There is zero evidence of Sanjaya sitting in a CCTV control room of sorts, narrating the war live to the blind Dhritarashtra.
Bengaluru: Science is a rather hazy concept for many of our politicians.
While scientists and researchers spend years holed up in laboratories to better understand our world, some politicians need nothing more than a mike and an audience to prove or disprove scientific truths. For them, research is but the sum of personal convictions.
In keeping with its strong commitment to public interest journalism, the HoaXposed feature of ThePrint will now also track leaders or people of prominence trying to peddle their personal beliefs as scientific truth, and help you get the real picture.
We start with Tripura chief minister Biplab Deb’s recent statement about the internet’s Mahabharata origin.
Statement: “The internet existed during the times of the Mahabharata. It was not invented recently, it existed in India lakhs of years ago.”
Who said it: Tripura chief minister Biplab Deb
Full statement: “This country is one where, even during the times of Mahabharata, Sanjaya was able to relay to Dhritarashtra what was happening in the war. What does this mean? There was technology. There was internet. There were satellites. How could Sanjaya have seen everything with just his eyes? We don’t know what happened afterwards. Things changed. But back in those days, that technology existed in this country.”
“These days, European countries claim that these technologies are theirs. Americans say it too. But it isn’t theirs; it’s all ours and belongs to our country. Our country’s culture has the widest reach. Even today, people who try to prove themselves as big shots in internet and technology [sic]… look at Microsoft. It is in America but all the software engineers are Indians.”
In Mahabharata, Tripura Chief Minister finds proof of internet, satellite communication
Read here: https://t.co/1ZYXqSqhtr pic.twitter.com/T0sqLofkMR
— NDTV (@ndtv) April 17, 2018
Accuracy Meter: 0/5
Explanation: It is a great mental exercise to exert confirmation bias on our mythology and imagine Sanjaya sitting in a CCTV control room of sorts, narrating the war live to the blind Dhritarashtra. Unfortunately, there is zero evidence that this happened.
The first satellite, Sputnik 1, was launched by the Soviet Union in 1957. It could transmit only radio signals.
The internet was conceived as a network of networks developed by the American military after its predecessor ARPANET, which aimed to unite all military networks across America in the 1980s. It gained popularity in academia in the 1980s. Tim Berners-Lee created the world wide web, the first “browser” to access data over the internet, in 1990, causing it to go mainstream.
As for the “lakhs of years ago” part, the Kurukshetra war is “dated”, as calculated by seasons and astronomical phenomena mentioned in the Mahabharata, to 3139 BC. The anatomically modern human came into existence 315,000 years ago, and the concept of heavily debated ‘behavioural modernity’ (languages, art, music, culture) developed just 40,000 years ago.
“The anatomically modern human came into existence 315,000 years ago, and the concept of heavily debated ‘behavioural modernity’ (languages, art, music, culture) developed just 40,000 years ago.” These facts may also appear to be exaggerated. It is said that last ice age occurred some 10,000 years ago. How could then be behavioural modernity developed 40,000 years ago?