Damodar dharmanand kosambi biography of christopher

He also continued his work on "path-geometry", a term he invented, with Path-equations admitting the Lorentz group and The concept of isotropy in generalized path-spaces In Kosambi published Statistics in function space which introduced a method for decomposing a signal into its components, a technique widely used today in image processing and in data analysis.

Another important paper by Kosambi around this time was The estimation of map distance from recombination valuesa work on genetics before the structure of DNA had been discovered. Despite his achievements, his personality led to him making enemies at Ferguson College [ 16 ] :- Kosambi had himself to thank for all the bitterness that was caused.

He was not an amicable person and had many disagreeable facets to his personality. He was short tempered. He would not stand any nonsense and would not hesitate to cut anyone to his size irrespective of his age, seniority or prestige. Many times he would lose his temper for small negligible mistakes and offend others. He took great pride in his intelligence.

His intellect was not matched with humility and because of this he tended to underestimate others. In addition he had a childlike impishness and indulged in teasing people. He was also given to using shock treatment to stir people out of their habitual thinking by taking an extreme stand. He would never attempt to interact or mingle with others and if anyone dared to communicate with him he seemed to disappoint them as far as possible.

Kosambi resigned from Ferguson College in The high academic reputation he had gained, however, led to the nuclear physicist Homi Jehangir Bhabha -who was the founding director of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, inviting him to join the Tata Institute. He continued to live in Pune, travelling by train to the Tata Institute in Bombay.

What was now becoming typical, the sixteen years he spent at the Tata Institute started well but deteriorated. His presidential address was Possible applications of the functional calculus but the published paper of the talk was poorly prepared [ 49 ] :- In the somewhat didactic article DDK elaborates on his ideas for the proper orthogonal decomposition initiated in his paper, 'Statistics in Function Space' and also on calculating machines.

By this time he had tried his hand at fabricating at least one, his "universal" calculating machine, the Kosmagraph DDK did not proofread this paper, and thus it is not in the form that he would have wished. The typesetting was cavalier, particularly the equations. Kosambi's father Dharmananda died in June [ 16 ] :- The end was agonising for Damodar.

Dharmananda had prohibited even his own family from visiting him. So not only Damodar but his mother too was not near him when the end came. Damodar was much too disturbed during this period of his father's fast unto death. He often expressed his anxiety to his near ones, 'I feel quite helpless; I often dream of Bapu his father.

Damodar dharmanand kosambi biography of christopher

Dhannananda must have had great influence on Damodar's growth. However their minds had progressed in two different directions. In addition the hardships his mother had to suffer because of Dharmananda's wanderlust must have hurt him and he might have held a grudge against his father on that account which however never found expression In - 49 Kosambi visited the United States, gave a 36 -lecture course on tensor analysis at the University of Chicago, visited Harvard and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and spent the spring of as a visitor at the Institute for Advanced Study.

The two became friends as Kosambi's interest in ancient Indian history increased. Although he continued to undertake research in mathematics and publish research papers in that topic, he was undertaking research into ancient Indian history, on social issues from his Marxist viewpoint and was active in the Peace Movement. Other than mathematics, all these other interests which occupied his time were irrelevant to the Tata Institute which aimed at being a top class research establishment in nuclear science and mathematics.

Things went from bad to worse when Kosambi published two incorrect proofs of the Riemann hypothesis, using probability. An application of stochastic convergence appeared in and was reviewed by William Judson LeVeque for Mathematical Reviews who writes:- Of the two proofs given for the crucial Lemma 1. The second proof appears to be erroneous, in that it invokes a sieve theorem under inappropriate conditions.

The reviewer is unable either to accept this proof or to refute it conclusively. The author must replace verbal descriptions, qualitative comparisons and intuition by precise definitions, equations and inequalities, and rigorous reasoning, if he is to claim to have proved a theorem of the magnitude of the Riemann hypothesis. Perhaps his colleagues were more annoyed that Kosambi published a paper on such a significant mathematical topic in the Journal of the Indian Society of Agricultural Statistics.

In his contract with the Tata Institute was not renewed. Later, Kosambi first traveled to Pune with an intention to learn Sanskrit. At Varanasi, he diligently learnt Sanskrit under the tutelage of Gangadharpant Shastri and Nageshwarpant Dharmadhikari. He faced many difficulties in Kashi while attempting to provide for himself. He had to work hard to earn enough to eat and maintain accommodation.

To make matters worse, Kashi was affected by a severe epidemic during his time there. Still, he made phenomenal progress in Sanskrit. However, he was rather disappointed with the dismal state of Buddhism there and instead continued on to Calcutta and then to Ceylon Sri Lankawhere he enrolled himself in the Vidyodaya College. He studied there for three years under the tutelage of Hikkaduwe Sri Sumangala Thera and was ordained as a Buddhist monk in Later, he went to Burma Myanmar and undertook comparative study of Buddhist texts in Burmese language.

After spending seven years abroad, Kosambi returned to India. He started working as a reader at the University of Calcutta and brought his wife and daughter Manik to Calcutta. His son Damodar was born in Later, Dharmananda gave up his university job to work as a research fellow in Baroda. In Bombay he met Dr. Woods invited Kosambi to Harvard, to complete the task of compiling a critical edition of Visuddhimaggaa book on Buddhist philosophy.

Help us build the largest biographies collection on the web! Add a New Bio. D Kosambi D. Powered by CITE. Discuss this D. Notify me of new comments via email. Cancel Report. Create a new account. He welcomed the Maoist leadership of the People's Republic of China he was a frequent guest in China from to and actively participated in the peace movement as a member of the International Peace Council.

Establishing contacts with like-minded individuals and participating in world congresses, Kosambi visited Moscow, Beijing, and Helsinki several times. Kosambi's daughter, Mira Kosambi, is a sociologist and feminist activist. Damodar Dharmananda Kosambi Indian mathematician, statistician, philologist, historian Date of Birth: Contact About Privacy.

Daniil Bernulli. Niels Koch.