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Microcosmology : Atom From a different aspect, sound may be divided into three kinds :
(1) Sound produced by animate organisms. (ii) Sound produced by inanimate objects. (iii) Sound produced jointly by both.
Thus, sound is not a quality (guna) but modification (paryā ya) of pudgala. Sound is in the form of waves produced by the vibrations of sound-producing aggregates and is propagated by material medium such as air or water but not by space i.e. in vacuum. Sound is perceived by the sense-organ of hearing.
The Vaiseșika philosophy does not accept sound as the modification of pudgala, but an attribute of space. This view is patently untenable. Firstly, sound is mūrta-perceivable by a sense-organ, while space is amūrta-devoid of sense-data. The attribute of an amūrta substance can never be mūrta. For the sound to be an attribute of space, either the space must be considered as mūrta of the sound to be amūrta which is obviously not the case. Moreover, sound-waves are propagated, and therefore, dynamic, while space is static (niskriya). According to science, sound-waves cannot be propagated in vacuum (space). If it was an attribute of space, it must inhere everywhere in space.
2. LIGHT AND DARKNESS
Light is an attribute of pudgala and is the cause of visibility. Darkness, the anti-thesis of light and the cause of invisibility is also an attribute of pudgala!. Darkness, according to Jain belief, is not merely absence of light but is a specific combination of physical bodies in which black colour is predominant.
There are three kinds of light radiations :(1) Hot effulgence (ātapa) (ii) Cold effulgence (udyota) (iii) Lustre (prabhā)
1. Sarvărthasiddhi, 5/24.
