gupta's rough simplification. The first objection (viz. that Bháskara makes no allusion to the infinitesimal magnitude of the intervals of space and time employed) would be more to the point if it were well founded.[1] But it is not, and Mr. Spottiswoode’s error was due to the insufficiency of the data supplied to him. As a matter of fact, even Bháskara’s unit, the Truti of time (or Paramánu), is exceedingly small, as the very name implies, being about one thirty-four-thousandth of a second of time. And in the passage in which Bháskara describes the process, he distinguishes between Sthúla-gati and Súkshma-gati (velocity roughly measured, and measured accurately, i.e. by reference to indefinitely small quantities; for Súkshma, as we have seen, has always a reference to the Anu, the indefinitely small); indeed, he expressly mentions that the Sthúla-gati takes only Sthúla-kala (finite time) into consideration, and that the determination of the Tátkálikí-gati (Súkshma-gati) must have reference to the moment ((
Indic characters)), which is an indefinitely small quantity of time, being, of course, smaller than his unit, the Truti. (Cf.(Indic characters);—nothing can be clearer
- ↑ It is an error to suppose that infinitesimals are indispensable to the Calculus, but I am here speaking of the earlier Calculi, and not of the modern developments which have made the Calculus independent of infinitesimals. My claim on behalf of Bháskara is limited to the historically earlier imperfect form of the Calculus.
