Nyaya Theory of Knowledge

SR No.: 011115
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: S C Chateerjee
Publisher: University of Calcutta
Publication Year: 1939
Total Pages: 440
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 38 MB

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NYAYA THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE
knowledge is liable to contradiction. Hence we are to say that invalidity belongs to knowledge at its inception and its validity is due to the negation of invalidity by external conditions. In fact, the question of truth and falsity does not arise so long as we are concerned with mere belief. We may know things and believe in them without knowing whether the belief is true or false. The question of the validity of knowledge arises first when a certain belief is contradicted and we apprehend its invalidity. Hence in logic we must start with the invalidity of knowledge.
From a sceptical or rather critical standpoint, the Buddhists take all knowledge as intrinsically invalid and treat validity as an extrinsic character which knowledge comes to have by way of conative verification (pravrttisämarthya) According to them, the truth of knowledge is constituted by successful activity. Hence it follows that prior to successful activity, knowledge is not-true. When any knowledge leads to successful activity we know that it is not not-true, 1.e. it is true. So the Buddhists give a negative definition of truth as what is not false (avisamvādakam) and conclude that falsity is intrinsic and truth extrinsic to knowledge.
1
The Naiyayikas reject the Bauddha view of intrinsic invalidity on the ground that it cannot account for unsuccessful practical activity (pravrttivisamvāda). If the invalidity of knowledge be self-evident, why should a man run after the false, knowing that it is false. Hence there cannot be any practical reaction in connection with illusion. Again, if the invalidity of knowledge be due to defects in the conditions of knowledge and be known through contradiction, it cannot be held that it is intrinsically conditioned and self-evident That invalidity is due to certain extra conditions (kāranadosa) must needs be admitted. Invalidity is not merely the absence of validity, but a positive character 1 NBT, pp 3 f