Gravity: Bhaskaracharya and Newton
AI-drafted · awaiting admin review
Brahmagupta and Bhaskara II wrote that the Earth attracts heavy objects towards itself. Newton's 1687 law of universal gravitation, with its inverse-square formula, was a different and much larger step.
Indian contribution, later developed elsewherePhysics & chemistry
Indian claim
Bhaskaracharya discovered gravity 500 years before Newton.
Evidence for the Indian claim
- Brahmagupta (628 CE) wrote that the Earth attracts bodies, which is why things fall.
- Bhaskara II's Siddhanta Shiromani (1150, Goladhyaya) says the Earth has an attracting power by which it pulls heavy things towards itself, so they seem to fall.
Commonly credited to
Isaac Newton discovered the law of universal gravitation, published in the Principia in 1687.
Evidence for the other claim
- Newton's law says every mass attracts every other mass, with a force that falls with the square of the distance; it explains falling objects, the Moon, planets and tides with numbers.
- The Indian texts state the idea in words, apply it to the Earth, and give no quantitative law.
- There is no evidence Newton knew the Indian texts.
What historians and scientists say
Indian astronomers clearly stated that the Earth attracts objects, a real and early insight. The law of universal gravitation is Newton's. Claims that Bhaskara 'discovered Newton's law' go beyond the texts.