Comparative Study of Indian Science

Author(s): Harisatya Bhattacharya
Publisher: C S Mallinath

Page 13

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Yoga-Sutras. Sankara Misra, the Vaiseshika scholar, described Samsaya, Biparyaya, Svapna and Anadhyavasaya as the four modes of Avidya or false knowledge. The Jaina philosophers refuse to regard Svapna or Dream as a form of false knowledge and hold that Samaropa is of three modes only viz, Biparyaya Samsaya and Anadhyavasaya.
(a) Biparyaya" is a false idea of a thing owing to our attending to one aspect of it only." The example is, we often take an oyster-shcil for a piece of silver. The cause of this form of false knowledge is that we fail to consider at the time the characteristics which distinguish a shell from silver and fix upon whiteness which quality the shell has in common with a piece of silver.
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The philosophers of the school of Prabhakara 'refuse to look upon Biparyaya as a form of false Knowledge. According to them, the Illusion,- this is Silver-contains an element of Perception ('this') and an element of Recollection ('Silver'),-the correctness of none of which can be challenged. Hence, Biparyaya or the psychosis This is silver' is not a case of false knowledge but a case of 'Bhedakhyati' i.c., failure to distinguish two distinct mental elements and our proneness to mix up the elements of Perception and Recollection in one single psychosis. The Jaina
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