Matter and Mind: The Vaisheshika Sutra of Kanada

Matter and Mindis a new translation of the nearly 2,500-year oldVaisheshika Sutra of Kanada together with an introductoryessay and acommentary. TheVaisheshika Sutrais one of the mostimportant texts in the history ofscience that has not received the attention it deserves. It presents an ontology of reality that includes four kinds of fundamental atoms, two of which have mass and two that do not, as well as minds and consciousness. It also presents symmetry principles that it uses to infer properties of the basic atoms.Kanada's laws of motion are nearly identical to those of Newton.