New Dimensions in Jaina Logic

Author(s): Mahaprajna Acharya, Nathmal Tatia
Publisher: Today and Tommorrow Printers and Publishers

Page 143

Universal Concomitance
because all trees do not contract the leaves in the night. According to the Buddhist philosopher death is characterised by the cessation of the sensations, the sense-organs and the life, and such a death is not possible of the trees. Again the universal concomitance, established by the Jainas, between death and taking off the entire bark, is refuted by the Buddhists in the following way-death which consists in the cessation of sensations etc. is not possible in the case of the trees because the sensations, whose cessation is asserted, do not exist in them. Exsiccation cannot also be regarded as death, because the latter presupposes the existence of the sensations. Exsiccation alone, independently of the cessation of sensations, is not presupposed by the existence of the sensations. It, therefore, follows that the death which is the real probans is not an established fact in respect of the trees, and exsiccation, that is accepted by both the proponent and the opponent, is not a valid probans. The Jainas, however, adduce death alone irrespective of its concomitance with the subject (pakṣa) as the probans, being quite ignorant of its real nature. They identify exsiccation with death, which is found in the trees. The opponent, however, is conversant with the true nature of death which is identical with the extinction of consciousness. Had the proponent been familiar with the connotation of the word 'death', the probans would have been an unestablished fact (asiddha) for him also. *
The Jaina logician, however, believes that 'the trees are animate beings'. Had the Buddhists been conversant with this truth, the above probans (viz. exsiccation) would not be an unestablished fact for them. The Buddhists consequently assert that the trees are not animate beings, becaue they do not have the death identical with extinction of the sensations, sense-organs and life. Such probans is an established fact for the Buddhist proponent, but it is quite otherwise for the opponent Jainas.
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The universal concomitances are most controversial issues. The concomitances concerned with the facts of nature are multifarious. We have just mentioned one such case of concomitance. The concomitances related to theoretical doctrines are most divergent in nature. In fact, every philosophical system has constructed specific universal concomitances in consonance with their own philosophical beliefs. For instance
*Dharmottarapradipa, page 190-191; Nyayabindu (Govindacandra Pandey), p. 85.