Aryabhatt (Elder)

[Richard Quick]

On Tue, 28 Sep 1999 15:06:03 CEST, Kailash Srivastava
<se224141 at HOTMAIL.COM> wrote:

>Let me introduce myself.
>
>My name is Kailash Srivastava and I come from India. I live in Sweden and
>work for a multinational company. By profession, I am a research engineer
>and have a PhD degree in electrical engineering.
>
>I have recently got interested in reading about ancient India's
achievements
>with respect to science and technology. I usually get some questions which
I
>can not answere. Usually, news groups like soc.cultre.indian etc. do not
>appear to be a serious place for my questions. I am not sure if this is
>right place for me but I am sure there are people knowledgeble enough to
>answer my stupid questions.
>
>My first question is on Aryabhatt (elder).
>
>I read in "India's Contribution to World Culture" that AryaBhatt was the
>first to propound heliocentric theory of gravitation much before
Copernicus.
>However, I do not find such reference anywhere else including MS-Encarta.
He
>also gave various mathematical formulas that too do not find a place
>anywhere.
>
>What are the possible reasons for this?
>
>This is all for time being.
>
>Thanx/Kailash
>
>______________________________________________________
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Some of the Ancient Greeks, including Aristarchus of Samos, Philolaus of
Tarentum & Heraclides of Pontus, placed the Earth and other planets in
motion around the Sun, with the earth spinning daily on it's axis.  This
was well before either Aryabhatt or Copernicus. This idea, however, was
rejected by the people in favor of Aristotle's geocentric theory.

Claudius Ptolemy wrote in Almagest around 140 AD that the Earth was
motionless because constant gales would sweep across it if it were in
motion. It was Ptolemy's theory of 'epycycles' which was adopted by the
Roman Catholic Church.

Copernicus aparantly knew of the work of the Greeks.