Karma Mimansa

Author(s): Berriedale Keith
Publisher: Berriedale Keith

Page 36

THE PROBLEM OF KNOWLEDGE
27
motion, while the generalities of these two can be perceived by a relationship of identity with that which is identical with that which is in conjunction.
A further technicality, also found in the Nyāya, is the discussion of the exact nature of the means of proof and its result. If the term Pramāna is understood as “means of proof," then perception denotes one or other of the contacts between object and organ, organ and mind', mind and soul, each of which is essential to the result (phala), in this case the mental percept. If, however, Pramāna denotes the cognition itself, then perception signifies the mental percept, and its result is the attitude of acceptance, rejection, or indifference of the subject to the object presented to him in the cognition,
Inference in the view of the Vrttikārai is the apprehension of a thing not before the subject, by reason of the perception of some other thing, between which and the first object we know an invariable connection to exist. The relation, according to Prabhākara, must be both general and constant; examples are the relation between the class and the individuals; substance and quality, the qualities of the same substance; or cause and effect. Smoke stands in an invariable relation to fire, but not vice versa, for on the Indian view glowing iron emits no smoke. Even individual events may thus be related in Kumārila's view, thus the sight of the constellation Krttikā suggests the proximity of Rohini. How, then, is this relation to be recognised? The Nyāya view, when it realised the question as a result of the introduction by Dignāga and, following him, Prasastapāda of the conception of a universal relationship (vyāpti) in lieu of mere reasoning by analogy, found refuge in the development of a transcendental perception (alaukika pratyaks"), by which in perceiving, for example, fire and smoke, the percipient recognised not merely the
I Mironiső Sütro. p. 10; Prakararapancika, pp. 64-87; Slokatarttika, pp. 345-405; Mānameyodaya, pp. 11-46; Nyayamafijari, pp. 109-41; Logic and Atomis777, pt. II, ch. lii.
"The Mmānsā rejects wholly the perception of Yogins, which 18 the precursor of this idea in the early Nyaya : cf Nyayamañjuri, pp. 93 ff.