Contemporary Vedanta Philosophy 01

SR No.: 269348
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: George Burch
Publisher: George Burch
Total Pages: 20
Language: English
Classification: Article
File Size: 2 MB

Page 8

492
GEORGE BURCH
judgments and literally thinkable.” Fact is expressible as a judgment which has no reference to its being spoken, yet it is nowise independent of its being known, for it is believed not as self-evident or self-subsistent but as essentially knowable, though perhaps actually unknown. For science the object is knowable as of right, not only knowable but also usable, and it is this wrong spiritual attitude of science toward the object which provokes a philosophy which goes beyond science. (2) The content of pure objective thought (contemplative consciousness without necessary reference to perception) is the self-subsistent object. The self-subsistent object is speakable literally, not spoken of but spoken as meant. It is constituted by being spoken, and so always has reference to the subject, and is not, like fact, literally expressible in an independent judgment. Not being restricted by perception, however, it is not necessarily knowable, and so is self-subsistent, not dependent on any individual mind but selfevident. The philosophy of the object includes logic, the study of the form of the self-subsistent object (which is also the form of fact), and metaphysics, which is the study of the object in reference to the subject. (3) The content of spiritual thought (enjoying consciousness or introspection) is reality. Reality is speakable literally, spoken not as meant but as symbolized. It cannot be understood literally, but the objectively contemplated meaning symbolizes a subjectively enjoyed content, the subject I, spoken as though it were object but understood as the speaking subject. The subject I is enjoyed either psychologically as embodied, morally as related to other selves, or religiously in communion with the over-personal self. But religious experience is infinitely varied, and systematizes itself in alternative religious systems, which in turn are expressed in alternative systems of psychology, metaphysics, and logic. There is consequently indefinite scope for differences in philosophical theory. Philosophy can never progress toward a unanimously acceptable solution, but is a systematic symbolism which necessarily admits of alternatives. (4) The content of trancendental thought (in which both objective and subjective attitudes are rejected) is truth. Truth is speakable,"
11 He has no place in his theory of knowledge for the ineffable, taking the plausible position that everything we speak is speakable.