Monday, 23 March 2015

Pi belongs to Hindus and India.........!

Do you know pi is another gift of Hindus to the modern world. Hindus first calculated value of pi.
The value of pi is being used in India from ancient times. It gives us an insight about how evolved our past was.
Indians were the first to observe that the perimeter (circumference) of a circle increases in proportion to its diameter. Therefore, our ancestors established the relation- perimeter / diameter = constant. Never did they know that this constant will be known as Pi!
Since the Indus Valley script is not completely deciphered, it will be incorrect form my side, to claim that Π was known to Indians in 3000 BC. But they did know the value of Pi by the time Rigveda was written! The Vedangas and Sulabasutrams also mention the value of Π. The oldest of them, the Baudhayayana Sulabasutra claims that the perimeter of a pit is 3 times its diameter- therefore approximating the value of Π at 3. Many other texts, including the Mahabharatam (Bhishmaparva, XII: 44) and many Puranams and Ithigaasam approximate Π at the value of 3.
Later, many other Sulabasutrams mention the value of Π to be 18 * (3 – 2 √2) = 3.088. The Manava Sulabasutram approximates the value of Π to be 28/5= 3.125. The ancient Jaina school of mathematics preferred the approximation Π = √10. This value of Π has been used not only by Jainas, but also by the greats like Varahamihirar, Brahmaguptan and Sridharan.
Its amazing that our forefathers used an encryption technique to easily remember it. What is more astonishing is that they needed pi up to 31 places!
Science and spirituality both moved together in this land.
The Sanskrit text, by the famous Hindu mathematician, Baudhayanar in his Baudhayanar Sulbha Sutram of the 6th century BC mentions this ratio as approximately equal to 3.

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