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makes it impossible for it to express the real nature of its socalled object. For what is a word? A word is the outcome of conception. We find some common characteristics in all cows; the experience and the idea of these common characteristics build up a concept and this concept clothed in a word is the word, cow,—which is thus the result of conception. And as a word is thus a Vikalpa-yonii.e. the result of conception, it signifies only the concepti.e. the group of general characteristics. But what is the nature of a real object? A real object is characterised by a strictly individual functioning ( 372ff1afra). Nothing that does not actually do anything is real. A glass of water is real because it quenches one's thirst. A concept of water is not real because the concept would not quench one's thirst. A real object is thus strictly particular (F t ) as the Buddhists call it. A word which, as shown above, is the outcome of and stands for a general concept only is incapable of expressing the particular and real nature of the object.
NEGATIVE SIGNIFICANCE OF A WORD
What then is the function of the word, cow, for instance, according to the Buddhists? It does not directly signify the animal Cow. When we hear the word cow,—there arises a negative apprehension in us, an apprehension consisting in a negation of all beings other than a cow. The primary function of the word cow is thus to remove all our ideas about beings other than a cow. For this reason, the Buddhists described a word as consisting in Apoha or Anyāpoha i.e. negative apprehension about others. Subsequently other concepts and ideas are mixed up with this Apoha or primary negative apprehension, as a result of which we come to understand the meaning of the word cow. The word cow thus does not directly and immediately signify the actual animal. When we hear the word cow, the first apprehension that arises in our mind is that of a removal or cessation of all ideas of things other than a cow; thereafter apperception works upon this primary per
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