Fwd: [swisseph] Updating to DE440/441 Planetary Ephemeris (Horizons)

[A K Kaul]

Respected members of BVP,

Jai Shri Ram!

The below being a very interesting and informative mail  especially for the ones who are "fixing" the dates of the Mahabharata war and "Rama Ravana Yuddha" etc., I am taking the liberty of forwarding it to this august forum.

With regards and Jai Shri Ram!

A K Kaul

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Todd Carnes <toddc...@gmail.com>
Date: Sat, 10 Apr 2021, 04:21
Subject: [swisseph] Updating to DE440/441 Planetary Ephemeris (Horizons)
To: <swis...@groups.io>

I thought the group might find this interesting, especially with all the talk about Horizons in the group recently.

Todd

-------- Forwarded Message --------

Subject:	Updating to DE440/441 Planetary Ephemeris (Horizons)
Date:	Fri, 9 Apr 2021 12:57:58 -0700 (PDT)
From:	Jon.D.G...@jpl.nasa.gov
Reply-To:	Jon.D.G...@jpl.nasa.gov
To:	ssd-an...@list.jpl.nasa.gov

During the week of April 12, the Horizons ephemeris system will be updated to replace the DE430/431 planetary ephemeris, used since 2013, with the new DE440/441 solution and sixteen most massive small-body perturbers.

The new DE440/441 general-purpose planetary solution includes seven additional years of ground and space-based astrometric data, data calibrations, and dynamical model improvements, most significantly involving Jupiter, Saturn, Pluto, and the Kuiper Belt.

For details, see "The JPL Planetary and Lunar Ephemerides DE440 and DE441", R.S. Park, et al., The Astronomical Journal, 161:105 (15pp), 2021 March.

A) Impact on Horizons:

For consistency with the new DE440/441 planetary solution, the catalog of 1.1 million small-body orbit solutions will be recomputed during this week using the updated perturbation model.

Because it will take a number of days to complete the refit, there will be a period of time with the potential for some minor dynamical inconsistency.

This means that Horizons will propagate requests for small-bodies still in the database with DE431-based solutions using the new DE441 perturber model, until the new DE441-consistent solutions execute and filter into the database.

The temporary inconsistency will normally be much less than the asteroid or comet's solution uncertainties and therefore not meaningfully significant.

The most visible change with this update may be ephemerides expressed with respect to the solar system barycenter (SSB), such as small-body SPK files.

Inclusion of 30 new Kuiper-belt masses, and the Kuiper Belt ring mass, results in a time-varying shift of ~100 km in DE441's barycenter relative to DE431.

Therefore, users of SSB-relative small-body SPK files sensitive to that level of accuracy should load in the matching planetary ephemeris for consistent calculations.

B) Notes for small-body SPK file users

For small-body SPK's generated prior to 2021-April-12, a DE430 planetary ephemeris should be loaded. For SPK files generated after the refit, DE440 should be used.

Compatible planetary ephemeris SPK files may be retrieved here:

ftp://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/pub/eph/planets/bsp/de430t.bsp

ftp://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/pub/eph/planets/bsp/de440.bsp

If you aren't sure which planetary ephemeris is needed for consistency with a given small-body SPK file, check the file comments ("commnt -r <file_name>"). A notation like "source: SB431-N16" or "DE-0431" (or date of generation before April 12) indicates the older DE430 should be used with the SPK file.

Regarding notation, DE431 is essentially a longer version of DE430 and can be used interchangeably. Similarly, DE441 refers to a longer version of the new DE440 solution.

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[Krishna Kumar Pillalamarri]

Dear Shri AK Kaul,

This note is informative. I want to link this to the earlier correspondence we had regarding the dating of Ramayana and Mahabharata by Shri Nilesh Oak and Ms. Rupa Bhaty. Specifically Ms. Rupa vigorously defended her research and findings, and you 'seemingly' were disputing the results because they were basing their research on DE430/DE431. You have now been gracious to give the details of the publication of DE440/DE441. In all this, the big unanswered question for me is: what exactly is your objection to JPL's DE430/431, and by extension the new DE440/DE441? I tried to follow your logic carefully, yet the answer missed me. I don't deny my ignorance in the matter, but objectively stating, the disdain should be matched by a specific instance of invalidation, isn't it? Mind you, I 'get' that the source of the astronomical data on which Shri Oak's and Ms. Bhaty's research is based on foreign sources. What is the alternative?

Best Regards,

Krishna

Krishna Kumar Pillalamarri
Ph-Cell: 408-373-9273

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[A K Kaul]

Shri Krishna Kumar Pillalamarri ji

Shri Krishnaya Namah!

<I want to link this to the earlier correspondence we had regarding the dating of Ramayana and Mahabharata by Shri Nilesh Oak and Ms. Rupa Bhaty. Specifically Ms. Rupa vigorously defended her research and findings, and you 'seemingly' were disputing the results because they were basing their research on DE430/DE431>

Kindly rest assured that I am not disputing anybody's "research" or "findings".

I have made a categorical statement that the dates of Mahabharata war from about 5561 BCE to about 900 BCE may all be wrong, or, who knows, all those dates may be correct!

The Same is the case with the dates of Rama-Ravana-Yuddha from about 900000 BCE to about 4000 BCE.  All those dates may be right or all of them maybe wrong!

What is the real problem?:

The problem actually is that all the dates of the two epics or the SS etc.  have been/are being "decided" on the basis of  "modern Western Astronomy". 

And that astronomy came into existence only after the heliocentric theory of Nicholas Copernicus of the 15th century!  It was disputed by Tycho Brahe but followed by Galileo of Galilee, Johannes Kepler and Isaac Newton etc. to name a few of them!

The software  like "Sky Pro" or "Planetarium Gold" or "Stellarium" etc. being used by various scholars to decide these dates are based on the data/ephemerides like DE402 etc. provided by JPL.   And that organization itself was started in 1936 which was taken over by NASA when it was established in 1958.

Prior to the establishment of JPL/NASA, ephemerides were prepared from the data provided by Greenwich Observatory, which was established in 1675  CE or US Naval Observatory which was established in 1875.

How the data were calculated before the advent of computers and satellites, will be clear from the attachment XSChapterVI!

You can well understand my anguish that on the one hand we call ourselves "Vishwa-guru" (विश्व-गुरु ), but even to fix the dates of the "mother of all battles" or "Rama-Ravana-Yuddha" or "the antiquity of the Surya Siddhanta" we have to take refuge either behind Greenwich Observatory or JPL/NASA---in other words नासा शरणं गच्छामि .  And we call such organizations just upstarts, who have stolen all the data from us and are now using it against us!

How ancient is Indian astronomy?

We must therefore first find out and decide once for all as to how old Indian astronomy really is!

As seen in one of my mails, the earliest indigenous astronomical work available as on date is the Vedanga Jyotisham of Acharya Lagadha, which was of January 2, 1399 BCE---because it was a New Moon on that date when the sun and the moon were both conjunct the Winter Solstice, which was "almost conjunct Dhanishatha" whereas at the time of Summer Solstice, the sun was in the midst of the  Ashlesha division, where the Ashlesha Star itself was in the midst!

And needless to repeat here that the VJ is just a rudimentary work that enables us to calculate only the mean tithi, nakshatra etc. of the sun and the moon.

There is no mention of any planets much less Mesha, Vrishabh etc. Rashis.

So there is absolutely no Indian astronomical work from which the planetary position vis-a-vis nakshatras in the Mahabharata or planetary position vis-a-vis Rashis like that of the VR could have been calculated!

What about the Surya Siddhanta?!

While I was a young Sanskrit student, my maternal grandfather used to go through the Surya Siddhanta and he would impress upon me as to how old a work it was.  Same was the case with my father, who literally worshipped it like he worshipped the Ramayana or the Bhagavad-Gita etc., as it was a divine work by none other than Surya Bhagwan Himself.

Science in Nehruvian Era!

As my good luck or bad luck would have it, while on the one hand I was making preparations for my Sanskrit examinations like Visharad and then Shastri, I was advised to opt for non-medical subjects which meant in those days Chemistry, Physics, Mathematics and English.

History---both British and Indian besides geography was an elective subject and came under social sciences.

For quite some time I also believed the Surya Siddhant to have been a couple of million year old work and Bhagwan Ram having been around about 900000 years back and the Mahabharata war having taken place in around 3200 BCE and Bhagwan Krishna having Incarnated on July 20, 3228 BCE since that was what "the emperor among Vedic astrologers" viz Dr. B V Raman had worked out meticulously!

And as you must be knowing "emperors" never lie!

So as you can see, everything was hunky-dory!

But the fact remains that though the SS is said to have been updated in 12000 or 2900 BCE because the Obliquity of Ecliptic etc. it is actually a work of early centuries of CE!!  

Conflict between facts and figures!

My school level geography books talked a lot about the phenomenon of seasons and I learnt that Makar Sankranti was the shortest day of the year and so on!

It also said that the earth revolved round the sun apart from its daily rotation on its axis but the SS said quite the opposite!

With the passage of time when I extended my Sanskrit studies further I found that all the Puranas also dittoed geography books to the extent that Makar Sankranti was the shortest day of the year and so on.

After some time I undertook a thorough study of the SS and other siddhantas.

I found all of them claiming the earth to be the centre of the universe and the sun and planets revolving around the same which was a direct contradiction of my geography books.

You can't have the cake and eat it as well!

"Smart's Textbook of Spherical Astronomy" said everything that was opposite to what the SS was saying!

I tried to study Aryabhata and Brahmagupta and so on, but was dismayed to find that as per Brahmagupta, Aryabhata was मूर्खो वा पिशाचो वा as he had claimed that the earth had a daily rotation!

Quite late in the day, I found that the Siddhanta Shiromani of Bhaskaracharya of the 13th century had taken the orbital elements of Brahma-Gupta and had not done any "research" of his own!

To crown it all, as late as the 19th century, the last "siddhantic astronomer" of India viz. Samanta (Pathani) Chandrashekhar had dittoed the line of the Surya Sidhanta and Siddhanta Siromani in his "Siddhanta-Darpana", that the earth could not have a daily movement on its axis and the sun was revolving around it instead of it being the other way round!

Chandrashekhar (Pathani) Samant has gone to the extent of saying that we would go against all the Puranas and siddhantas if we accept the statement of Aryabhata that the earth does have a diurnal motion!

He also believed in giving planetary revolutions of a kalpa----4320000000 years, just like the SS and the Siddhanta Shiromani! (Attachments sd-1 and sd-2).

So from which works did the Veda Vyasa and Valmiki Rishi etc. calculate planetary longitudes vis-a-vis nakshatras or Rashis and so on in the  Mahabharata and the Valmiki Ramayana etc. etc. since there was absolutely no indigenous astronomical work around before the VJ and even the Western astronomical works worth the name have been around hardly for the last few centuries?

The software Planetarium Gold is no gold!

If you have gone through the work ''itihas ka upahaas" by Shri Vinay Jha, he has proved it conclusively that the dates of Incarnation of Bhagwan Ram or any other astrological factors of the Valmiki Ramayana or the Mahabharata proved on the basis of "Planetarium Gold" have become quite obsolete since they were based on much earlier data of JPL!  

Thus the conclusions drawn from the same about the dates of the planetary aspects vis-a-vis nakshatras in the Mahabharata or the horoscope of Bhagwan Ram etc. are no longer valid!

Who knows, after a few years, the DE431 of JPL/NASA also may be declared obsolete for such ancient dates!

So when did the Mahabharata war and Rama Ravana-Yuddha actually take place?

If we are really serious about finding the above dates, the only way out is that we must first find out as to when Kaliyuga started and what the duration of the four Yugas is.  Why?  Because

1. The Mahabharata itself has said at about half a dozen places that the war took place in Dwapara-Kali-Sandhi or at the fag end of Dwapara yuga and so on.

2. Srimad Bhagavata etc.  Puranas say that Kaliyuga started the day Bhagwan Krishna left for His Eternal Abode.

3. Almost all the Puranas and the Manusmriti give the duration of yugas exactly what "Maya Mahasura" of the SS has said ---12000 divine years i.e. 4320000 years for "Chatuygua" where the yugas were/are in the ratio of 1:2:3:4

4. Both Srimad Bhagavata (Section 12, Chapters 1 & 2) and the Vishnu Purana (4/24/32)  claim that there was a gap of 1015 or 1115 years between the grandson of Yudishthira viz. Parikshit and Chandragupta Maurya who had dethroned Mahapadma-Nanda 

 5. Parikshit is said to have been around just when Kaliyuga had started and that is why he had put a snake around the neck of a Tapasvi Rishi, whose son had cursed him.  (In fact, to ameliorate the effects of the curse of Rishi, Srimad Bhagvata was narrated by none other than Shukadeva himself to Parikshit!---and that is why it has pun शुक मुख-गलितम् )

6. That means Kaliyuga had really started in around 1431 or 1531  BCE since Chgandragupta Maurya  was definitely around in about 316  BCE when he had become the king! (Attachment Pauranic-date-of-Kaliyuga---a page from Bharatiya Jyotisha Shkastra by S B Dikshit)

7. This is entirely against what Maya Mahasura has "proved astronomically" in his SS and what has been dittoed by Aryabhata in his Aryabhatiya, with the only difference that the SS Kaliyuga is supposed to have started on the midnight of February 17/18, 3102 BCE midnight whereas Aryabhata made it to start at 6-00 am (LMT) of Ujjain on February 18, 3102 BCE.

8.  If we really want to solve these riddles, we will definitely have to determine the date of Kaliyuga first!  

Maybe a conference of scholars and scientists and archaeologists etc. can decide this issue, since "Dharmacharyas" have their own psychological barriers and maybe they will not go against the "divine work" viz. the SS!

9.  If it is decided once for all that Kaliyuga was a myth instead of an astronomical fact, then we have to do a lot of rethinking about all the dates of the Mahabharata and the VR---since if the yuga-theory is real, then the Rama-Ravana-Yuddha could have taken place only about 900000 years back, which is an impossibility as per the "history of homo-sapiens"!

DE431 or DE441 is not going to solve our problem!

The net outcome of all this "long sermon" is that neither DE431 nor DE441 is going to solve our problem but we have to solve it ourselves on the basis of the records that we have in the Puranas and itihasas etc.----sans their comments like "Saturn tormenting Rohini" or "Eclipses taking place on Trayodashis" etc. which are astronomical impossibilities!

With regards and Shri Krishnaya Namah!

A K Kaul

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[Bijoy Misra]

Dear Pandit Kaul,

I admire the scholarly exposition.  I will study the attachments more leisurely.

Dating the sky phenomena and production of the almanac is one of the important

activities of our Observatory.

Best regards,

Bijoy Misra 

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[Raja Roy]

Dear Shri Kaul,

Like Prof. Misra, I really admire your write up. I would say that I had a similar journey as you describe. Have you taken a look at Jain astronomy texts (Surya Prajnapti, Jambudwipa Prajnapti and others) and Buddhist astronomy  text Shardulakaranavadana (part of Ashokavadana)? I believe that these texts bridge the gap between Vedanga Jyotisha and siddhanta texts. Astronomy in Jain texts is similar to Vedanga Jyotisha even in the 2nd-4th century BCE.

Best regards,

Raja

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[A K Kaul]

Dear Prof Misra,

Jai Shri Ram!

Really glad to note that you liked my response to the query about various dates of the Mbh and VR events etc.

Do kindly give me feedback  regarding the "exposition" after going through the attachments.

Yes, Bharatiya Panchangas have got derailed and unfortunately, most of us appear to be reluctant to take the bull by the horns!

It will be a boon for the entire Hindu community if your Observatory takes the lead in setting it right!

With regards and Jai Shri Ram!

A K Kaul

PS

I was elated to see you addressing me as "Dear Pandit Kaul" since in Kashmir every Hindu is a Pandit---and that is why the first Prime Minister of Independent India was called as Pundit/Pandit Nehru! 

And he enjoyed it in spite of being "secular"!

AKK

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[A K Kaul]

Dear Shri Raja Rammohan Roy,

Jai Shri Ram!

< Like Prof. Misra, I really admire your write up. I would say that I had a similar journey as you describe. I would say that I had a similar journey as you describe >

It is for the first time that I get such a heartening response from scholars like you and Prof. Misra to a very ticklish---nay even "controversial" issue!

Many thanks to both of you for the same.

<Have you taken a look at Jain astronomy texts (Surya Prajnapti, Jambudwipa Prajnapti and others) and Buddhist astronomy text Shardulakaranavadana (part of Ashokavadana)? I believe that these texts bridge the gap between Vedanga Jyotisha and siddhanta texts. Astronomy in Jain texts is similar to Vedanga Jyotisha even in the 2nd-4th century BCE. >

No, I have not read the Jain astronomy texts directly but have gone through some blogs and articles about them.  And they confirm what you have said in a nutshell, "Astronomy in Jain texts is similar to Vedanga Jyotisha even in the 2nd-4th century BCE".

In the Panchasiddhantika (of 505 CE)  of Varahamihira, we find that Pitamaha Siddhanta more or less towed to a great extent the same line as that of the VJ whereas Vasishtha siddhanta is a bit different though!

Paulsiha and Romaka are Greek siddhantas as their names indicate which singles out the Surya Siddhanta as the only "स्पष्टतरः" siddhanta, especially since  we find Mesha etc. Rashis for the first time in that Siddhanta out of all the five siddhantas!

There were no Mesha, Vrisha etc. Rashis prior to that siddhanta in any astronomical work, which confirms the stand that these Rashis came to India much later---maybe early centuries of CE---much after the VJ or the Atharva Jyotisha or even Atharva-Veda Parishshishta etc. 

Regarding "Buddhist astronomy" someone had suggested a book titled "Dasharatha Jatakam" which I found obnoxious, to say the least!  It was also quite off-putting about Buddhist astronomy!

Kindly do  continue giving your feedback!

With regards and Jai Shri Ram!

A K Kaul

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