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Slokavartika-a study
act which the Buddhist calls 'perception' and Kumärila 'indeterminate perception' is in fact a physiological rather than cognitive act. For that is the logical meanining of the Buddhist's insistence that perception is a sense-born process and one involv ing no thought-element at all. Kumärila himself moved in the same direction when be made out that indeterminate perception is a process that involves no employment of speech, but to be logical he will have to side with the Buddhist in toto. On the other hand, the Buddhist himself is being illogical when he talks as if perception-necessarily indeterminate-reveals the total nature of a thing, for here Kumarila is right when. he insists that all revelation of the nature of a thing takes place through the instrumentality of memory etc. that begin operating in the wake of sense-object contact. In this connection one point of difference, which in a way was also a point of agreement between the Buddhist's position and Kumãrila's deserves notice. Thus the Buddhist had argued that memory etc. that take place in the wake of senseobject contact are no part of perception because they are of the form of a thoughtelement while perception is ex hypothesi devoid of all thought-element. To this Kumārila had replied that memory etc. when they take place in the presence of senst-object contact are a part of perception while the same when they take place in the absence of sense-object contact are a part of inference etc. This way Kumarila was making the important point that perception is in essence a process of identifying a present object while inference etc. in essence a process of learning about an absent object; but while doing so he was at the same time conceding the force of the Buddhist's contention that post-perceptual thought, insofar as it is of the form of a thought-element, is essentially akin to inference etc. which too are of the form of a thought-element. Not that the Buddhist would deny the specific significance of the cases when post-perceptual thought proceeds in the presence of sense-object contact, nor that Kumärila would deny that perception and inference etc. are essentially similar insofar as both involve memory etc., but the former point was properly emphasized by Kumarila and not the Buddhist while the latter point was properly emphasized by the Buddhist and not Kumārila. All this should become clearer when we come to examine Kumārila's treatment of inference etc.
56
(iv) Object of Sense-Perception-Unitary or Otherwise
(vv. 156-70)
In Kumarila's times one somewhat ticklish question concerning sense-perception was also often examined; it was as to what constitutes an object of perception. On the basis of usages like this thing is seen. heard, touched, tasted, smelled' it was suggested that the object of all the five sense-organs eye, ear, skin, tongue and nose is one and the same, while on the basis of the usages like the colour of this thing is seen, its sound heard, its touch touched, its taste tasted, its smell smelled' it was suggested that the five sense-organs have five different objects. The dilemma was sought to be solved sometimes by maintaning that the thing supposed to be the
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