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Ramanujan’s story is very interesting but I would love more Indian mathematicians and scientists to become household names. Mathematicians like Harish Chandra,
by dyauspitr 2y ago
Ramanujan’s story is very interesting but I would love more Indian mathematicians and scientists to become household names. Mathematicians like Harish Chandra, C. R. Rao, Manjul Bhargava, Narendra Karmakar etc. Physicists like C. V. Raman, Satyendra Nath Bose, Meghnad Saha. Others like Har Gobind Khorana and Venkatraman Ramakrishnan too.
- xanderlewis 2y ago> Satyendra Nath Bose I imagine most people won't recognise the name. But everyone's heard of a boson. So he's somewhat immortalised — more than most.
- sulam 2y agoFwiw Chandra, Rao, and Bose are instantly recognizable to me. I’m not a mathematician or physicist and don’t know the other folks. That said I am very aware that Indians have made significant contributions to math, physics and I imagine other disciplines.
- profsummergig 2y agoWhen I first encountered the Mahalanobis distance, I thought it sounded strangely Indian. Turned out it was!
- ks2048 2y agoYou're right, some Indians don't have the recognition they deserve, but if it makes you feel better, few "western" mathematicians or scientists are household names either.
- esperent 2y agoHowever, pretty much all of the ones who are household names, are western. Well, at least to western people. Are Indians more familiar with Indian scientists?
- your_challenger 2y agoAmoung the people who are interested in science? Yes. But to the general public? No. I don't think a non STEM guy would know Ramanujan or C V Raman.
- noisy_boy 2y agoC V Raman's name is known via school text books; though granted that few would remember it unless they carry on with STEM.
- Lutger 2y agoHousehold names (in the west) are maybe Aristotle, Galileo, Newton and Einstein. If you are lucky. For a lot of people it is just Einstein, that's it.
- xanderlewis 2y agoI've noticed India seems to be full of ring theorists/algebraic geometers. I wonder if that's actually true and, if so, why.
- nasalspirant 2y agoPart of the answer is that research funding in India is predominantly from the public sector, and investments in pure science research have been low for a long time (not that applied sciences are doing much better). Thus many researchers lack the resources for experimental science whereas theoretical study is more accessible.
- xanderlewis 2y agoAh. I was only comparing with other 'pure' disciplines like analysis and topology/geometry, but I guess these are still more strongly connected to applied things.
- rramadass 2y agoThis is entirely the fault of the Indian Education System and Popular Media. The current generation knows almost nothing about these Indian Greats. In order to rectify the status quo; 1) Everybody should get the monthly magazine Science Reporter published by National Institute of Science Communication and Policy Research (NIScPR), Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR), New Delhi, India. which gives a overview into Indian Science - https://sciencereporter.niscpr.res.in/ https://sciencereporter.niscpr.res.in/ 2) The two-volume The Mind of an Engineer by Purnendu Ghosh et al. published by Springer contains essays from many of our recent Scientists/Researchers/Engineers etc. - https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-981-10-0119-2 https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-981-10-0119-2 3) Books on Indian Science/Scientists by various authors are available on Amazon India and are worth getting. 4) Also see the books by the great astrophysicist/cosmologist Jayant Narlikar (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayant_Narlikar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayant_Narlikar), specifically; The Scientific Edge: The Indian Scientist From Vedic To Modern Times. - https://www.penguin.co.in/book/the-scientific-edge/ https://www.penguin.co.in/book/the-scientific-edge/ and Science and Mathematics: From Primitive to Modern Times - https://www.routledge.com/Science-and-Mathematics-From-Primitive-to-Modern-Times/Narlikar/p/book/9781032066240 https://www.routledge.com/Science-and-Mathematics-From-Primi...
- kadal 2y agoTo this excellent list, I would humbly add Bhavana: https://bhavana.org.in/ https://bhavana.org.in/
- rramadass 2y agoGreat; I didn't know of this Mathematics magazine.
- rramadass 2y agoTwo More; a) Resonance : Journal of Science Education published by Indian Academy of Sciences - https://www.ias.ac.in/Journals/Resonance_Journal_of_Science_Education/ https://www.ias.ac.in/Journals/Resonance_Journal_of_Science_... b) Science India magazine published by Vijnana Bharati- https://scienceindiamag.in/ https://scienceindiamag.in/
- billfruit 2y agoPhysicists like Subrahmanyam Chandrashekhar and George Sudarshan. Also Mahalanobis for statistics. And Mani Chandy for computer science.
- andrewflnr 2y agoChandras(h?)ekhar is already there, at least if you're the kind of nerd who knows about physics at all. Probably even more so than Ramanujan, but that could just be my science bias as a kid.
- chompychop 2y agoManjul Bhargava is not Indian.
- dyauspitr 2y agoYou’re right, I can’t edit my comment anymore though.
- the-mitr 2y agoUniversities press in India had bought out a series of books by G Venkataraman called Vignettes in Physics it also had books on Saha, Bhabha, Bose, Chandra and Raman. https://universitiespress.com/books?id=0&sid=161 https://universitiespress.com/books?id=0&sid=161 National Book Trust also has several books on Indian scientists.
- seanhunter 2y agoWhat about Madhava of Sangamagrama[1], who (among other things) described various Taylor expansions for trigonometric functions (including an estimate of the error term) in the 14th century? (ie 300 years before James Gregory discovered the method for the Taylor expansion in the West). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madhava_of_Sangamagrama https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madhava_of_Sangamagrama