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On Kant's Treatment of the Ontological Argument 1 P HILOSOPHICAL P APERS J O U R N A L O F THE D EPARTMENT OF P HILOSOPHY ISSN: - 0976 – 4496 V o l u m e - VII I M a r c h - 2011 DEPARTMENT OF PHILOSOPHY U NIVERSITY OF N O R T H B ENGAL D ARJEELING , W E S T B ENGAL - 734013, I NDIA 2 SERIES EDITORS Dr. Debika Saha, Associate Prof. and Head, Dept. of Philosophy, University of North Bengal (Editor-in-Chief) Dr. Laxmikanta Padhi, Assistant Prof. Dept. of Philosophy, University of North Bengal (Co-Editor) E DITORIAL BOARD Prof. Kalyan Kumar Bagchi, Dept. of Philosophy and Religion, Viswabharati University Prof. D. N. Tewari, Dept. of Philosophy and Religion, Banaras Hindu University Prof. Amitabha Dasgupta, Dept. of Philosophy, Central University of Hyderabad Prof. Subirranjan Bhattacharya, Dept. of Philosophy, University of Calcutta Prof. Indrani Sanyal, Dept. of Philosophy, Jadavpur University Prof. Shibnath Sharma, (Retd.) Dept. of Philosophy, Guwahati University Prof. P.R. Bhatt, School of Humanities, IIT, Mumbai. Prof. Kumar Mitra, Dept. of Philosophy, Rabindra Bharati University Dr. Nirmalya Narayan Chakrabarty, Dept. of Philosophy, Rabindra Bharati University Prof. Raghunath Ghosh, Dept. of Philosophy, University of North Bengal Prof. Kantilal Das, Dept. of Philosophy, University of North Bengal Dr. Jyotish Chandra Basak, Dept. of Philosophy, University of North Bengal Dr. Koushik Joardar, Dept. of Philosophy, University of North Bengal Dr. Nirmal Kumar Roy, Dept. of Philosophy, University of North Bengal Dr. Anirban Mukherjee, Dept. of Philosophy, University of North Bengal Mr. N. Ramthing, Dept. of Philosophy, University of North Bengal 3 C ONTENTS Subirranjan Bhattacharya: on Kant’s Treatment of the Ontological Argument … 1 - 9 Raghunath Ghosh: The Concept of Social Justice in the Śrutis and Dharmaśāstras ….10 -16 Manjulika Ghosh: Rituals and Performatives …. 17- 22 Kanti Lal Das: Moral Universalizability: A Kantian Approach …. 23 - 35 Jyotish Chandra Basak: Ethical Issues about Voluntary Euthanasia ….36 - 47 Nirmal Kumar Roy: Is Tarka Pramān a or an Accessory to a Pramān a?: Some Observations ….48 -62 Bimal Chandra Pal: The Value of life in Radhakrishnan’s Philosophy …. 63-68 Sanghamitra Dasgupta: Environmental Concern and Rabindranath Tagore: …69-73 Some Reflections Koushik Joardar: ‘Truth and truths’: Experiments Gandhi Made ….74 - 83 Laxmikanta Padhi: The Moral Status of Animals … 84 -95 Sutapa Ray: Rorty’s Sociology of Knowledge ….96 – 109 Surya Kanta Maharana : Metaphysics of Consciousness in Samkara’s Advaita …110-119 Hasen Ali Ahemed: A Reflection on Wittgenstein’s Therapeutic Philosophy …. 120 - 126 Purbayan Jha : Art and Music in Language-game: Private Language Problem Revisited …. 127 -131 Sudip Goswami: Meaning And Music: Some Reflections …. 132 -135 Book Review .... 136 -142 Our Contributors Notes to the Contributors Our Publications 4 E D I T O R I A L N OTE We are obliged to the members of the editorial board for painstakingly correcting the drafts of the contributors. We are thankful to our esteemed colleague, Prof. Raghunath Ghosh, the academic coordinator of our SAP (DRS-II) programme of UGC for his support and suggestions. Our other colleagues Prof. Kantilal Das, Dr. Koushik Joardar, Dr. Anirban Mukherjee, Dr. Nirmal Kumar Roy and Mr. N. Ramthing in the department have earnestly supported us in bringing out this volume, for which we are thankful to them. Thanks to the University Grants Commission, our Honourable Vice-Chancellor, Development Officer and Finance Officer for providing and helping us with the financial grant. Our sincere thank goes to the University Press, for publishing this volume. There are three classical arguments for the existence of God, namely, the ontological, the cosmological and the physico-theological (teleological). The ontological proof argues for the necessary existence of a supremely perfect being solely through its concepts. Subirranjan Bhattacharya considers Kant’s treatment of the ontological argument and divides his arguments into four sections. In the first section, a brief formulation of the ontological argument as given by St. Anselm and Descartes has been stated. In the second section, he explained the arguments offered by Kant against the ontological argument. In the third section, he intends to consider one of the objections of Shaffer against Kant’s view and show that this objection is due to complete misunderstanding of Kant. And in the concluding section, he makes a few elucidations on the connection between Kant’s theory of knowledge and his critique of the ontological argument. The concept of social justice generally refers to the idea of creating a society or institution that is based on the principles of equality and solidarity, that understands and values human rights, and that recognizes the dignity of every human being. There is a wide acceptance that social structure from Indian perspective is ridden with castes and communities, and that this has led to barriers and segregation and condemnation of obnoxious vice of social inequalities and untouchability. Raghunath Ghosh uses the term ‘justice’ alone that can convey the desired meaning as a social being alone can do justice. However, ‘justice’ for him is always a social phenomenon and hence, there cannot be ‘justice’ which is social. ‘Justice’ in the above-mentioned sense is frequently found in different philosophical literature available in ancient Indian tradition starting from the Vedas, Upanis ads and Śrutis to the Pitakas of Buddhism. Ritual is understood as the routine of worship. However, outside the domain of religion any formalized social interaction may be characterized as ritual. In recent years there has been a spate of literature, written mainly by anthropologists, relating rituals to performative utterances conceived and so-called by the English philosopher, J.L.Austin. Manjulika Ghosh attempts to link up Austin’s concept of performatives to understand ritual acts. For that purpose, she divided her discussions into three sections. In the first section, she defines the concept of ritual. In the second, she has outlined the nature of performative utterances. In the last section she tried to make a link between rituals and 5 performatives. She concludes: the great insight of the speech act theory and its relevance for rituals is that it brings back language to the collective scene of human community. An objective basis for morality can be found in an evolutionary account of its origin and development. Morality is a key factor in the success of human groups whether in competition or in co-existence with each other. One of Kant’s formulations of moral theories, say for example, is the ‘Categorical Imperative.’ It is commonly known as the ‘Formula of Humanity.’ It commands us to “Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in any other person, always at the same time as an end, never merely as a means.” In recent years, this moral principle has become extremely popular not only among the self-proclaimed Kantians but also among those who are unwilling to accept Kant’s moral theory. It is popular among contemporary Kantians because the content of its command promises to enrich a theory commonly associated with formalistic rationality. It is popular among the non-Kantians because of the values that float in uncertainty of this command are values that vibrate with us when we must make life-altering decisions about medical treatment, personal interactions, and social policy. Kantilal Das critically explores in what sense and how far Kantian moral theory is claimed to be universalizable, although contested. It is a fact that death is an important feature of human experience. Yet, while the event of death is purely beyond human control, the process of dying has increasingly been brought into the domain of medication and life-extending technologies. The decision to use life- extending technologies is a moral choice, because it involves a decision about a fundamental human good, the preservation and intrinsic/inherent value of life. Yet, in some circumstances, to choose for a technology to stave off death comes at the price of compromising another fundamental human value, i.e. the quality of that life. Decisions about continuing treatment for the dying, or of allowing death to take place by foregoing or terminating such treatment, or even by physician-assisted suicide or euthanasia, are thus, both existentially and ethically agonizing. Jyotish Chandra Basak makes an effort to trace the origin of the controversy that takes us back from the ancient Greeks like Pythagoras, Plato and Aristotle to the contemporary period. He tries to say that if voluntary euthanasia were accepted as a legitimate form of medical assistance in dying, then it must be acceptable for noncompetent patients. By legalizing voluntary active euthanasia, one must bite the bullet and also accept nonvoluntary active euthanasia or must concede that if nonvoluntary active euthanasia is regarded as too dangerous or unpalatable, then this is a valid and cogent reason for rejection of voluntary active euthanasia as well. The Naiyāyikas unanimously accept that tarka is not an independent instrument of knowledge; rather it is just a condition for it. That is why for the Naiyāyikas, tarka itself is not a pramān a but a promoter to a pramān a. Sometimes tarka plays the role of a promoter to a pramān a and it does not establish that tarka can not be an independent pramān a itself. Nirmal Kumar Roy attempts to deal with the view of Jayatirtha regarding the nature and role of tarka. Especially he focuses on the probable answer that may be put forward from the part of the Nyāya school against the position of Jayatirtha in particular and that of the Mādhvas’ school in general. In his concluding remarks, he 6 mentioned that how tarka helps in eliminating the impediment and thereby becomes an auxiliary factor to an accredited organ of knowledge.
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