Decolonising Maths education remove Church ideology

A cocktail of practical value and religious propaganda can have obnoxious consequences. Post-colonisation, Maths teaching in India blindly apes Western practices — a pity because most of that school Maths actually originated in India. Europeans also imported it for its practical value. However, contrary to popular belief, the understanding of Maths is not universal. Indian ganita accepted empirical proofs. This differed from the European understanding of Maths as metaphysics. Hence, over centuries, the West adapted the imported Indian Maths to fit their metaphysics, which was linked to church theology. During colonisation, the West exported back this religiously coated mathematics, which is now taught globally.

"Maths was considered especially suited to arouse the eternal soul since it was believed that it contains eternal truths."

Maths was considered especially suited to arouse the eternal soul since it was believed that it contains eternal truths. The belief in eternal truths in turn led to the Western belief that Maths is “perfect.” It was further thought that this perfection could be achieved only through metaphysics and not empirically. Today, Maths is 100 per cent metaphysics.

Imperfect Maths

The belief that Maths is perfect is certainly not universal. Indian tradition accepted Maths as non-eternal and imperfect. Most practical applications of Maths today, such as sending a spacecraft to Mars, are done using computers which do Maths “imperfectly.”

Teaching Western metaphysics spreads other biases. All systems of Indian philosophy, without any exception, accept the pratyaksa, or empirically manifest, as the first means of proof. This also applies toganita. Science and engineering too prefer empirical proofs to metaphysics. So if Maths is done for its practical applications, it is better to accept empirical proofs in the subject. But present-day Maths teaches such proofs, hence all Indian philosophy, is “inferior.”

Does any of this make a difference to 2+2=4? Yes. Why is 2+2=4? Putting together two pairs of apples to show four apples is erroneous on formalism which disallows reference to the empirical. Formalism posits that 2+2=4 can be “rigorously” deduced only metaphysically from, say, Peano’s axioms. Most people don’t know how to do that or even what Peano’s axioms are. Thus, most Western educated never even properly learn 2+2=4. Since they are taught alongside that all other systems are inferior, they are compelled to rely blindly on Western authority for everything. This is by design. To put an end to this mental enslavement through indoctrination, education must be decolonised. The new government ought to focus on that.

Description of the Unreal असत्‌का वर्ण

Our mind is controlled by our five senses, touch, sight, taste, smell, hearing they are our inputs into our mind. The mind in an effort to make sense of this creates self, ego and thoughts. That which is unsmelt, unseen untouched unheard not tasted all share a commonness of the unreal .

The unreal which does not exist in space or time, in action,  objects, persons,  states,  circumstances and incidents etc.,   is actually non-existent.  Lord Krishna declares -  “ The unreal has no existence”  (Gita 2/16).  

That which exists in a particular space at a particular time or in a particular action or thing or person or state or circumstance or incident does not actually exist anywhere,  anytime, in anything or person etc.  That which exists in certain bodies, classes, groups,  and stages of life only,  can’t actually exist anywhere.  If it seems to exist, it is transient.  If the sense of doership is perceived in some persons but it is not perceived in others,  it means that it is not real,  it is merely assumed.  Similarly evils such as desires, anger, lust, greed, delusion, ego, fear, arrogance, envy, and jealousy etc.,  sometimes appear in the mind while sometimes they don’t appear;  it means that actually they have no existence of their own.  They are naught.  Had they been real, they will have permanence.

In fact thoughts such as lust and anger have no independent existence.  Thoughts and independent existence (reality) are contrary to each other.  How can thoughts  existence of their own, when they temporary?   How can the reality which has an independent existence of its own and which remains the same undergo any modification?   It is by misapprehension that we assume such thoughts as lust and anger etc.,  in us.  Thus by assuming them in us,  we try to wipe them out.   But actually we strengthen them by supposing their pre-existence*.   Similarly we accept independent existence of the mind.  So thoughts and projections come to the mind.  But they are changing every moment while the real does not undergo any change.  That which undergoes changes has no existence.  It is by attachment or Maya that we give our existence meaning to that which has no existence at all.  

The unreal has no existence but in our minds we have assumed its existence.  This existence is merely assumed and imaginative.  Similarly the world has no independent existence.  But when the real self accepts existence of the unreal because of its reality the unreal seems to exist in the same way as fuel,  coal, pebbles, stones etc.,  shine brightly when they are put on fire, though they are not bright in them selves.  

The unreal may manifest but that has really no existence.  The reason is that whatever does not exist anytime and anywhere does not exist ever and at all.  But the Real (God) does not cease to exist at any place,  at anytime,  in any action,  in any object, in any state,  in any circumstance and in any incident.   That which does not cease to exist at anytime and in any space has existence at all times and at all places is real.  So the Lord declares,  “The real never ceases to be”  (Gita 2/16).  As far as actions,  things, persons, places and time etc.,  are concerned,  they neither existed in the past,  nor will exist in future and at present also decaying every moment.  But God was even the same,  will remain the same and is the same now.  He ever remains the same without undergoing any change.  

From book in English “Sahaj Sadhana”  by Swami Ramsukhdasji

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