It is very unlikely that the Buddhist concept "su~n~na" forms the basis
for the concept of zero. Ancient Indians exploited "zero" in their
grammatical literature quite extensively. Panini defines several
"zero-affixes" so that he can derive words which require stem
modifications in the absence of a suffix. His treatment presumes that the
concept is not new. Most accept that Panini preceded the Buddha, in part
because the *Asthadhyayi* makes no reference to him.
This often gets overlooked by historians of math, probably because
Panini's "lopa" is not actually a number. It is an "empty suffix" which
serves as a place holder and marks stems for further operations, e.g. for
the lengthening of the initial vowel. In this respect it mirrors the most
important feature of the mathematical concept zero.
best,
Tim Cahill
--------------------------------------------------------------------
su~n~na means empty or void. It is interesting to point out that the
Indians were probably first to grasp the concept of zero, and likely
due to this concept of su~n~na. It takes the rest of humankind much
longer to 'count' zero as a number. In fact, according to historians,
the Arab numeral 0 comes from India.