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NYAYA THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE
existed, is the source of our knowledge of the jar's nonexistence.
Among Western thinkers it is now generally recognised that negative facts are as real as positive facts. But there is much difference of opinion as to how negation or nonexistence is known. According to Alexander, 'negation is not merely a subjective attitude of the mind. That is only an instance of negation, in the region of mental acts. Negation or negativity is a real character of things, which means exclusion or rejection. Not-white is the character which excludes or is different from white.' This then would support tbe Nyāya view that non-existence is perceived as a determination of some positive entity. This seems to be implied also in the 'iew of negation held by Bradley and Bosanquet. Bradleysays: “The affirmative judgment qualifies a subject by the attribution of a quality, and the negative judgment qualires a subject by the explicit rejection of that same quality" According to him, the truth of the negative lics in the affirmation of a positive quality In “A is not B” the real fact is a character a belonging to A, which is incompatible with B. The basis of negation is really the assertion of a quality that excludes (c). It is not the mere assertion of the quality of exclusion (not-B).' So too Bosanquet“ holds that affirmation is prior to negation as supplying the reality within which alone negation has a meaning. In this sense the non-existence of a jar on the ground will be equivalent to the existence of the ground as such. It is to be observed, however, that wbile the ground is perceived, its exclusion of a jar is not 80 perceived. The fact of there being no jar on the ground may be a given fact, but it is not given by way of sense
1 Vide TC., I, Ch on Apupalabdhi, VP , Ch. VI.
Space, Time and Derty, p. 200 3 Logic, Vol. I, pp. 116-17 4 Logic, Vol 1, p 261
