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kartavyatārsvabhāvāt / asiddham ca kartavyam / siddhavastuvisayas ca sannikarsah / anumānādini85 tadātve yady apy asantam artham avagamayanti ("... even though they make one cognize an object which does not exist at that particular point in time”) pipīlikāndasañcārena hi bhavisyantīm vrstim anumimate tathāpi na tebhyah kartavyatāvagatih / (1 63.5-9). Does Me. refer here to the Nyāyabhāsya on NS 2.1.35 and 36, or what is his source? And what is even more important: Does the fact that Me. uses the 3. prs. plural (anumimate) indicate that he himself regards such an inference as problematic?
3.7. Almost in passing only it may be noted that at one place, viz. in the Bhāsya on M. 2.16, Me. uses the expression sāmānyato 'numānam. 86 Yet this has nothing to do with the term sāmānyato drstam (anumānam), and is meant to characterize a particular (Vedic) injunction which can be inferred as a general one.
4. Of the many and different problems involved by the Bhāsya passages presented in the foregoing there is one only that I am able to pursue a little further, viz. that of the origin of Me.'s distinction between viseșato drstam and sāmānyato drstam anumānam. These terms are met with for the first time in the history of Indian logic87 in Vārsaganya's Şastitantra88 and may very well also have been coined by this famous Samkhya philosopher. But apart from their designations the difference between these two classes of inferences as viewed by Vārsaganya has nothing to do with the dichotomy referred to by Me. It is true that Me. does not define the former, or give an illustration of it; but quite the reverse holds good for sāmānyato drstam (anumānam), and it is hence highly probable, to put it not too strongly, that visesato drstam refers to a form of inductive conclusion,89 and not, so it seems, to the inference of an object previously already cognized by perception.90 Is Me.'s dichotomy therefore identical with that drawn by Prasastapāda between drstam and sāmānyato drstam [anumānam]? Perhaps, that is to say, this possibility has certainly to be carefully examined, but the lack of a full terminological correspondence does not speak in favour of it. Besides there is another alternative, which suggests itself even earlier in view of the fact that, Me.'s knowledge and recognition of the Vaiseșika” apart, it is the Purvamīmāmsā to which he mainly shows allegiance, philosophically, conceptually and methodologically. 92
