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Ancient Planes and Other Claims Spark Controversy at Indian Science Congress

Posted by samzenpus on from the and-we-invented-air dept.

An anonymous reader writes A paper presented at the 102nd Indian Science Congress on Sunday claims that Indians had mastered aviation thousands of years before the Wright brothers. India's science and technology minister Mr. Harsh Vardhan who was present at the conference claimed that ancient Indian mathematicians discovered the Pythagorean theorem but that the Greeks got the credit. These startling claims come just a few days after prime minister Narendra Modi had called Lord Ganesha who is part elephant and part human, a product of ancient India's knowledge of plastic surgery.

17 of 381 comments (clear)

  1. ...and... by Charliemopps · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...and the best part is they have Nukes!

    1. Re:...and... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      That's so ghee

    2. Re:...and... by Rei · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's an interesting phenomenon and you see the same thing in Russian science. There are an awful lot of brilliant scientists in both India and Russia doing amazing things. But it's like there's no filter. The unadulterated garbage rises just as much to the top as the actual great scientific work. I can't help but wonder if it's related to the same sort of corruption and patronage systems that you see a lot in the business and political world as well.

      It's also interesting that even on things that they innovate on (and there have been a lot), you don't see much commercialization actually within their respective countries. You see a lot more when they leave and move to Europe or the US or whatnot.

      --
      If you play a Ke$ha song backwards, you hear messages from Satan. Even worse, if you play it forwards you hear Ke$ha.
    3. Re:...and... by arglebargle_xiv · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's an interesting phenomenon and you see the same thing in Russian science. There are an awful lot of brilliant scientists in both India and Russia doing amazing things. But it's like there's no filter. The unadulterated garbage rises just as much to the top as the actual great scientific work.

      It's a good thing this sort of quackery is limited to India and Russia. I'd be pretty embarrassed if we had some of our people claiming that the world was only a few thousand years old, that climate change doesn't exist, and that we didn't evolve over time but were all designed by a supernatural entity.

    4. Re:...and... by AqD · · Score: 5, Insightful

      And how is India different?

      In India idiots are recognized as idiots.

    5. Re:...and... by Prof.Phreak · · Score: 5, Funny

      ...and the best part is they have Nukes!

      Which according to The History Channel were also invented in India thousands of years ago!

      --

      "If anything can go wrong, it will." - Murphy

    6. Re:...and... by gstoddart · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Slashdot is haven for people who prefer an evidence based approach, and despise you idiots who need to boil everything down to "left" and "right" since both sides of the spectrum as seen by the US are full of hypocrisy.

      If you blindly think the left is all good or the right is all good ... you're a fucking moron who is driven by ideology and not intellect.

      --
      Lost at C:>. Found at C.
    7. Re:...and... by LWATCDR · · Score: 5, Insightful

      And landed men on the moon, sent the first probes to Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. Invented the transistor and IC, created Unix and C and managed to turn Japan in to democratic nation and kept Europe for burning to the the ground...
      And we have nukes.

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    8. Re:...and... by TWX · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It also seems like our American politicians that land on the side of the quackery don't actually believe it most of the time, they're using a population that's too stupid to see that their patron only wants their votes. The politician almost always stops short of fully committing to the quackery cause.

      These reports make it clear that many politicians in other countries either are much less cautious, or actually do support these crazy notions.

      Granted, we could just be seeing the crazy part, as crap rises to the top and makes for good press, regardless of how fringe it is.

      --
      Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
  2. Greeks by Extremus · · Score: 5, Funny

    The greeks got the credit, but lost them some years ago due to economic difficulties. The common wisdom now is that the Pythagorean theorem have been discovered by an anonymous hedge fund.

  3. Coming soon to another episode of Ancient Aliens by gewalker · · Score: 5, Insightful

    And the ancient planes also had the ability to fly between planets too. Don't think that these claims will stand up to review.

    Ancient peoples were just as smart as us, but you need time to build the necessary tech. base in order to make advanced equipment so that you can discover advanced scientific theories and engineering disciplines.

  4. As an Indian; knew this was inevitable by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Indian politics has a long history of using pseudo science to sway the gullible. Many years ago, we had a veteran politician getting farmers to agitate against dams claiming that the dams removed the electricity from the water, so when it reached the fields it did not have any electricity left. The lack of electricity was affecting the quality of the crops.
    The creationist museum here in the US where I currently stay is the US version of the same thing. The use of "common sense" and "the written word of God" to counter empirical, evidence driven hard science.
    The problem as I see it is that in the name of defending religion, we are required to unquestioningly suspend all argument and reason when reading religious texts. It is a very short step to suspend all argument and reason when listening to the people who hold themselves as defenders of these texts.

  5. The number 0 is attributed to India... by cardpuncher · · Score: 5, Funny

    ... but I guess a paper entitled "Indians Invented Nothing" might not be selected for presentation.

  6. If they were so smart by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Well, documentation is legendary in Indian code.

    The inventions were obviously self documenting

  7. Re:hysterical by NotDrWho · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I'm just wondering if anyone has actually verified that "Mr. Harsh Vardhan" isn't actually Sacha Baron Cohen in disguise.

    --
    SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
  8. Re:Coming soon to another episode of Ancient Alien by war4peace · · Score: 5, Funny

    It's also proven that ancient people mastered the art of wireless communication. The lack of wire traces is definite proof.

    --
    ...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
  9. Re:The indians also have mastered the art by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I made a heat transfer calculation webapp some years back for a undergrad research project. After the first several emails from Chinese and Indian grad students asking for my source code because it could help them with their own projects I stopped even bothering to read questions about the program.