been able to inspire the student to go past his own level of knowledge, then he

or she has failed.

The other point I wish to make today is that of swimming against the current. We tend to be with

the crowd and it is great for those who are in front if the purpose is to find something new. But

for others it cannot be so productive. If you are ambitious, you mustcarve out your own path. Not

just for the sake of the newness of the path, but to be true to yourself.

There is this great Latin phrase that does wonders for making things clear: docendo disco,

scribendo cogito: I learn when I speak, I think when I write. Writers and scientists swear by it,

and it should be of great use to you also.

What it really means is that you must speak and write from the heart. This is seen best when you

push yourself – or when you are pushed as, for example, when you are giving a speech or

lecturing to students (not reading it!) – you discover things about yourself that you were not

aware of. You are in front of the audience and you are asked a question that you have never

thought of before. It is a question of life or death – figuratively – and suddenly out of nowhere

you say something that you did not know and it is true, a new insight and scientific advance. It

makes you humble. The greatest discoveries are not a result of deliberate reasoning but sort of

accidental.

I would like to on lude with a famous story in Plato’s Republi . So rates wishes to prove that

knowledge is already present in the unconscious although it might be hidden. Learning is merely

a process of uncovering of this knowledge and indeed, the Latin root educo for education means

to educe or draw out. Socrates asks for an uneducated peasant to be brought to him. By a series

of questions, he shows that the peasant instinctively knows geometrical theorems although he has

never been taught the subject.

From Plato’s A ademy to the modern great university: the se ret is a system where professors

and students have to give seminars and challenge each other. We hope we provided you that kind

of environment. Now as you march out armed with your diplomas, seize the day!

Subhash Kak