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Sanskrit:
-"Tatha ca smaryate yojananam sahasre dve dve sate dve ca yojane ekena nimisardhena kramamana"
Translated:
-"Thus it is remembered: [O Sun] you who traverse 2,202 Yojanas in half a Nimesa."
Source
Roemer noted that the observed time interval between successive eclipses of a given moon was about seven minutes greater when the observations were carried out when the earth in its orbit was moving away from Jupiter than when it was moving toward Jupiter. He reasoned that, when the earth was moving away from Jupiter, the observed time between eclipses was increased above the true value (by about 3.5 minutes) due to the extra distance that the light from each successive eclipse had to travel to reach the earth. Conversely, when the earth was moving toward Jupiter, the observed interval between eclipses was decreased (by about 3.5 minutes) because of the decreased distance that the light had to travel on each successive eclipse.
originally posted by: MerkabaMeditation
This research paper from 1998 postulates that the Speed of Light was written down in the Rigveda's most likely between c. 1,500 and 1,200 BC, that's 3,000 years before the Danish astronomer, Olaus Roemer, whom western scholars give credit for being the first to correctly calculate the speed of light.
The Rigveda is an ancient Indian collection of Vedic Sanskrit hymns that are at least 3,200 years old. The texts says the speed of light is 185,793 miles per second, while the standard scientific value for speed of light is 186,322 miles per second - that is so close it just can't be a pure coincident.
originally posted by: MerkabaMeditation
a reply to: moebius
The commentary was written by Bhatta Bhaskara who according to scholars lived somewhere between the 10th and 12th century AD - that's still 700-500 years before Roemer lived.
There is also a commentary by Sayana (1315-1387 AD) on the speed of light, the oldest existing copy of Sayana’s commentary is dated 1395 AD, and is preserved in the Central Library at Vadodara. Roemer calculated the speed of light in 1676.
I have changed the OP title and text to be less misleading, thanks.
-MM
originally posted by: jeep3r
a reply to: MerkabaMeditation
Interesting thread, and no matter which of the values we assume for 1 Yojana, that text passage definitely described something that was darn fast. The other unit mentioned (nimesa) seems to be quite close to our second: 1 nimesa = 0,43s (source).
Another question would be: why is the Hindu base unit for time (Truti) measured in µs (microseconds), 1 Truti ≈ 0.031 µs? That's a rather short time interval, equivalent to 0.000000031 seconds. Ridiculously short, actually. I guess that's rather a unit one would apply when measuring particle collisions...
originally posted by: jeep3r
a reply to: MerkabaMeditation
Interesting thread, and no matter which of the values we assume for 1 Yojana, that text passage definitely described something that was darn fast. The other unit mentioned (nimesa) seems to be quite close to our second: 1 nimesa = 0,43s (source).
originally posted by: jeep3r
Another question would be: why is the Hindu base unit for time (Truti) measured in µs (microseconds), 1 Truti ≈ 0.031 µs? That's a rather short time interval, equivalent to 0.000000031 seconds. Ridiculously short, actually. I guess that's rather a unit one would apply when measuring particle collisions...
originally posted by: Harte
Well, it's off by 50%, isn't it.
Earlier I said it means "blink of an eye." That's not exactly correct - it is more like "twinkling of an eye."
Again, quite arbitrary.
This allows the fanatically faithful to make great claims about what's in the Vedas. It also allows shysters to sell books and book some conference presentations.