Pseudo science

[prasad1]

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There the various post in the Sociology and Religious section Masquerading as science. They are purely mythical not real.
We can not debunk it.
For instance:
Ancient Chariots of Alien Gods: The Great Vimana Controversy:

Vimanas are, without question, mentioned throughout many of the ancient Vedic texts, proving they certainly are not a concept that originates entirely from recent times; but if not sophisticated avionics of the modern variety, what then might they have been? Could it be possible that some elements regarding the vimana mystery–specifically our interpretation of these objects as technologically advanced aircraft that existed in ancient India–could be a result of our own desire to superimpose modern themes and ideas into the framework of the ancient Indian epics?

Before we get to the discussion of flying craft, there are a few things we must look at first with regard to the exact meaning of what a “vimana” is, in order to better unravel why I feel there may be misinterpretation associated with their presence in literature. One thing that we must take into consideration is that “vimana” is a word used to describe a number of things in a variety of different contexts throughout the Vedas. For instance, vimana can translate to mean the innermost sanctuary of a Rama temple (sometimes called an “adytum,” though this word actually has its origins in the Greek, rather than the Sanskrit). A variety of different temples, palaces, shrines, towers, and other structures associated with kings, emperors and divinity were also called “vimanas” in the Vedas, roughly translated to mean “a god’s palace.”

But if it is clear that vimanas are indeed mentioned in the ancient Sanskrit texts, and that this term was used, at least on occasion, to describe flying objects, then where is the so-called “controversy” regarding vimanas? In truth, where I think our modern interpretation of such things becomes misleading is when we take “vimana” to mean anything more specific than merely an “ancient flying machine.” In other words, to assert that they were a technological device using highly advanced, anti-gravitic science and engineering that may have involved mercuric engines, etc, is something that, based on my own research, likely stems from constructions or misinterpretations from the earlier part of the last century. The same may not be said entirely of the vimanas themselves however, as one cannot refute their presence in the ancient texts, at least by virtue of their frequent mention, and various descriptions.

And in truth, much of this modern idea of the inner mechanics of vimanas stems from a single manuscript, authored around 1920, called the Vaimanika Shastra. This work is based entirely on information allegedly channeled by the author, Pandit Subbaraya Shastry, and the information contained within has been chalked up by most aeronautics experts in modern times as being pure rubbish, to put it nicely. To illustrate this, the following statement by the late John B. Hare of the Internet Sacred Text Archive discusses the shortcomings in people’s interpretation of the Vaimanika Shastra’s content over the years:

The Vymanika Shastra was first committed to writing between 1918 and 1923, and nobody is claiming that it came from some mysterious antique manuscript. The fact is, there are no manuscripts of this text prior to 1918, and nobody is claiming that there are. So on one level, this is not a hoax. You just have to buy into the assumption that ‘channeling’ works. … there is no exposition of the theory of aviation (let alone antigravity). In plain terms, the VS never directly explains how Vimanas get up in the air. The text is top-heavy with long lists of often bizarre ingredients used to construct various subsystems. … There is nothing here which Jules Verne couldn’t have dreamed up, no mention of exotic elements or advanced construction techniques. The 1923 technical illustration based on the text … are absurdly un-aerodynamic. They look like brutalist wedding cakes, with minarets, huge ornithopter wings and dinky propellers. In other words, they look like typical early 20th century fantasy flying machines with an Indian twist.

Thus, in the absence of much of a justifiable link between the ancient flying vimanas and modern avionics (or even anti-gravitics), we are left to attempt to decipher by peering through the proverbial mists of time as to what, exactly, these “vimanas” actually were. Were there mechanical flying ships buzzing around in ancient India, or were these the chariots of the proverbial gods (or aliens)? Or, just perhaps, could some of our own understanding of the vimana mystery even stem from fanciful elaborations of these myths and legends, filtered through cultural windows that project the world of today onto mysteries of the past?

Ancient Chariots of Alien Gods: The Great Vimana Controversy

The ancient Hindu epics are rife with tales of the strange and fantastic. Elements described within consist of elaborate

mysteriousuniverse.org

 

[prasad1]

The Vimanika Shastra is not an actual ancient text. It was channeled, or dictated, to the author from the spirit world in 1918.

The spirit who supposedly dictated the text claimed to be and ancient seer named Bharadvada, who is prominent in some ancient writings, so I guess that is what is supposed to give this text credibility – that is, the idea that the ghost of someone ancient supposedly dictated it.

But they’re not even sure if that version of the story is true, because the first mention of any of this in 1952 by the guy who supposedly found and translated this text from 1918, so as far as anyone knows he could have made the whole channeled by a famous ghost story up in 1952.

The text itself reads like a technical manual, describing the details of how Vimanas operated. It includes the description of what must have sounded like a really technical idea in 1918 or 1952 called a mercury-vortex engine.

“One of the texts talks about mercury rotating and driving some sort of a powerful wind or a windmill effect. That might be some sort of what we call a fly-wheel energy storage where you have a spinning disc and you extract energy from it slowly – that would be the mercury. That could be used to drive some sort of propeller or what we call a conducted fan.”

Some of the other things this text describes are equally scientific sounding. It even includes very technical drawings of the things it’s talking about.

But when you look closer at all this it becomes obvious that it is physically impossible for any of these craft to get off the ground. In fact 20 years later, in 1974, a study was done on the texts and the drawings by the Aeronautical and Mechanical Institute of Science in Bangalore, India. I will quote Will Hunt, an American freelance writer based in India for a description of how that study came out.

“As thoroughly as it had been written, the committee just as thoroughly dismantled the study in an essay called A Critical Study of the Work Vymanika Shastra. They questioned whether the author (whoever that may have been) had any grasp of basic physics, chemistry and electricity, not to mention the “disciplines of aeronautics: aerodynamics, aeronautical structures, propulsive devices, materials, and metallurgy.” Their conclusion: “None of the planes has properties or capabilities of being flown; the geometries are unimaginably horrendous from the point of view of flying; and the principles of propulsion make them resist rather than assist flying.”


So let’s move on to the mentions of Vimanas in the actual ancient Vedic texts.
So as I have already mentioned the word Vimana came to mean ‘palace’, and when it was a palace of a god it was usually capable of flying around.

When we look at the development of Vimanas chronologically the mystery surrounding them vanishes. First of all they were not even mentioned in the earlier texts, and when they were finally mentioned, the next thousand years of their being mentioned always included them having wheels and being drawn by horses, not exactly a mercury vortex engine.
Then, around 500 BC, the chariots lose their horses and are depicted as flying on their own.
Jason Colavito says the following about the first mentions of Vimanas without horses:
“The very first of these is the flying chariot of the earthly king Ravana called Pushpaka. By the time of the Mahabharata (c. 400 BCE), these flying chariots had grown in size–one was now described as 12 cubits in circumference–but they never lost the large wheels that marked them as derived from earthly horse-drawn chariots.”



It’s also interesting to see that Ancient Astronaut theorists have to distort the actual description of Vimanas in the Vedic texts in order to make them sound like UFO’s.

Vimanas - Ancient Aliens Debunked

www.ancientaliensdebunked.com

 

[prasad1]

Exactly 40 years ago, a group of five young Indian scientists from the aeronautical engineering and mechnical engineering departments of the Indian Institute of Science in Bangalore had debunked such claims after conducting a thorough study.


The group, led by H S Mukunda, a now retired professor of aerospace engineering from IISc, had found that none of the technologies documented in the Vymanika Shashtra would allow an object to fly. They also found that the Vyamanika Shastra was based on a figment of imagination of a man who lived in the 20th century, and not the ancient sage Maharishi Bharadwaja.


In a paper titled “Critical Study of the Work Vyamanika Shastra’’, published in the journal Scientific Opinion in 1974, Mukunda, S M Deshpande, H R Nagendra, A Prabhu and S P Govindaraju said: “The planes described are at the best poor concoctions rather than expressions of something real. None of the planes has properties or capabilities of being flown; the geometries are unimaginably horrendous from the point of view of flying; and the principles of propulsion make then resist rather than assist flying.”

Following futile attempts to establish the Vedic origins of the claims in the Vymanika Shastra , the scientists found that the book was in fact “brought into existence sometime between 1900 and 1922 by Pandit Subbaraya Shastry’’, an interpreter of Sanskrit shlokas whose work was documented by an aide before his death in 1944 as the Vyamanika Shastra.

The work, according to the paper by the IISc scientists, was discovered in 1951 by A M Joyser, the founder of an International Academy of Sanskrit Research at Mysore, who published it.

While the science of aeronautics requires understanding of “aerodynamics, aeronautical structures, propulsive devices, materials, and metallurgy’’, the Vyamanika Shashtra paid “little or no emphasis on aerodynamics’’, said the IISc paper. “It is worth pointing out that that the history of aeronautics (western) in regard to production of heavier- than-air craft is studded with initial failures, significantly traceable to a non-understanding of aerodynamics,’’ it said.


“What we feel unfortunate… is that some people tend to eulogise and glorify whatever they can find about our past, even without valid evidence. In the absence of any evidence, efforts will be made to produce part of the evidence in favour of antiquity,’’ the scientists noted.

“Anybody who talks about these things has the responsibility to prove these things as well — at least on a small scale,’’ Prof Mukunda told The Indian Express. “If you see the drawings presented with the Vedic papers, it is grotesque. What is this nonsense? We went out of the way to find some substance for it at that time. We put in enormous effort. We have not stated it in the paper, but we went to great extent to find the origin of that book,’’ he said.

“I don’t know where we are going by glorifying the past. It makes sense if the ancient knowledge is put to use, not otherwise. In a way, I regret doing all that work to write the paper. Ultimately it seems to have no meaning,’’ said Prof Mukunda. “Look, if my father was an outstanding man and I am ordinary, what can I do by carrying on about what a great man my father was? What purpose is served by going on about that?”

Science meet didn’t hear: 40 years ago, IISc debunked flying claims

They also found that the Vyamanika Shastra was based on a figment of imagination of a man who lived in the 20th century.

indianexpress.com

Fiction should be in the fiction section and must be preceded by a disclaimer.