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XXXIV
are said to survey objects from this standpoint. Next is the Samgraha Naya, or the collective viewpoint. Here are taken into consideration only the generic properties and the particular ones are ignored. For example, when you say 'Man' what is thereby understood is, not only the human kind but also the whole range of animal world. Man' is made to imply the generic property of being animate which is an attribute of man as well as of other animate beings. It is said that the Sankhya and the Advaita schools of the East and the pure materialists of the West explain the phenomenon of the Universe from this point of view. The third Naya is Vyavahara, ie, the practical. It is just the reverse of its predecessors. This is the method of considering only the specific or particular attributes. For instance, if one is asked to bring the vegetable (a) one cannot do so without the specification of particularity. It must be a mango, a nimba or some such particular variety. Another and perhaps a better illustration is given by the author of the Naya Karnikā. He says no wound, bruise or a scratch can possibly be healed by the application of the general quality of poulticeness or ointmentness. The (specific) healing properties alone are in specific poultices or ointments.' In other words Vyavahara Naya lays an undue emphasis on particular attributes losing sight of the general ones. The Charvakas of the East and the Positivists and the Pragmatists of the West are said to take their stand on this method of viewing objects. Fourth is the Rijusutra Naya. It is the attitude of looking at the thing without any reference to its past or future. It goes straight to the thing as it is at present. Those, looking at things in this way, say that neither the past nor the future serve any practical purpose and it is vain to ponder over it. A man may have been my son in former birth, but he is now born a prince, and is of no practical use to me now. An actor cannot perform the actual functions of the king.
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There are four ways (s) of knowing a thing. We may know it with reference to its name (a) or form