Aryabhata · Mathematics
Aryabhata the calculator of the real heavens - explaining eclipses by the plain geometry of shadows rather than the swallowing demons of myth, and inventing the <em>kuttaka</em> or ‘pulverizer,’ a general method for solving equations in whole numbers that Indian mathematics would prize for a thousand years.
You learned that Aryabhata explained eclipses geometrically by shadows (against the Rahu and Ketu demons of tradition), and that his kuttaka or ‘pulverizer’ method solves linear indeterminate equations in integers by repeated division. Explain both, and why they show an astronomer committed to calculating…
Leads to Brahmagupta.
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