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APPENDIX I
ESSENTIALS OF DHARMAKIRTI'S THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE
(BASED ON THE PRAMĀŅA VĀRTTIKA)
Dharmakirti (c. 550-600 A.D.) is a brilliant Buddhist logician. In this article we shall study his views regarding the main problems pertaining to his theory of knowledge.
While discussing what constitutes the object of perception, Dharmakirti considers a prima fácie view. To put it in simple language, this view maintains that the object of perception is a physical aggregate which is something over and above the individual atoms that constitute it'. As against this view, Dharmakirti submits that the object of perception are these atoms themselves, which as a result of combining with one another develop the capacity to become visible instead of remaining invisible - his point being that a physical aggregate is nothing over and above its constituent atoms2. In reply to a query of Dharmakirti the opponent suggests that a variegated colour-patch which is something over and above its constituent colours is a case of an aggregate standing over and above its constituent elements. Dharmakirti refuses to agree and argues that a variegated colour-patch too is nothing over and above its constituent colours. At this stage the opponent raises a point which gives an altogether new turn to the controversy; for he says that if a variegated colour-patch is not something unitary then our cognition of this colour-patch too cannot be something unitary (and it goes without saying that a piece of cognition is something unitary)". Dharmakirti meets the point by urging that there is something essentially enigmatic about a thing becoming an object of cognition inasmuch as this thing exists outwards while cognition is something oriented inwards. His concluding argument is that since we know one object as different from another on the basis of our cognition of these objects and since our cognition of an object is something essentially
