Jaganmohanlal Pandita Sadhuwad Granth

Author(s): Sudarshanlal Jain
Publisher: Jaganmohanlal Shastri Sadhuwad Samiti Jabalpur

Page 196

Eastern and Western Philosophical Approaches
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I turn now to another characteristic of Western epistemology as it has evolved in the modern period especially, and that is the emphasis on sense knowledge or knowing through the senses. Empiricism is an inevitable concomitant of epistemological dualism. For if the known and knower are separate, the only way it can be known is through the senses. The object, existing separately from us, is inert and is an entity which we see, touch, smell, etc. What this means is that all we can know about the known is what is externally verifiable about it. The known can be known only in terms of its external attributes, characteristics or form. We cannot know it in terms of its essence or that which transcends or underpins the attributes. Indeed, from an empiricist's perspective, there is no essence; the known has no "isness". The known is characterized by and is known only in terms of its attributes. Thus all a thing is in its attributes.
This leads one back again to the suggestion that we have still another reinforcement for the utilitarian-exploitation view or attitude toward reality or nature. Its components have no essence either to be violated or to be respected and considered inviolable. Whatever exists, exists as an object, known externally or in terms of its attributes and subject to the will and usefulness of the knower.
Another characteristic of the Western epistemological tradition is its emphasis upon reason or rationalism. We must, however, define rationalism or indicate what we are referring to when we talk about Western rationalism.
If we define rationalism as analysis, then analysis is the process of breaking up reality or dividing it into parts in order to understand and thus better manage, use or manipulate it. In that case not only is the purpose of knowing morally questionable, the method is a dubious one since it assumes that the nature of reality is not distorted or violated as it is broken down into parts to be analyzed.
If reasoning is the inductive process of going from the particular to the universal or inferring from particulars to universals, we are no further ahead because the nature of the universal is determined by the nature of what it started with, namely the particulars; or the rational process is limited by its starting point, the observed particular or the particular as known through the senses; or the universal one ends with is an artificial construct since it is an assemblage of observed particulars.
Thirdly, if rationalism or reasoning is the process of drawing conclusions from premises, we are in a circulatory bind because the content of the premises is derived from empirical observation, or it consists of data gotten through the senses. Finally, we may conceive of reasoning or logical thinking as the determining of the consistencies or inconsistencies between things or between assertions. In that case, however, all we can know is consistency or inconsistency-reasoning does not help us to know thing-in-itself, to use Kant's terminology.