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370 Anekāntavāda and Syādvāda
‘man in the lift'. Suppose that the man is in the lift with an apple in his hand and that the support breaks and down goes the man with ever-increasing velocity, falling freely. The man now tries to drop the apple held in the hand. The apple cannot fall more than it was doing already. It should be remembered that all the things contained in the lift are falling along with the lift. Consequently the apple remains poised by his hand. So he would think; but the observer outside the lift would regard the falling of the apple due to the law of gravity. Thus for the man in the lift is that apples do not fall'. The Newtonian Law of gravitation is altogether absent in his scheme of laws of Nature. It should be borne in mind that Einstein accepts that law of gravitation for the observer outside here for the sake of illustration only.
The difference in weights of the object and in views with regard to Natural Laws in the above illustrations judgements which are nonetheless true if we only bear in mind the stand point from which they are made. A certain thing may be large in comparison with some subject say X, but it is small with regard to another say Y. Thus the same thing is said to be large and small but in compariosn with different objects X and Y. Largeness and smallness of a thing is thus relative to the points of view adopted.
Eddington says, “I think we often make a distinction between what is true and what is really true. A statement which does not profess to deal with anything except appearances may be true, a statement which is not only true but deals with the realities beneath the appearances is really true.28
Einstein even challenged the measurements and the length of classical dynamics. The lengths (distance between points in rigid bodies) usually measured in classical dynamics by a rod not independent of the system of co-ordinates adopted according to Einstein's view. Einstein showed that the change of directions makes for the difference in lengths. Thus lengths are relatively true in their own systems. The same is true of the movement relatively to the vast distances, it proceeds very slowly in the universe.
Thus the weights, lengths, motion are all relative to the points of view from which they are seen. None of them is absolute, i.e., cannot be regarded in the same way in different systems. Time, space, causation, motion, duration, mass, force, etc., are all relative and have
28. 'The Nature of the Physical World', p. 43.
| SR No. | 002012 |
| Book Title | Facets of Jain Philosophy Religion and Culture |
| Original Sutra Author | N/A |
| Author | Shreechand Rampuriya, Ashwini Kumar, T M Dak, Anil Dutt Mishra |
| Publisher | Jain Vishva Bharati |
| Publication Year | 1996 |
| Total Pages | 400 |
| Language | English |
| Classification | Book_English, Philosophy, Religion, & Nyay |
| File Size | 23 MB |