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difficulty in this, as they point out that some individuals different from one another are found to possess identical causal efficiency and on this ground they may have a common name and common concept. Doubt has been expressed, however, regarding identical causal efficiency in different individuals. But, the Buddhists are not silenced. They say that though the activity of individuals varies and its cognitions are not identical, still one can speak of the possibility of an identical reference that cannot be ruled out. The cognitions of individuals may vary but the determinate judgement coming in their wake may make reference to an identity.
It is on this service of the determinate judgement that Jayanta joins issue. And, he does not hesitate to brand it as a dogmatic assertion of the Buddhists. Jayanta argues that all conceptual cognitions are distinct and if the content is not distinct from the conceptual cognitions it should be different with different cognitions and cannot be identical, with the consequence that a synthetic reference of such cognitions is a hoax. The identity of content of all conceptual cognitions is the ground of synthesis. And, the content being distinct from the different cognitions it must be of the nature of the objective Universal only with a different nomenclature. As it has been already mentioned, this and other objections advanced by Jayanta were so forceful that Ratnakırti had to review the position of his predecessors, particularly Śântarakṣita and reinstate the theory of Dinnaga.
