All high-level programming languages do 4 basic things:
- Assignment
- Condition
- Loop
- Function/Procedure.
Everything else is syntactic sugar.
Galileo has influenced us heavily to think math in terms of symbols. A mathematical symbol expresses an idea very concisely and effectively. Much more than a language could do.
So
x = 1
Let me rephrase the above bereft of assumptions --
The mathematical expression "x = 1" is more concise than saying it in English "let x equal to 1".
But what if we could express "x = 1" much more concise in a natural language?
For e.g., let me just say
x 1
People think that just because ancient Sanskrit mathematicians did not use symbols, the works are not scientific. Symbol is just a convenience; if language could be more powerful than symbols, who needs them? As a side note, Sanskrita almost does not use punctuations (except for end of sentence - the pipeline character |). In contrast, English just can't be "communicated" without appropriate punctuations' usage.
To demonstrate the power of the language, let us look at a simple program using a pseudo-language.
//Pseudo-code to produce a random number and determine if its odd or even
s = 100;
r = (int) rand(s);
if (r % 2 == 0)
return "even";
else
return "odd";
Now lets apply the Sanskrit grammarian Paninian rules. I am going to keep the function names as is (in bold), but conjugate the variable names per Sanskrit rules (taking them to be consonant ending variables).
1: aSeSha: SUnyam // No remainder 0 (No remainder equals 0)
2: s Satam // s Satam asti (s is 100)
3: sa: rand r // of s random is r (r is random of s)
4: int ca // int also (r is also int of random of s)
5: even ra: aSeshe dvibhAjane // "even" is of r during division of 2 when no reminder happens (on division by 2 of r has no reminder, it is even)
6: odd SeShe // "odd" when there is a reminder
Here are the sutras in proper Sanskrit:
अशेष: शून्यम् |
स् शतम् |
स: वृथा र् |
अभिन्न: च |
समं र: अशेषे द्विभाजने |
विषमं शेषे ||
Using nominative case and the implicit "is", Panini eliminated the need for equals sign. Functions are defined via genetive case. Using the locative case, Panini provides the if-else condition. In effect, mathematical expressions are substituted by simply conjugating the variables.
That is the genius contribution of Panini to Sanskrita! Now a skilled poet could come and rearrange the above 6 sutras into a sloka format, and lo! there is sloka that tells us how to determine an even/odd number!
Let me attempt a half-baked sloka (May Sanskrita enthusiasts forgive me for such a blasphemy).
अशेषो शून्यं भूयात् सेकशतं वृथा रेफ: स: ।
अभिन्नश्च द्विभाजने विषमं समं शेषोऽशेषे ॥
Due to the occurrence of words like SeSha, SUnyam, aSeSha, dvibhAjane, abhinna the above can be mis-interpreted to refer Adisesha, SUnyavAda, Vishnu, Dvaita, Advaita etc. Now we have an example of a sloka referring to the gods and a mathematical algorithm encoded in it!
