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Thread: mathematicism (Pythagoreanism, Leibnizianism, etc.) and Hinduism

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    mathematicism (Pythagoreanism, Leibnizianism, etc.) and Hinduism

    Much/most of this sub-forum refers to Western dualist or materialistic science. However, when science started in the West, maybe around the time of Pythagoras or one of his teachers (or some people refer to some older person Hermes Trismegistus, who may have actually been later) there was idealist/mentalist/spiritualist science as well as perhaps materialism (Atomism, etc.) Pythagoras was one of the idealists, who studied in Egypt, Mesopotamia, maybe India, or India's ideas reached him, because he believed in reincarnation and was vegetarian/vegan (maybe also because of the pre-Christian, non-Abrahamic Northern Essenes whom may have been influenced by India.)

    Pythagoras was one of the first philosopher-scientist-mathematicians in the West. There are theories of some in ancient India, or maybe some people here even know some, like there's a whole theory of Vedic mathematics. The standard philosophical viewpoint in math is Platonism, from Pythagoreanism, which are both forms of rationalist idealism. They state that the universe seems orderly, so is logical/rational, and exists as ideas/mind/spirit. Until maybe scientist Isaac Newton, idealism, dualism (says both mind/spirit and matter exist) and materialism (not as much until him) were all competing ideas. The philosopher Rene Descartes seemed like a dualist, but probably was really rationalist idealist. He came up with some ideas Newton and others used, then because of them, materialism increased until the modern day.

    I'm just saying, materialism and matter-focused dualism aren't the only two schools of thought in science, because maths' Western founder--Pythagoras--was mathematicist rationalist idealist (mathematicist.) Pythagoras said ‘All is number,’ ‘Number rules the universe.’ Rationalist idealism should be seen as a very important view in science. Much of ancient/Classical Greek philosophy was similar to Hinduism, etc., not just in cosmology but things like morality. Several philosophies through Platonism, Neopythagoreanism, Neoplatonism, and, according to certain contemporary science writers, also some German Idealism such as Leibnizianism, continued mathematicism.

    There are contemporary philosophy/science/mathematics writers detailing a mathematicist view of the world, and they call themselves the Pythagorean(-Leibnizian) Illuminati (PI.) Illuminati means ‘enlightened ones’ and refers to Classical Greek philosopher Plato's definition (in his book The Republic) of philosophers as enlightened. They don't really believe they've attained perfect knowledge, but maybe in the last several years/decades, the best scientific model of reality, and they aspire to superhuman knowledge. They said that Hinduism (and when asked, also Jainism) as an idealist system that included some rationalist philosophies, is the best philosophy/religion of India, and they quoted several Hindu statements similar to Pythagoras. Later, probably to interest more Western scientists, the PI started to criticize how more religions explained the world, like pointing out how Buddhism denies self, and even (through deconstructionism & anti-logic) denies itself... the PI later even saying they don't think they can try to work with Hindus anymore, because of emotionalistic mysticism. I'm not sure they really tried on a large scale, or just said that to appease Western scientists. Anyway, there's a lot of similarity between mathematicist Western philosophy and the scientific/mathematical/logical aspects of Hinduism. Those have more in common with Pythagorean-derived mathematicism than with modern Western materialistic science.

    Even in Hindu dualism, maybe some people feel more like they want to be idealist (monist, Advaita) but have to focus on the material world sometimes so are dualist/etc. (or think there are several lokas/‘worlds’/etc.) The PI philosophy is idealist, but a ‘dual-aspect’ idealism in which the material world is like Maya, illusion, but is an ‘objective illusion,’ and shared dream. Most of us can agree we all (when incarnate) exist in the material world, and it works by some sort of scientific laws we all are under, so that's why it's objective. However, the theory is it's still in the mind, rather than the mind being in matter, so you can also say matter doesn't exist independently, and then, it is like a dream.

    I don't have Hindu cosmology anymore rather than contemporary Neopythagorean-Leibnizian cosmology, but in earlier writing they admit there are some aspects they missed. As has often been said since the world started to become more interconnected, philosophies like Hinduism focus more on the internal or spiritual world, and philosophies like even some Classical Western philosophy focus a lot on the external, illusory material world, even if they state it is illusory.

    Hindu (and apparently also Chinese/Taoist) Yogis discovered the spiritual energy that exists in a human being and makes one live, which a goal of Yoga is to activate, which happened to me, as I discussed in the Hatha & Kriya Yoga sub-forum and maybe elsewhere. The Greeks represented this by Hermes' caduceus (snakes coiled on a staff such as with seven positions) but there's no further description of that energy in Western philosophy (apart from some later occult philosophy, and West Asian stuff that interacted with Greek.)

    So, to get a total picture of reality, you need something like mathematical analysis of the material world from the macrocosmic to microcosmic levels (as Western science has done on some levels) but also the mathematical analysis of the spiritual world, such as the Yogic-spiritual energy that exists in a human being and makes one live. That's why I'm glad this sub-forum is here, and I'd like to see more dialogue between Western (more idealist version) science and Yoga/etc. Mathematicism doesn't mean there isn't any subjective world, or no emotions either, just that all that is understandable.
    Last edited by DavidC; 13 January 2017 at 03:13 AM. Reason: elaboration/correction

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