Wk 05 Wed, Feb 3
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1 Today - Nyāya
VSI Chapter 5 on Nyāya Dasti’s “Nyāya’s Self as Agent and Knower,” Chapter 5, FWASIP, Dasti & Bryant, eds. 2014.
Monday Wk06
Khilnani, Sunil. 2016. "The Buddha: Waking India Up." In Incarnations: A History of India in Fifty Lives, 9-15 Ch. 3 on Buddha’s Middle Way in Hamilton’s IP: VSI Asaf Federman, 2010. "What Kind of Free Will Did the Buddha Teach?" Philosophy East and West 60 (1): 1-19. OPTIONAL: Luis O. Gómez, 1975. "Some Aspects of the Free-Will Question in the Nikāyas." Philosophy East and West 25 (1): 81-90. Karin Meyers on “Free Persons, Empty Selves,” Chapter 2, FWASIP, Dasti & Bryant, eds. 2014.
2 WOTD
• Inhere ← Inherence Miles
• Volition Sai, Dhruv • Cikīrṣā, intention, lit.
desire to do Dhandeep
6 Schools (darśanas) of ‘Hindu’ Philosophy
1. Sāṅkhya, Dualistic Discrimination – 900 BCE – 1000 CE 2. Yoga, translation? – 200 BCE → 3. Nyāya, Logic & Empiricism ✓ – ~250 CE → 4. Vaiśeṣika, Atomism, Particularism ✓ – 200 BCE – 1 CE, 550 – 1000 CE
5. Mīmāṃsā, Vedic Exegesis – 200 BCE – 700 CE 6. Vedānta, Upaniṣads – ‘Later’ Vedic Exegesis – 200 BCE →
3 Hamilton on Nyāya, Dasti on “Nyāya’s Self as Agent and Knower”
Some Terms
pramāṇa – means of valid knowledge –Nyāya: 1. Perception: sense, yogic / intuitive 2. Inference 3. Comparison / Analogy, upamāna 4. Testimony Dharma – 2 meanings 1. Merit 2. Property
Conative (Dasti 120), drive to act
Simpliciter (Dasti 123), Latin for “simply, by itself, unqualified”
4 25 tattvas, ontological principles puruṣa / ātman -#1 prakṛti -#2 – originating, mūla prakṛti . 3 qualities – sattva, goodness / intelligence / subjectivity – rajas, energy / passion / motion & agency – tamas, inertia / objective or determinate aspect – buddhi / mahat, intellect - #3 – ahaṃkāra, egoity - #4 khya – manas, mind - #5 – 5 sense capacities - #6-10 āṅ . hearing, touching, seeing, tasting, smelling S – 5 action capacities - #11-15 . speaking, grasping, movement, excreting, procreation – 5 subtle elements - #16-20 . sound, contact, form, taste, smell Structure of Reality – 5 gross elements - #21-25 . space, wind, fire, water, earth
Nyāya–Vaiśeṣika Pluralistic Realism
7 Categories, padārtha, “predicated by the word (72)”: 1. substance, dravya [atomic, eternal] . earth, water, light, air; [material (4)] . ether, time, space, ātmā, manas [immaterial (5)] 2. quality, guṇa . Color, taste, odor, touch, sound, number, magnitude, separateness, conjunction, disjunction, remoteness, proximity, weight, fluidity, viscidity, cognition (buddhi), pleasure, pain, desire, dislike, volition (prayatna), dharma, adharma, saṃskāra (24) 3. action, karma . (5: upward, downward, contraction, expansion, motion) 4. generality/universality, sāmānya (2: comprehensive, less comp.) 5. particularity, viśeṣa (infinite) 6. inherence, samavāya 7. absence, abhāva (4)
5 Substance – Quality
odor taste color touch sound
earthxxxx
waterxxx
fire/light x x
air x
ākāśa, ether x
Goal of Nyāya
Enquiry undertaken if: – Doubt / uncertainty exists. – Possibility of certain outcome. – Contributes to highest good, liberation. Not for idle curiosity, ‘aimlessness’ Grounded in reality, existential, experiential
? Focus on outcome? Attachment to result?
6 Logical Method
Properly formulated Nyāya inference has these components: 1. Thesis a. the ‘locus’ (pakṣa, p ) or place of the inference, b. a property (sādhya, S ) whose presence in the locus is to be inferred. 2. reason (hetu, H ), 3. example (dṛṣṭānta, d ) “The mountain (p ) has fire (S ), because it has smoke (H ); where there is smoke, there is fire; e.g. the kitchen (d ).”
Sound Argument
Must fulfil at least three criteria: 1. H must be present in p; 2. H and S must be appropriately related, roughly such that wherever H is present, so is S; 3. d must be an uncontroversial place where both H and S are present.
7 Objects of True Knowledge, prameya Only those whose knowledge leads to the attainment of the highest good (NS 1.1.9) – ātman – body, sense organs, sense objects – cognition buddhi, mind manas, action karman / pravṛtti – defects, endless series of birth and death, consequences phala, suffering, liberation (mokṣa / apavarga)
Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika’s Self
Non-material, eternal, all-pervading, non- composite, atomic Plural, associated with manas/manaḥ mind, atomic “directly engaged in the world (135).” Has Qualities, guṇa-s – Volition, prayatna / kṛti → Will 1. produced by merely being alive, sub-volitional 2. produced by desire, icchā & dislike, dveṣa – cognition, desire, dislike, pleasure, pain, dharma, adharma, saṃskāra . cognition for N-V = buddhi (= upalabdhi) = jñāna, knowledge / consciousness
8 Mokṣa in N-V
Arises from knowing the categories – nature of self, and distinction from body Freedom from: – all suffering –pain (same as pleasure? IP 81) – all constraints, including consciousness . ātman free from all qualities, guṇa – embodied existence, saṃsāra –agency
“…the self of liberation is in fact less than the self of ordinary life… (113-4)” v. “directly engaged in the world (135).”
Cognition, buddhi
Not a substance, because not eternal Not an action, because no spatial movement Therefore it is a quality – apprehended by only one sense, manas . not a quality of mind because only self knows – desire, dislike, pleasure, pain, activity all have same locus as cognition . not body, as body is material – Therefore, quality of the self
9 Agency, kartṛtva
An agent, kartṛ / kartā – a sentient being possessing: . volition prayatna, intention cikīrṣā, cognition jñāna – i.e., ātman – employs other direct participants, kāraka-s – is not employed by another as an instrument Goals, reasons, desires ≠ kāraka – internal motivation Also requires manas + body
Causal Chain leading to Action
Cognition (of some act as worthy of being performed) → – Outcome is desirable – Means of performing act are known, available Intention (cikīrṣā) → Volition (prayatna) → Bodily action (karman; ceṣṭā).
FWASIP 115-6
10 Unlike Sāṅkhya
Cognition, buddhi is a property of ātman Ātman also possesses other properties: –karma (dharma, adharma) –memory – desire & dislike –agency Properties change but ātmā doesn’t
Nyāya Argument #1, From Karma Rule: “Karmic results to be enjoyed by producer of karma” Sāṅkhya: – Self is enjoyer / experiencer – buddhi → action, volition, karmic merit
So what? –Nyāya to Sāṅkhya à la Kaufman? (Dasti 126)
11 Nyāya Argument #2 Buddhi & Cognition Nyāya argument: If buddhi has consciousness, prakṛti definition contradicted If ātman has consciousness but not cognition, how can ātman be conscious of buddhi’s cognition? Consciousness = ability to cognize, both must reside in same place – knower must be involved in knowing
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