Matter and Mind: The Vaisheshika Sutra of Kanada

Matter and Mind is a new translation of the nearly 2,500-year old Vaisheshika Sutra of Kanada together with an introductory essay and a commentary. The Vaisheshika Sutra is one of the most important texts in the history of science 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.