Part 50 (1/2)

movement which is within the purview of sense-cognition [Footnote ref 1].

The production of knowledge is thus no transcendental occurrence, but is one which is similar to the effects produced by the conglomeration and movements of physical causes. When I perceive an orange, my visual or the tactual sense is in touch not only with its specific colour, or hardness, but also with the universals a.s.sociated with them in a relation of inherence and also with the object itself of which the colour etc. are predicated. The result of this sense-contact at the first stage is called _alocanajnana_ (sense-cognition) and as a result of that there is roused the memory of its previous taste and a sense of pleasurable character ([email protected]_) and as a result of that I perceive the orange before me to have a certain pleasure-giving character [Footnote ref 2]. It is urged that this appreciation of the orange as a pleasurable object should also be regarded as a direct result of perception through the action of the memory operating as a concomitant cause (sahakari). I perceive the orange with the eye and understand the pleasure it will give, by the mind, and thereupon understand by the mind that it is a pleasurable object. So though this perception results immediately by the operation of the mind, yet since it could only happen in a.s.sociation with sense-contact, it must be considered as a subsidiary effect of sense-contact and hence regarded as visual perception. Whatever may be the successive intermediary processes, if the knowledge is a result of sense-contact and if it appertains to the object with which the sense is in contact, we should regard it as a result of the perceptual process.

Sense-contact with the object is thus the primary and indispensable condition of all perceptions and not only can the senses be in contact with the objects, their qualities, and the universals a.s.sociated with them but also with negation. A perception is erroneous when it presents an object in a character which it does not possess ([email protected]_) and right knowledge (_prama_) is that which presents an object with a character which it really has

[Footnote 1:

_Na khalvatindriya s'aktirasmabhirupagamyate yaya saha na karyyasya [email protected]

Nyayamanjari_, p. 69.]

[Footnote 2:

_Sukhadi manasa buddhva kapitthadi ca [email protected]@sa tasya karanata tatra manasaivavagamyate...

...[email protected] [email protected]@sajam jnanam tadupadeyadijnanaphalamiti [email protected]@rtas'cetasi sthitam sukhasadhanatvajnanamupadeyajnanam.

_Nyayamanjari_, pp. 69-70; see also pp. 66-71.]

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(_tadvati tatprakarakanubhava_) [Footnote ref 1]. In all cases of perceptual illusion the sense is in real contact with the right object, but it is only on account of the presence of certain other conditions that it is a.s.sociated with wrong characteristics or misapprehended as a different object. Thus when the sun's rays are perceived in a desert and misapprehended as a stream, at the first indeterminate stage the visual sense is in real contact with the rays and thus far there is no illusion so far as the contact with a real object is concerned, but at the second determinate stage it is owing to the similarity of certain of its characteristics with those of a stream that it is misapprehended as a stream [Footnote ref 2]. Jayanta observes that on account of the presence of the defect of the organs or the rousing of the memory of similar objects, the object with which the sense is in contact hides its own characteristics and appears with the characteristics of other objects and this is what is meant by illusion [Footnote ref 3]. In the case of mental delusions however there is no sense-contact with any object and the rousing of irrelevant memories is sufficient to produce illusory notions [Footnote ref 4]. This doctrine of illusion is known as _viparitakhyati_ or _anyathakhyati._ What existed in the mind appeared as the object before us ([email protected] parisphurato'rthasya bahiravabhasanam_) [Footnote ref 5]. Later [email protected] as interpreted by Pras'astapada and S'ridhara is in full agreement with Nyaya in this doctrine of illusion (_bhrama_ or as [email protected] calls it _viparyaya_) that the object of illusion is always the right thing with which the sense is in contact and that the illusion consists in the imposition of wrong characteristics [Footnote ref 6].

I have pointed out above that Nyaya divided perception into two cla.s.ses as nirvikalpa (indeterminate) and savikalpa (determinate) according as it is an earlier or a later stage. Vacaspati says, that at the first stage perception reveals an object as a particular; the perception of an orange at this _avikalpika_ or _nirvikalpika_ stage gives us indeed all its colour, form, and also the universal of orangeness a.s.sociated with it, but it does not reveal

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[Footnote 1: See Udyotakara's _Nyayavarttika_, p. 37, and [email protected]'a's [email protected],_ p. 401, _Bibliotheca Indica_.]

[Footnote 2: ”[email protected] maricin uccavacamuccalato nirvikalpena [email protected] [email protected] viparyyeti, savikalpako'sya pratyayo bhranto jayate tasmadvijnanasya uvabhicaro narthasya,_ Vacaspati's _Tatparyatika_,” p. 87.]

[Footnote 3: _Nyayamanjari,_ p. 88.]

[Footnote 4: _Ibid._ pp. 89 and 184.]

[Footnote 5: _Ibid._ p. 184.]

[Footnote 6: _Nyayakandali,_ pp. 177-181, ”[email protected]@na [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]'yamanurundhata [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]@h._”]

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it in a subject-predicate relation as when I say ”this is an orange.”

The avikalpika stage thus reveals the universal a.s.sociated with the particular, but as there is no a.s.sociation of name at this stage, the universal and the particular are taken in one sweep and not as terms of relation as subject and predicate or substance and attribute (_jatyadisvarupavagahi na tu [email protected] mitho [email protected]@[email protected] yavat_) [Footnote ref 1]. He thinks that such a stage, when the object is only seen but not a.s.sociated with name or a subject-predicate relation, can be distinguished in perception not only in the case of infants or dumb persons that do not know the names of things, but also in the case of all ordinary persons, for the a.s.sociation of the names and relations could be distinguished as occurring at a succeeding stage [Footnote ref 2].

S'ridhara, in explaining the [email protected] view, seems to be largely in agreement with the above view of Vacaspati. Thus S'ridhara says that in the nirvikalpa stage not only the universals were perceived but the differences as well. But as at this stage there is no memory of other things, there is no manifest differentiation and unification such as can only result by comparison. But the differences and the universals as they are in the thing are perceived, only they are not consciously ordered as ”different from this” or ”similar to this,”

which can only take place at the savikalpa stage [Footnote ref 3].

Vacaspati did not bring in the question of comparison with others, but had only spoken of the determinate notion of the thing in definite subject-predicate relation in a.s.sociation with names. The later Nyaya writers however, following [email protected]'a, hold an altogether different opinion on the subject. With them nirvikalpa knowledge means the knowledge of mere predication without any a.s.sociation with the subject or the thing to which the predicate refers.

But such a knowledge is never testified by experience. The nirvikalpa stage is thus a logical stage in the development of perceptual cognition and not a psychological stage. They would