whydidsciencenotflourishinindiathewayitdidineuropefromthesixteenthcenturyonwards?

Question

why did science not flourish in india the way it did in europe from the sixteenth century onwards?include in the answer the features of indian society that inhibited the development of science and those of europeanssociety that encouraged it.

Answer 1

I'd say the religion and ways of thinking. For one thing, the cast system did not help it, for the folks on the bottom of the heap were not given the chance to study and show their great minds.

Western ideas evolved itself after the Dark Ages....there was a sudden desire to learn and discover, combined with the religious movements. The discovery of the world around them pushed them on even more.

Answer 2

Christianity.

True science arose only once, in Europe, because Europe embraced a religious philosophy that encouraged it. Ancient Greece, China, India, Islam, etc. all had alchemy. Only in Europe did alchemy become chemistry.

Christianity posits a rational Creator God. Therefore, it follows that everything such a rational Creator would create would likewise be rational and able to be discovered. Galileo wrote: "The book of nature is a book written by the hand of God in the language of mathematics."

If, on the other hand, a society embraces a religious philosophy of capricious Gods who may or may not cause phenomena at their whim, or a religious philosophy that sees the Divine as a remote supernatural essense without conciousness, then there is no reason to believe that the world is governed by any sort of descernable rules. And if you don't believe something is there, there is no reason to look for it.


The "Dark Ages" of Europe are, in fact, a myth perpetrated by Englightment era philosophers who had rejected Christiantiy and felt compelled to denigate anything from an era that had embraced it. While it is true that Europe took some giant strides forward in terms of scientific understanding during the 16th & 17th centuries, this was not due to some sudden new interest. It was the the statistically expected result of centuries of study.

Exponential growth patterns always start small and grow. Bell curves are even more dramatic, but closer to approximating reality. As Lynn White puts it, technology in the early medieval period experienced a steady technological advance over that of the Roman period. At the same time, the Scholastics continued to explore the philosophical groundwork for what became science. Without this groundwork, science would have been impossible. By the 16th century, the previous millenium of work had built up to an explosive point, the steep upward climb of the statistical curve that has been mis-interpreted as a "renaissance."

Answer 3

Among the respondents to your question, religion is the dominate answer and I agree. But how and why did religion fuel the rebirth of science? The answer can be seen most clearly in the development of the university system in Europe and later in America. All of the great universities in Europe were started in the 16th century and all began as Christian enterprises, no surprise really since the Church was really the only institution with ability and motive to undertake such a task. The only other institution in Europe at that time(the royal governments) were only interested in building armies and ships. The reformation and counter-reformation raging across Europe fueled these developments. The first of these was the University of Paris(Sorbonne), followed by Oxford then Cambridge. In these universities, reason and faith were seen to establish each other and science was understood to be a means to a greater understanding of God, to better understand the Creator by understanding creation. By "thinking God's thoughts after him" (Kepler).Within that century, a generation of scholars, educated in such a system, produced the inevitable explosion in a variety of sciences. Your question really begs a more involved answer but I hope this points you in the right direction.

Answer 4

Well,

Science did not flourish in India as much as in european countries because it slowed down during the Mughal reign of Akbar. He did'nt take much interest in Science and technology.
He refused any trader to come here and share knowledge with India.

Answer 5

Perhaps they were too busy asking the same question 3 times over and not, as a result, taking any notice of the answers.

Answer 6

in one word - religion.