Vaishali Institute Research Bulletin 1

Author(s): Nathmal Tatia
Publisher: Research Institute of Prakrit Jainology & Ahimsa Mujjaffarpur

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VAISHALI INSTITUTE RESEARCH BULLETIN NO, I
not a confirmed sceptic is not assailed by the visitation of any such doubt. Doubt is a healthy attitude and Descartes made it the starting point of philosophical enquiry. In India it has been recognized from a very ancient time that inquisitiveness, i, e, desire for further knowledge is generated by doubt. But if it degenerates into unhealthy scepticism it will lay the axe at the very root of the possibility of the progress of knowledge.
In order to obviate such an undesirable and self-stultifying scepticism, the Indian logicians and particularly the Jaina logicians have laid stress on another faculty called üha, inductive reasoning which will come in for discussion at later stage.
Now we shall consider the example based on dissimilarity which is defined in the next verse.
Text sadhye nivartamāne tu sādhanasyā pyasambhavaḥ/ kh ya pyate yatra drstante vaidharmyeneti sa smrtah/l
Translation
“A concrete instance in which the absence of the probans is shown necessarily to follow the absence of the probandum is known as an example based on dissimilarity.” ... (XIX)
Elucidation In the case of inference of fire from smoke, a lake is cited as the example in dissimilarity. There is no fire in the lake and consequently no smoke also. It serves to bring home the necessity of the relation of the probans and the probandum by demonstrating the absence of the probans necessarily coinciding with the absence of the probandum. Necessary concomitance is a case of logical entailment In positive concomitance the knowledge of smoke entails the knowledge of fire because fire necessarily exists in which smoke is present. In negative concomitance the knowledge of the absence of fire entails that of the absence of smoke. It is to be borne in mind that necessary concomitance is not a case of reciprocal concomitance of both probans and probandum. The existence of fire is not necessarily coincident with
1. Cf. athato dharmajijñāsā (MD, sūtra 1) Also : vişayo visayas caiva pūryapakşas tathottaram
nirņayas eeti pañcāngam sāstre 'dhi karaṇam smộtam ||
The subject, the doubt, the proposition, the prima facic reply and the final judgement, these are the five members of a discussion of which doubt is the foremost factor.