5 ms·

I am currently studying Panini's Ashtadhyayi (the authoritative source of Sanskrit grammar) and I can tell you from first hand experience what is true and what

I am currently studying Panini's Ashtadhyayi (the authoritative source of Sanskrit grammar) and I can tell you from first hand experience what is true and what is not. That Sanskrit is scientific, mathematical, ideal for AI/Comp Sci is gross exaggeration. Panini's work is truly astounding. It is extremely concise and dense. He uses some concepts to explain grammar rules that are normally not used in natural language grammars. For example, he assigns names to certain concepts and then builds on those concepts to create more and more complicated rules. There are rules that encompass other rules. There are rules that prohibit rules declared elsewhere in the book under certain circumstances. You can obtain a verb form by systematically applying 5-6 rules successively. If you know how to apply the rules you don't have to remember verb forms. They can be derived (easier said than done because there are 4000 rules and multiple rules can be applied with plenty exceptions and there are exceptions to exceptions). Panini was far ahead of his time and his work is truly amazing but there is nothing scientific/AI about it. He was a genius who devised a very clever way to succinctly list immensely complicated rules of Sanskrit grammar. Because Sanskrit grammar relies on very precise rules it is very amenable to computational analysis. However this does not mean that it is useful in Comp Sci/ AI as many Sanskrit zealots brag without any proof whatsoever.

svat 9y ago
I know how the Sanskrit/AI thing started (it's alluded to in the linked article, but not clearly enough). In 1985, Rick Briggs, a NASA employee and Sanskrit (over)enthusiast, wrote an article in AI magazine [1] pointing out that for knowledge representation, one could use the Navya-Nyaya language (which in his article he called "Shastric Sanskrit"). As this (highly artificial) language (or "dialect of Sanskrit"?) had been created by the Navya Nyaya school precisely for knowledge representation (in some sense), this is not very surprising. A good description of this language is given by Ganeri ([2][3]). I think it's good to publish such articles to show "related work" across cultures (and centuries). There are no clear advantages to using this Navya-Nyaya language over some other formal language though. In popular culture, the awareness of the existence of this paper morphed from "a particular formal dialect of Sanskrit devised by logicians for knowledge representation happens to be good at knowledge representation which we need in AI" into "Sanskrit is useful for AI" into "Sanskrit is great for computers". [1]: https://www.aaai.org/ojs/index.php/aimagazine/article/view/466 https://www.aaai.org/ojs/index.php/aimagazine/article/view/4... [2]: http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pollock/sks/papers/Ganeri(Matilal%20vol).pdf http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pollock/sks/papers/Ganeri... [3]: http://www.academia.edu/download/30301777/Logic_Navya-Nyaya_and_Applications_2008_Ganeri-1.pdf http://www.academia.edu/download/30301777/Logic_Navya-Nyaya_...
- monster_group 9y ago
  Thank you for providing this information. It is amazing how everybody seems to have an opinion about Sanskrit (not talking about you but the media/government etc.) without actually having spent any effort to learn or understand it.

svat 9y ago

I know how the Sanskrit/AI thing started (it's alluded to in the linked article, but not clearly enough). In 1985, Rick Briggs, a NASA employee and Sanskrit (over)enthusiast, wrote an article in AI magazine [1] pointing out that for knowledge representation, one could use the Navya-Nyaya language (which in his article he called "Shastric Sanskrit"). As this (highly artificial) language (or "dialect of Sanskrit"?) had been created by the Navya Nyaya school precisely for knowledge representation (in some sense), this is not very surprising. A good description of this language is given by Ganeri ([2][3]). I think it's good to publish such articles to show "related work" across cultures (and centuries). There are no clear advantages to using this Navya-Nyaya language over some other formal language though. In popular culture, the awareness of the existence of this paper morphed from "a particular formal dialect of Sanskrit devised by logicians for knowledge representation happens to be good at knowledge representation which we need in AI" into "Sanskrit is useful for AI" into "Sanskrit is great for computers". [1]: https://www.aaai.org/ojs/index.php/aimagazine/article/view/466 https://www.aaai.org/ojs/index.php/aimagazine/article/view/4... [2]: http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pollock/sks/papers/Ganeri(Matilal%20vol).pdf http://www.columbia.edu/itc/mealac/pollock/sks/papers/Ganeri... [3]: http://www.academia.edu/download/30301777/Logic_Navya-Nyaya_and_Applications_2008_Ganeri-1.pdf http://www.academia.edu/download/30301777/Logic_Navya-Nyaya_...

monster_group 9y ago
Thank you for providing this information. It is amazing how everybody seems to have an opinion about Sanskrit (not talking about you but the media/government etc.) without actually having spent any effort to learn or understand it.