An Ayurvedic physician also possessed knowledge of different geographies and climates, plants and trees, fruits and vegetables and the medicinal benefits of everyday spices and condiments used in the Indian kitchens. He was also adept at psychology in a sense. He had knowledge of different types of psyches and temperaments. This body typing tells him about your body, mind and emotional makeup. Ayurveda wants to minimize inflammation in your body. Ayurveda has long known about inflammation and its effect on aging and is focused on minimizing inflammation through various means.
It teaches you about how to make food choices that are beneficial to your body based on your body type, your way of life and where you live. Ayurveda also provides a lot of knowledge about avoiding food combinations that are harmful to your body. Ayurvedic influences on Hylunia Skin Care. It is a small country near the southern tip of India. It was also known as Ceylone. Serendip is the corrupted version of that word.
It is a beautiful country with abundant wildlife, forests and beaches. Lingam has been greatly influenced by his upbringing in Sri Lanka. He later moved to UK to get his degree in chemical engineering. After his education in UK he moved to Canada to work as a rocket scientist for oil companies.
He was invited to the United States to work on jet fuel for the Tomahawk cruise missile. While he is steeped in modern science, he never forgot the many life lessons and secrets of mind and body that he learned while growing up in Sri Lanka.
Ayurveda had definitely left its mark on him. In India and many Asian countries Ayurveda is not an esoteric science to be practised only by physicians in clinics.
It is woven into their way of life. And so, it was for Dr. The key tenets of the Hylunia philosophy based influenced by Ayurvedic principles. Later in life he combined principles of Ayurveda with modern science to develop the Hylunia Philosophy. Results may vary based on various factors specific to the individual user. If you have sensitive skin consult a professional or do a test patch before use. Full Disclaimer. After Panini wrote his Ashtadhyayi the entire non-Vedic Sanskrit literature was written in accordance with Panini's grammar, and even that part of the non-Vedic Sanskrit literature which existed before Panini was altered and made in accordance with Panini's grammar except some words called apashabdas.
For instance, the Ramayana, the Mahabharata, the Puranas, the works of Kalidas, etc. To illustrate, some parts of the Mahabharata were written before Panini because Panini has referred to the Mahabharat in his Ashtadhyayi.
However, it was not permissible to change the language of the Rigveda and make it in accordance with Panini's grammar. Panini or no Panini, one could not touch the Rigveda, because it was held to be so sacred that it was not permitted to change its language. In fact after having been initially composed may be around B.
Thus the Vedic literature is not in accordance with the Panini's grammar. This provided for uniformity and it systematized the language so that scholars could easily express and communicate their ideas with great precision. This was a necessary requirement for the development of science. The spoken language no doubt is very useful, but the spoken dialects change every 50 or kilometers, and hence there is no uniformity in them.
A written language like Classical Sanskrit in which scholars could express and communicate ideas to other scholars living far away with great precision and clarity was thus absolutely necessary for the development of science, and this is the great achievement of Panini.
As regards the second factor contributing to the development of science in ancient India, namely, scientific philosophy I would now like to tell you something about Indian philosophy. Hence I am making another digression. The generally accepted view is that there are six systems of Classical orthodox Indian philosophy Shat Dharshana and three non classical unorthodox systems.
The non classical unorthodox systems are Buddhism, Jainism and Charvak. T he Shatdarshanas are given below, with a brief mention of their viewpoints Shatdarshana or six classical orthodox schools of Indian philosophy 1. Nyaya — presents the scientific outlook. It insists that nothing is acceptable unless it is in accordance with reason and experience. It was subsequently distorted by the later Nyayiks.
Vaisheshik — presents the atomic theory. Sankhya — Probably presents the materialist ontology of the Nyaya Vaisheshik system. However, very little of the original literature on Sankhya has survived, and there is some controversy about its basic principles, some saying that it is dualistic and not monistic because it has two entities, purush and prakriti, in it. Yoga — presents a method of physical and mental discipline 5.
Purva mimansa or briefly mimansa — lays emphasis on the performance of the yagya for attaining various spiritual and worldly benefits. Hence relies on the Brahmana part of the Vedas. Uttar Mimansa or Vedanta — lays emphasis on brahmagyan, hence relies on the Upanishad part of the Vedas. It is said that the classical and non-classical system of philosophy differ in that the former accept the authority of the Vedas while the latter do not. However this does not seem to be correct as a close examination shows that the first 4 classical systems do not really accept the authority of the Vedas though some of them pay lip service to it.
I need not dilate on all these systems and it is only necessary to mention about the Nyaya and Vaisheshik systems, which represent the scientific outlook. Nyaya philosophy states that nothing is acceptable unless it is in accordance with reason and experience, and this is precisely the scientific approach see in this connection D.
Vaisheshik is the atomic parmanu theory, which was the physics of ancient India. Originally Nyaya and Vaisheshik were regarded as one system, but since physics is the most fundamental of all sciences, the Vaisheshik system was later separated from Nyaya and made as a separate system of philosophy. It may be added here that the Sankhya system is perhaps older than the Nyaya Vaisheshik systems but very little literature on it has survived the Sankhya Karika and Sankhya Sutras and commentaries on them.
However, the Sankhya philosophy certainly seems to have given the materialist ontological foundation on which the later Nyaya-Vaisheshik scientific philosophy was built, and hence we can broadly call the Indian philosophy representing the scientific approach as the Sankhya-Nyaya-Vaisheshik system. However, in brief we are calling it the Nyaya-Vaisheshik system, since we know much more about Nyaya and Vaisheshik then we know about Sankhya.
The Nyaya Vaisheshik system is i realist, and 2 pluralistic. This is in contrast to Advaita Vedanta of Shankaracharya which is monastic and regards the world as illusion or maya in the ultimate analysis. Brahman whereas the various objects like table, glass, pen, room etc.
On the other hand, the Nyaya Vaisheshik systems says that there are several real entities and the world comprises of not just one entity, but a large number of entities which are different e. Hence the Nyaya philosophy is pluralistic and not monistic. I n this connection it is important to again digress a bit and tell you something about philosophy. The two most important branches of philosophy are ontology and epistemology.
Ontology is the study of existence. In other words, in ontology the questions asked are what really exists? Does God exist? Does the world exist or is it illusion maya? What is real, and what is only apparently real? Epistemology is the study of the means of valid knowledge. For instance, how do I know that this object in front of me exists?
The answer is that it is Pratyaksha? I can see it with my eyes Pratyaksha is the knowledge which we derive from the five senses, and pratyaksha pramana is regarded as the pradhan pramana or the most basic of all the means of valid knowledge. However, there are other pramanas e.
Thus, much of scientific knowledge comes from anuman pramana. For instance, Rutherford never saw an atom with his eyes, but by studying the scattering of alpha rays which are positively charged helium ions he used anuman praman inference to deduce that there was a positively charged nucleus around which negatively charged electrons were orbiting. Similarly, black holes can not be known by pratyaksha pramana since light cannot escape from them , but we can infer their existence by the movement of some nearby heavenly bodies on which an invisible body the black hole is exercising a gravitational pull.
The third Pramana in the epistemology of the Nyaya system is Shabda Pramana, which is the statement of an expert or a person having great reputation in a particular field. We often accept such statements to be correct, even though we may not understand the proof, because the person making it has a reputation of an expert.
Similarly, we accept what our doctor tells us about our ailment, as he is an expert. There is another pramana called upama analogy in the Nyaya system, but we need not go into it here.
As already stated above, the Nyaya Philosophy represents the scientific outlook, and it places great emphasis on the pratyaksha pramana though this too may sometimes be deceptive e. This is also the approach of science because in science we largely rely on observation, experiment and logical inferences. It may be mentioned that Pratyaksha pramana may not necessarily lead to truthful knowledge in all cases. For instance, we see the sun rising from the east in the morning, going up above us in the mid-day, and setting in the west.
If we rely only on Pratyaksha Pramana we would conclude that the sun goes around the earth. However the great mathematician and astronomer Aryabhata in his book Arybhatiya wrote that the same visual impression will be created if we assume that the earth is spinning on its axis. In other words, if the earth is rotating on its axis it will appear that the sun rises form the east and sets in the west.
Hence along with Pratyaksha Pramana we have also to apply reason, as observation alone may not always lead to truthful knowledge. It may be mentioned that the Nyaya philosophy developed logic to an extent even beyond what Aristotle and other Greek thinkers did see D. Thus the Nyaya philosophy gave great support and encouragement to science in ancient India. It must be mentioned that the Nyaya philosophy is one of the Shat Darshanas i. Hence our great scientists could not be persecuted by the orthodox people since they could say that they were relying on an orthodox philosophy, namely, the Nyaya.
This was unlike in Europe where some of the greatest scientists like Galileo were persecuted by the Church for preaching ideas inconsistent with the Bible. In the earliest Nyaya text, which is the Nyaya Sutras of Gautam , several categories of debate are mentioned e.
The numbers in the decimal system were called Arabic numerals by the Europeans, but surprisingly the Arab scholars called them Hindu numerals. Were they really Arabic or Hindu?
In this connection it may be mentioned that the languages Urdu, Persian and Arabic are written from right to left but if you ask any speaker of these languages to write any number e. This shows that these numbers were taken from a language which was written from left to right and not from right to left.
It is accepted now that these numbers came from India and they were copied by the Arabs from us. I would like to illustrate the revolutionary significance of the decimal system.
As we all know, ancient Rome was a great civilization, the civilization of Caesar and Augustus, but if one would have asked an ancient Roman to write the number one million he would have almost gone crazy because to write one million he would have to write the letter M which stands for millennium or one thousand one thousand times.
In the Roman numerals there is no single number greater than M, which stands for one thousand. To write we have to write MM, to write we have to write MMM, and to write one million one has to write M one thousand times. On the other hand, under our system to express one million we have just to write the number one followed by six zeros. In the Roman numerals there is no zero. Zero was an invention of ancient India and progress was not possible without this invention.
I am not going into details about the great contributions of our great mathematicians like Aryabhatta, Brahamgupta, Bhaskar, Varahamihira etc. However, I may just give two simple illustrations in this connection.
The number 1,00, is called a lakh in the Indian numeral system. Thus one mahashankh will be the number 1 followed by 19 zeros for further details you may see V. Apte's Sanskrit English Dictionary on the internet by using Google. On the other hand the ancient Romans could not express any number larger than one thousand except by repeating M and the other numerals again and again.
Take another illustration. According to the Agni Purana , the Kaliyuga in which we are living consists of 4, 32, years. The preceding Yuga is known as the Dwapar Yuga and is twice as long as the Kaliyuga. The Yuga preceding Treta Yuga is the Satyuga which was said to be four times longer than the Kaliyuga. Fifty Six Chaturyugis are known as one Manovantar. Fourteen Manovantars is known as one Kalpa. Twelve Kalpas make one day of Brahma.
Brahma is believed to have lived for billions or trillions of years. When our people do the sankalp, which is to be done everyday by orthodox people, they have to mention the exact day, month and year of the Kaliyuga as well as the Chaturyugi, Manovantar and kalpa in which we are living. It is said that we are living today in the 28th Chaturyugi in our present Manovantar, that is to say half the Manovantar of our Kalpa is over, but the remaining Manovantar is yet to be completed.
We are living presently in the Vaivasvata Manuvantar. One may or may not believe the above system, but one can only marvel at the flight of imagination of our ancestors who could conceive of billions or trillions of years in history.
Aryabhatta in his famous book called the Aryabhatiya wrote about algebra, arithmetic, trigonometry, quadratic equations and the sine table. He calculated the value of Pi at 3. Aryabhatta's works were later adopted by the Greeks and then the Arabs. I am not going into the contribution of the other mathematicians e. Brahmagupta, Bhaskar, Varahamihira etc. In ancient India, Aryabhata in his book Aryabhatiya presented a mathematical system that postulated that the earth rotated on its axis.
The other famous astronomers of that time were Brahma Gupta who headed the astronomical observatory at Ujjain and wrote a famous text on astronomy, and Bhaskara, who also was a head of the astronomical observatory at Ujjain.
Varahamihira presented a theory of gravitation which suggested that there is a force due to which bodies stuck to the earth, and also kept the heavenly bodies in their determined places. I am not going into detail into these theories of these great astronomers, but I would certainly like to say that it is remarkable that even today predictions can be made about the time and date of solar and lunar eclipses on the basis of calculations made by the ancient astronomers thousands of years ago, and that too at a time when there were no modern instruments like telescopes etc.
Sushruta is regarded as the father of Indian surgery and he invented cataract surgery, plastic surgery etc. In his book Sushruta Samhita he has mentioned in great detail about the medicines and surgeries, including dozens of instruments used in surgeries, details of which can be seen on the internet by using Google.
Sushruta said that to be a good surgeon one has to have a good knowledge of anatomy. Charaka Samhita is an ancient Indian Ayurvedic text on internal medicine written by Charaka and it is central to the modern day practice of Ayurvedic medicine. Both Sushruta Samhita and Charak Samhita were written in Sanskrit, details of which also can be seen in the internet in Google.
In this connection it may be mentioned that in the London Science Museum in one floor relating to medicine, there is mention of the various achievements in medicine in ancient India including the surgical instruments used by Sushruta. It is thus evident that India was far ahead of all countries in medicine in ancient times.
It is said that there was an institute in Aihole in Karnatka in the 6th Century A. The principles developed by this institute e. I may now make another digression, but that too will be relevant to the topic under discussion: The attitude of the British Rulers towards Indian Culture The attitude of the British rulers towards Indian culture passed through three historical phases.
The first phase was from about AD when the British came to India and established their settlements in Bombay, Madras and Calcutta as traders upto when the Battle of Plassey was fought. During that period the attitude of the British was totally indifferent towards Indian culture because they had come here as merchants to make money and they were not interested in Indian culture at all.
The second phase was from to AD i. In the Battle of Plassey was fought after which the Diwani of Bengal was granted to the British by the Mughal emperor. This transformed the Britishers from merchants to rulers, after which the entire province of Bengal which included Bihar and Orissa came under their rule. A ruler has to know about his subjects in order to properly administer their territory.
Hence, from to , the Britishers carefully studied Indian culture and made some important contributions, particularly with respect to spread of knowledge of Indian culture to the West. The third phase begins with the Indian mutiny of and its suppression by the British rulers.
After , the British were determined that there should not be any such outbreak against their rule. For this purpose they did two things: a they increased their army in India and particularly the number of Europeans in the Indian Army, and also placed the artillery completely in the hands of Europeans artillery and b they started a policy of deliberately demoralizing the India people by spreading the propaganda that Indians were only a race of fools and savages before the British came into India and there was nothing worthwhile in Indian culture as it was the culture of fools and savages.
This was deliberately done so that the Indian people may themselves start believing that they were an inferior race and should gladly accept the Britishers as their masters. It is because of the third phase that we had forgotten the great achievements of our ancestors, including their achievements in science. It is the second phase mentioned above which is of particular interest, because it is in this period that the British carefully studied Indian culture.
Sir William Jones was born in and he was a child prodigy who had mastered several languages such as Greek, Latin, Persian, Arabic, Hebrew etc.
He had studied at Oxford University and had also passed his Bar examination to qualify as a lawyer. Consequently, he enquired and found a good teacher called Ram Lochan Kavi Bhushan — a poor Bengali Brahman who lived in a dark and dingy room in a crowded locality in Calcutta.
Sir William Jones started going to this person to learn Sanskrit. He has written in his memoirs that when the daily lesson was completed he would glance behind and saw the " Bengalee Brahmin" washing the floor where Sir William Jones sat to learn his lessons as he was regarded as a Mleccha. However, Sir William Jones was not insulted by this as he was a scholar and hence thought that one should accept the customs of the teacher.
Having mastered the Sanskrit language, Sir William Jones established the Asiatic Society in Calcutta and also translated many of the great Sanskrit works e. Abhigyan Shakuntalam into English. This work was brought to the notice of the great German scholar Goethe who greatly praised it. Sir William proved that Sanskrit was very close to Greek and Latin.
In fact, it was closer to Greek than to Latin because Sanskrit has three numbers — singular, dual and plural as is the case with Greek, whereas Latin has only two numbers — singular and plural, like in English, Hindi and many other languages. Thus, Sir William Jones established that Sanskrit, Greek and Latin were all descended from a common ancestor and he was the creator of modern comparative philology.
There were several other British scholars who did research in Indian culture, particularly during the second historical phase mentioned above, but it is not necessary to go into detail about it as it will take too much time.
Suffice it to say that these scholars were wonderstruck about the great achievements of Indian scholars whose works were all written in the Sanskrit language. Condition of Science in Modern India I have stated above, at one time India was leading the world in science.
Scholars from Arabia and China would come to India to learn from us in our great universities at Taxila, Nalanda, Ujjain etc. However, it must be regrettably stated that today we are lagging far behind the West in modern science.
Bose, J.
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