Tuesday, February 16, 2010

on Indian Mathematics

feb 16th, 2010

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: S. Kalyanaraman
Date: Tue, Feb 16, 2010 at 12:05 PM
Subject: Mumford on Indian Mathematics
To:


A very interesting overview of Indian Mathematics by the eminent mathematician David Mumford in his review of the book,  Kim Plofker, Mathematics in India  Princedton 2008. This has appeared in the March 2010 issue of Notices of AMS.


Excerpt:

"Did you know that Vedic priests were using the so-called Pythagorean theorem to construct their fire altars in 800 BCE?; that the differential equation for the sine function, infinite difference form, was described by Indian mathematician-astronomers in the fifth century CE?; and that 'Gregory's' series PI/4 = 1 -1/3+1/3-… was proven using the power series for arctangent and, with ingenious summation methods, used to accurately compute PI in southwest India in the fourteenth century? If any of this surprises you, Plofker's book is for you. Her book fills a huge gap: a detailed, eminently readable, scholarly survey of the full scope of Indian mathematics and astronomy (the two were inseparable in India) from their Vedic beginnings to roughly 1800."


kalyan


2 comments:

Itsdifferent said...

The dumb education departments of our central and state government should start paying attention to these writings, and start crediting our great ancestors for their wonderful discoveries.
Just imagine what will it to do a generation, who is taught our great ancestry, and the pride we can all have. Rather than crediting every one such theorem to an European....

blogger said...

This, as appropriately complemented with material from Ian Pearce's article:
Indian Mathematics: Redressing the balanceIan G Pearce http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/history/Projects/Pearce/index.html ,
should made an extended part of the new nationwide math curriculum they are in the process of creating in India:

Common maths, science course for all schools from 2011IANS, 16 February 2010 http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Common-maths-science-course-for-all-schools-from-2011/articleshow/5581337.cms

A few of us should take this up as a project and pursue and follow it through unto success.