Jaina Perspective in Philosophy and Religion

Author(s): Ramjee Singh
Publisher: Parshwanath Shodhpith Varanasi

Page 38

Chapter Three
FROM NESCIENCE TO OMNISCIENCE
(1) Soul: The Basis of Science, Nescience & Omniscience
By overthrowing rational psychology in his 'Critique of Pure Reason', Kant has disproved the very existence of the soul and thereby the doctrines of the immortality and simplicity of it. But what he lost in the 'Critique of Pure Reason', he regained them in the 'Critique of Practical Reason'. Lord Mahavira presenting the Purva-pakşa in the Viseṣavaśyaka bhaṣya comes to the conclusion that the soul does not exist, but in the Uttar-paksa, refutes all the arguments of the opponents and successfully establishes the existence of the soul. Eminent psychologists of today have been finding themselves helpless to do away with the hypothesis of the soul. "Modern man (is also ) in the search of a soul."3 "The reality of self is obvious to the Introspectionist as the reality of the organism is to the Behaviourists."4 James supports it and his pupil, Calkins comes out strongly for a 'psychology of selves'. Stern, Dilthy, Spranger and Allport have been endeavouring to build up a 'science of personality'. The theory of soul holds that the principle of consciousness must be a substantial entity, psychic phenomena are activities, and the activity is possible unless there exists an agent. Therefore William James regards its admittance 'to be the line of least logical resistance'. Calkins holds that the self, far from being a metaphysical concept, is an ever present fact of immediate experience and fully worthy to be
1. On paralogism of Reason in the transcendental dialectic. 2. Gatha: 1552 (Yaśovijaya Granthamālā No. 1). 3. Jung's Modern Man in Search of a Soul, Kegan Paul. 4. Woodworth, R. S.: Contemporary Schools of Psychology, pp. 241-242.