Book Title: Contemporary Vedanta Philosophy 02
Author(s): George Burch
Publisher: George Burch

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Page 13
________________ 674 GEORGE BURCH called logic in contrast with first-level metaphysics and secondlevel dialectic. The abstract structure (exemplified in K. C. Bhattacharya's "grades of theoretic consciousness”) consists of four steps: (1) that which is first given, (2) that which is given later, (3) the reality of which both the preceding are appearances, (4) that reality considered in itself as transcending its appearances, that is, as absolute. Professor Murti's doctrine has it roots in Advaita Vedanta, Madhyamika Buddhism, and K. C. Bhattacharya's philosophy, but derives its form from his own original and comprehensive thought. It combines historical scholarship and metaphysical speculation in a fertile union where each guides and enriches the other 4. P. J. Chaudhury. The first phase of K. C. Bhattacharya's philosophy is being developed by P. J. Chaudhury. His philosophy is more conservative than that of Kalidas Bhattacharya or Murti in that it is closer to classical Vedanta, while it is more original than theirs in that it is less closely connected with K. C. Bhattacharya's. Chaudhury took the concept of planes of reality from K. C. Bhattacharya and made it the basis of his own philosophy, but in its details his doctrine has little in common with that of his teacher." Pravas Jivan Chaudhury, a Bengali Brahmin, was born at Howrah near Calcutta in 1916. His mother was K. C. Bhattacharya's sister. As a child he was interested in Rabindranath Tagore's philosophy—that we should enjoy the world in a disinterested way, for it is God who enjoys it through us. In college he became a physicist. After studying at Agra, Patna, and Calcutta, he taught physics at Shillong in Assam two years and at Visvabharati University (which developed from Tagore's ashram) five years, received a P. R. Scholarship and his Ph.D. at Calcutta, and later devoted two years to research in aesthetics. Meanwhile no conflict, it is not philosophy at all, and it does not lead to another alternative form of the absolute. 56 Chaudhury was not influenced by the later phases of K. C. Bhattacharya's philosophy, and does not accept the doctrine of alternative absolutes.

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