What are scientific advancements in the ancient indus river valley?

Question

What are scientific advancements in the ancient indus river valley?

Answer 1

Till the last decades of the twentieth century Indus Valley Civilisation (IVS) was considered the earliest archaeologically verifiable Indian civilisation. Recent research at various other archaeological sites suggests that there was a far more advanced civilisation (the Saraswati Valley Civilisation) that predated ‘Indus’ and after all, the river Saraswati was not mythical as was made out to be. Thus we find Indian civilisations stretching backwards and forwards in an unbroken continuum for nearly ten thousand years. We may with justification ignore the political polemics that transpose alien influences as lending an impetus to the evolution of Indian science.

That ancient Indians achieved proficiency in various branches of science as diverse as agriculture, atomic energy, astronomy, irrigation, mathematics (including the concept of zero which was a precursor to the concept of the wheel), medicine (including anaesthetics), metallurgy, pharmacognacy (the herbal branch of modern pharmacology) and surgery (including reconstructive surgery popularly known as plastic surgery), millennia before the western world discovered them is now an accepted fact. Aviation was not a concept of scientific fiction – ancient Indians understood it. These facts may be gleaned from the Vedangas, Kautilya's Arthasastra, the Charaka Samhita, the Sulva Sutras, the Surya Siddhanta and others.

There are two reasons why we have little knowledge about Indians’ scientific advancements. The first was that they had scant regard for recording their achievements. Although ancient Indians utilised science for improving the quality of mundane life, they studied it more as a philosophical pursuit. The second was, for over 800 years alien invaders attempted to run Indian civilisation into the ground and the British had a vested interest in psyching Indians as a backward people during their 200-year rule.

Mathematics: Indians were so much ahead of their time that for 500 years the Europeans did not accept the concept of zero, because the Church considered it heresy. Indians’ concept of the indivisibles led to the theory of real numbers and infinitesimals and to the development of calculus.

Metrics and the decimal system: An analysis of weights and measures used by the IVS people suggests that they had a system of numerology based on the number ‘16’, the development of fractional measures and the decimal system. They had a linear measure corresponding to the ‘foot’ of 13.2 inches divided into tenths. The symmetry of bricks they used suggests knowledge of geometry.

Civil engineering and town planning: The most striking feature of IVS we observe is the standardisation and uniformity of their town planning, which included sanitary drainage systems, irrigation canals and large artificial reservoirs. We will be able to understand the nature and extent of their advancement when we view them in juxtaposition with what we see in the labyrinthine mazes of gullies in ‘modern’ towns.

Mechanical engineering: Arthasastra describes variyantra, a revolving device used to spray water for cooling the air. The Samaraganasutradhara describes technical properties of machines, the toothed wheel and a general statement about the magnitude of ‘effort and load’ in a machine.

Farming and forestry: Ancient Indians developed eco-friendly and non-toxic fertilisers and pesticides to maximise agricultural produce and storage systems that preserved the produce to see them through drought years. Farming cotton and silk for making fine fabrics had been known in India for millennia. Managing forests by felling trees depending upon their natural renewal cycles to preserve ecological balance was a technique that was mastered by Indians.

Hygiene and health sciences: A fine example of balancing ecosystems to preserve hygiene and health is seen in this example: trees were planted on the banks of village ponds to provide shade and absorb carbon dioxide; birds that nestled in the trees ate away the larvae of mosquitoes and other insects breeding in the ponds, broke the life cycles of infectious organisms and destroyed them. Indians had an advanced knowledge of human body systems and disease control both through medicine and surgery.

Mining and metallurgy: Ancient Indians knew about mining and smelting metals. Making iron that is proof to atmospheric oxidation or rusting and making steel were Indian inventions. Europeans tried reverse engineering of Indian metallurgical products for several centuries before they were able to make alloys. Distillation of zinc to make it 100% pure and fuse it into alloys is again an Indian invention.

Astronomy and time measures: The descriptions of stellar constellations in various scriptures help us to date the chronology of events during the IVS/SVS periods. The Jyothisha Vedanga, which described methods of calculation of precise positions of stellar constellations bears testimony to the astronomical knowledge of Vedic Indians. They were also able to calculate the precise movements of various planets by tracing their orbits. The orbits were initially conceived as ‘square’, more a mathematical than an astronomical construct but later cosmological texts such as Surya Prajnapti adopt the circular path. Jambudvipaprajnapti refines the concept by introducing the ratio circumference, lengths of arcs, segments of chords and quadratic solutions.

Today we understand the theory of ‘time dilation’. For example, a person in a spaceship that can travel at the velocity of light returns to earth, after a year in the spaceship, hundreds of years would have elapsed on the earth by then. Ancient Indians conceptualized this as Brahma-nimesha-kalam, the time taken for Brahma to blink.

Mind over matter: The pressures of modern life make every one to turn into one form of mind control technique or the other. The mind sciences popularly known as yoga - scoffed at by western science for a long time but finally reinvented by them - have finally come into their own. Ironically, some of them originated in India and spread to neighboring countries and are being re-imported!

Indians have long recognized the preponderance of mind over matter and tried to control the latter through the former. This is the reason why Indians never saw a contradiction between science and religion!