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Indian Thought and the Ethos of Economic Development

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 July 2024

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Professor Northrop, in his introduction to Professor Heisenbergs volume in the World Perspectives series entitled Physics and Philosophy, makes the following significant observation:

It is frequently assumed by native leaders of non-Western societies and also often by their Western advisors, that the problem of introducing modern scientific instruments and ways into Asia, the Middle East and Africa is merely that of giving native people their political independence and then providing them with the funds and the practical instruments. This facile assumption overlooks several things. First, the instruments of modern science derive from its theory and require a comprehension of that theory for their correct manufacture or effective use. Second, this theory in turn rests on philosophical as well as physical assumptions… one cannot bring in the instruments of modern physics without sooner or later introducing its philosophical mentality, and this mentality, as it captures the scientifically trained youth, upsets the old familial and tribal moral loyalties. If unnecessary emotional conflict and social demoralization are not to result, it is important that the youth… must see their experience as the coming together of two different philosophical mentalities, that of their traditional culture and that of the new physics.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © 1964 Fédération Internationale des Sociétés de Philosophie / International Federation of Philosophical Societies (FISP)

References

1 Werner Heisenberg, Physics and Philosophy, New York, Harper, 1958: Introduction by F.S.C. Northrop, pages 2-3.

2 Heinrich Zimmer, Philosophies of India, New York, Pantheon, 1951, Appendix B. Historical Summary, page 2.

3 Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan and Charles A. Moore, A Source Book in Indian Philosophy, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1957, page 172.

4 The Laws of Manu, translated by G. Buhler : Sacred Books of the East, xxv, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1886.

5 Atharva Veda, III, 15.

6 Rigveda, VIII, 13, 5.

7 R.E. Hume, The Thirteen Principal Upanishads, London, Oxford University Press, 2nd ed. rev., 1931.

8 Henrich Zimmer, op. cit., page 156.

9 The Mahabharata, XIII, 60, 23; Laws of Manu, IX, 327. Both despise trade and moneylending.

10 Max Weber, The Religion of India, Glencoe, Illinois, Free Press, 1958, pages 84-5.

11 Harold J. Laski, Rise of Liberalism.

12 R.T.H. Griffith, The Hymns of the Rigveda, Benares, India, E.J. Lazarus and Co., 1926.

13 R.T.H. Griffith, The Hymns of the Rigveda, loc. cit.

14 The Gandhi Sutras, arranged by D.S. Sarma, New York, Devin-Adair, 1949, pages 80-1.

15 Nehru on Gandhi, New York, The John Day Co., 1948, page 24.

16 S. Radhakrishnan, An Idealist View of Life, London, George Allen and Unwin, 1929, Chapter III.

17 S. Radhakrishnan, Indian Philosophy, London, George Allen and Unwin, 1931, vol. II, Chapter 8.

18 Zimmer, op. cit. page 106.

19 H. Zimmer, Philosophies of India, New York, Pantheon, 1951, page 94.

20 Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan and Charles A. Moore, A Source Book in Indian Philosophy, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1957, page xxiii.

21 Jawaharlal Nehru, The Discovery of India, New York, The John Day Company, 1946, page 87.

22 Max Weber, The Religion of India, page 4.

23 Gene D. Overstreet & Marshall Windmiller, Communism in India, Ber keley, California, University of California Press, 1959, page 526.

24 A.I.C.C. Economic Review, XI May 25, 1957, page 31.