Category talk:Hindu mathematicians

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This category was nominated for deletion, renaming or merging with another category on 2007 January 12. The result of the discussion was no consensus.

The classification of all mathematicians, who were born in Hindu families, as "Hindu Mathematicians" ("Mathematicians that were followers of Hinduism") is extremely speculative and dangerously homogenising. Majority of these mathematicians were not pursuing their vocation as part of their religious practice. In fact, many of them were atheists. At least one of them was a hardcore Marxist, Prof DD Kosambi. He would have definitely found his name in this list as degrading and outrageous. Further, to call the ancient mathematicians Hindus is sheer madness. At that time there was nothing called Hinduism. There were Vaishnavites, Shaivites, Tantrikas etc. There were full-fledged religions, too, independently existing even now, like Buddhism and Jainism. Just because these sects existed before the advent of Islam, the Brahminists- in order to stabilise their caste hegemony - could comfortably homogenise them under Hinduism. If all ancient sects and people in India could be considered retrospectively Hindus, then all pre-Christian Greek and Latin scientists, mathematicians and philosophers Christians. Won't it be sheer madness to call Socrates, Aristotle or Pythagoras Christians? Pchandra 01:15, 8 September 2006 (UTC)note this was above users 3rd editBakaman _Bakatalk 02:33, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

The above editor, as of 8 September has three edits including the one above (unless he/she has editted under a different username or without logging in). --BostonMA 11:53, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Pchandra correctly points out that this category may contain inaccurate (or disuputed) information. This is true of all Wikipedia articles and categories. The solution proposed is to delete the category. A less drastic solution is to correct the information if any of it is incorrect. --BostonMA 11:59, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. There are names in this category where the article is so stubbish it's unclear why the person's Hinduism or Hindu cultural identity is important to their biography. I voted to keep this and believe in it as a valid category, but it likely does need inspection. Just like I'd ask, nay insist on, names be removed at Category:Christian mathematicians if their religion is not important to their biography.--T. Anthony 08:28, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

-Sheer madness? I see that you are one of the people who does not believe Hinduism is a religion. You may want to debate on the Hinduism talk page. Anyways an amazingly high number of reputable sources refer to Hindu mathematicians [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] Heck this is the google search 324k hitsBakaman _Bakatalk 00:45, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Bakasuprman, you are clearly misfiring. My points do not concern whether Hinduism is a religion or not. Here I am concerned about only specific points - firstly, many scholars in the list are those who existed before the birth of Hinduism as an organised religion. Of course, at that time there were sects and faiths which are today considered part of Hinduism, but the fact that the Old Testament is considered part of the Christian Bible does not make Moses a Christian, so one cannot retrospectively claim Aryabhatta and others to be Hindus. Further, there were Mathematicians who followed Buddhism and Jainism, which are till now independently existing religions. Secondly, leaving aside the ignorant inclusion of Kosambi, a Marxist in the list which claims to include "Mathematicians that were followers of Hinduism", almost all the modern mathematicians in the list were trained in secular, in fact, western, institutions of higher education, and most of them were not at all religious. Even a few of them who were religious (the list-maker should have the decency of at least counter-checking this) would not have claimed that their contributions had anything to do with their being Hindus. Now with regard to all the links that you have compiled - who is denying that India and South Asia have contributed a lot in sciences and mathematics? But that does not make all the contributors Hindus. Further let us not use such dubious mechanism of google searching for proving anything. If this was a criterion then many things would have been proven very easily - Hindu Mathematics[10], and Hindu Mathematicians[11] have very few hits in comparison to Indian Mathematics/Mathematicians, just see - [12] and [13]. So by this childish criterion too the latter binary is preferable. But isn't there far more to this? The main questions are - How far the category of "Hindu Mathematicians" is meaningful? Does it help us in understanding the history of mathematics? In the larger political milieu existing globally and in South Asia, such exclusionist categorisation has a clear regressive ideological semantics. Such categorisation has more to do with "hindu" than with "mathematics/mathematicians" Pchandra 17:44, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Well 324k is not a shabby number. Ramanujan was quite religious, and if you state that their achievements have nothing to do with Hinduism, you need to back that up with sources. This isnt going to be used in comparison to Category:Indian mathematicians, that is irrelevant. Again you are questioning Hinduism, and not the faith of the mathematicians. Hinduism had been organized quite strong around the Mahabharata, the time of Chanakya, the Gupta empire and after Shankaracharya. Most of these mathematicians came between Chanakya and Shankaracharya meaning they came during a time of well- defined mainstream Hinduism.Bakaman _Bakatalk 02:30, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

I am afraid this talk can go on endlessly and irrationally. Before quitting let me request you to go and check if 'hindu' term was ever used in pre-Islam Sanskrit/Prakrit literature - whether in Mahabharata, or in Arthashastra (chanakya's), or in Kalidasa's writings (Gupta period), or in Shankaracharya's Bhashyas. Hinduism was born as an upper-caste endeavour to curtail Islam's threat to Brahminist hegemony by homogenising pre-Islamic faiths in the region. I know you will again come with all kinds of "baba vakyam pramanam" logic. But all these are immaterial to the issues that I have raised above, whether you agree or not. For your example of Ramanujan, I cannot do more than ask you to read his mentor, GH Hardy's lectures on him. Hardy says - "Was he [Ramanujan] religious? Certainly he observed his duties as a high-caste Hindu assiduously, like being a faultless vegetarian and cooking all his food himself (after changing into his pyjamas first). And while his excellent Indian biographers (Seshu Aiyar and Ramachandra Rao) say he believed in the existence of a Supreme Being, in Karma, Nirvana and other Hindu tenets, I suspect he was not affected by religion any more than as a collection of rules to be followed. He told me once, to my surprise, that all religions seemed to him to be more or less equally true." Good luck and best. Pchandra 03:42, 14 September 2006 (UTC)

Again you're going off topic and debating "Hinduism". Hinduism is merely the western term for "Vedic Dharma" or "sanatan Dharma". The vedas were quite mature around Chankaya's time. There is/was/never will be any such thing as "Brahminism". Are you going to go "secular" and debate Hinduism? Bhaja Govindam from Shankaracharya is mainstream 1200 years after his death, Shankaracharya definitely was a Hindu, or was he a "Brahminist response to Budhism"?Bakaman _Bakatalk 16:27, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

There isn't any single religion called "Sanatana Dharma". If you go by its definitions, then all religions are "Sanatana Dharma". Do not be so homogenising, my friend - or the whole concept of Hinduism as a religion separate from others will collapse. What about "Vedic Dharma"=Hinduism? The most original proponents of "Vedic Dharma", if there is anything like that, were the atheistic school of Purva Mimamsakas, who despised the very notion of advaitin notion of'Brahman' and your bhajangiri. So to bind them in any religious ideology will be very unfair. Further, have you tried to verify how many "mathematicians" in your list of Hindu Mathematicians followed your "Bhaja Govindam"-variety religion (which too rationally cannot be squeezed into Hinduism or more modern Hindutvavad)? Let them be whatever they were. However, nobody stops you from learning from the pre-Islamic sects in India, but don't rebaptise them without their conscience (which, perhaps you will agree, being mortals we can never obtain, or are you sure you are the Hand of Govinda?). Don't waste your time and others, by creating "मन-गढन्त" sectist lists and putting names into it? Will it be not better that we try to study, propogate and develop on the teachings of these great men, including Adiguru, your favourite? Is it necessary for us to prove by hook and crook that they were our natural baap, when they can definitely be our spiritual ones? Let us not make them the victims of our post-modern identitarian crisis and turn wikipedia into a field of sectist struggles that we are witnessing in our region.Pchandra 22:21, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] WP:CFD

This category was nominated for deletion, renaming or merging with another category on 2006 September 10. The result of the discussion was no consensus.

But even if there was no consensus on deleting the category, I believe it is important to reframe it in order to accomodate the spirit of the discussions above. I think the categorisation is clearly faulty if we define "Hindu Mathematicians" as "Mathematicians who were followers of Hinduism" since it can't include many people in the list who were atheists or were not particular about their religious beliefs. If we wish to include their names it would be better to redefine "Hindu Mathematicians" as "Mathematicians who were born in Hindu families or in the families adhering to ancient belief systems of India, which are today generally taken to be part of Hinduism". Further, we should try to exclude Buddhists and Jains (non-Vedic Dharmas) from the list as it is bound to provoke controversy over the category. As Wikipedians, I believe we should adhere to rational intervention in the free distribution of information, rather than imposing one's own ideas and ideological constructions. As I am new to this sort of activism, I hope I am allowed to change the definition of the category, and others can make it more refined, apt and accomodative.Kumarilabhatta 19:00, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

Instead of making the description wordy, bow about we find potential problem mathematicians?Bakaman _Bakatalk 15:38, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Note that the consensus on the CfD page was that this cat be restricted to those people who were notable for being mathematicians and notable for being Hindu, in that their religion and occupation were jointly notable. At the very least no additions to this cat should be made without following the clear consensus of the CfD. Hornplease 22:28, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

No consensus. Other than you and Zora (whose opinions I will thoroughly disregard), nobody had a problem with the status quo on the cat.Bakaman _Bakatalk 22:35, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

You continue to misrepresent the consensus, which adds one to your long and puzzling list of misrepresenting things that happen to be linked from the page. Even the defenders of this and similar cats clearly argued in favour of joint notability. Please see T.Anthony's comments on the CfD page for details, as it was thanks primarily to him that the category was saved. And just because you disregard Zora doesnt mean that WP in general ignores her, given that she's an admin and one of the most productive WPedians.Hornplease 23:04, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Her rants on South Asia (and other fairytales) were thoroughly disregarded on the CfD. Anyways the article has stayed at 68-72 members for quite a while, meaning that I havent been "misinterpreting consensus" and "wildly adding categories". The last addition came from a member of the Brahmo Samaj thus giving instant notability in the Hindu column.23:09, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Her 'rants' on South Asia were not disregarded at the CfD or elsewhere. On the contrary, it could be viewed as her stating her POV up front, which is sensible in a CfD discussion. Regardless, my point about the consensus was precisely that it emerged from the discussion, and wasnt just Zora's view. You misrepresented the consensus by claiming it was Zora and my view alone. The phrase 'wildly adding cats' was used in the context of your foray into cat:indian american, which we have discussed elsewhere. Note I did not attack your last addition to this cat, having actually read the article first, something I recommend to you as a point of principle. Hornplease 00:22, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

I think Bakaman should demonstrate some patience and respect for others' opinions, before indulging in rewording gymnastics. My earlier attempt to redefine this category might have been wordy, but honestly I tried to take into account diverse opinions in the discussion, even Bakaman's. Further, I also believe creating such artificial categories is bound to be volatile, without adding to our knowledge about the development of mathematics in India. Even then participatory democracy of wikipedia requires respecting all opinions. My attempt, even if wrong, was in pursuance of this spirit.Kumarilabhatta 16:10, 28 October 2006 (UTC)