THESIS, ANTITHESIS, SYNTHESIS
Knowledge, Belief, and the Long Argument over India's Past
Arnab Gupta

BOOK-CLUB DISCUSSION GUIDE

1. What counts as knowledge in the cases the book examines? Which standards change, and which distinctions remain useful?

2. Can a story and a calculation explain the same event while doing different kinds of work? Where does coexistence become a conflict?

3. How does the ritual setting of an altar-construction problem affect your understanding of the mathematical procedure?

4. What evidence would establish continuity or influence between two traditions? Why is resemblance insufficient on its own?

5. What changes when a text or calculation is translated? Who decides which differences matter?

6. Why are claims that ancient traditions anticipated modern physics attractive? What might those claims conceal about both traditions?

7. What work can metaphor do that an experiment cannot? What can an experiment establish that a metaphor cannot?

8. After reading the book, what would 'wonder without credulity' mean in practice?

These are discussion prompts prepared for readers; they are not quotations from the book.