Vātsyāyana

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew Dasti
Keyword(s):  
Indian Philosophy ◽  
Theory Of Knowledge ◽  
Living Well ◽  
Epistemic Entitlement ◽  
Classical Indian Philosophy ◽  
The Way

Vātsyāyana (c.450 ce) is the author of the Commentary on Nyāya, the first full commentary on the Nyāya-sūtra of Gautama (c.150 ce), which is itself the foundational text of the school of philosophy called “Nyāya.” The Nyāya tradition is home to a number of leading voices within classical Indian philosophy and is celebrated in later doxographies as one of the six “orthodox” systems of Hindu thought. Vātsyāyana’s commentary sets the agenda for much of Nyāya’s philosophical developments throughout its history. This chapter explores his theory of knowledge, giving special attention to his account of the nature and importance of cognition as a guide to action. It illustrates the way in which this theme informs a number of apparently distinct elements of his project including his realism, his account of epistemic entitlement, and his notion of philosophy’s contribution to living well.

Gaṅgeśa (fl. c.1325)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen H. Phillips
Keyword(s):  
Indian Philosophy ◽  
Theory Of Knowledge ◽  
Multidimensional System ◽  
Ontological Status ◽  
Sources Of Information ◽  
Indian School ◽  
New School ◽  
Classical Indian Philosophy ◽  
Realist Ontology

Gaṅgeśa launched and solidified advances in logic and epistemology within the classical Indian school of Logic, Nyāya. He is traditionally taken to have inaugurated the ‘New’ school, Navya-Nyāya. Nyāya, both Old and New, is a multidimensional system that belies the stereotype of Indian philosophy as idealist and mystical in orientation. Gaṅgeśa worked with a realist ontology of objects spoken about and experienced every day. He articulated what may be called a reliabilist theory of knowledge: under specified conditions, sense-mediated and inferential cognitions (along with two other types) are reliable sources of information about reality. Gaṅgeśa was a pivotal figure in classical Indian philosophy; most later debate both within his school and outside it presupposed cognitive analyses that he standardized. These analyses focus on properties exhibited by things known, properties central to the processes whereby they are known. Properties relating the cognized to the cognizer are especially important. Though Gaṅgeśa had a lot to say about the ontological status of these properties, others in his school found them problematic. Such controversy appears to have contributed to New Logic’s success: proponents of rival views were able to utilize Gaṅgeśa’s formulas and definitions without abandoning their own positions on what is real.

Rethinking Classical Dialectical Traditions

2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 173-209 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elisa Freschi ◽  
Elise Coquereau ◽  
Muzaffar Ali
Keyword(s):  
Indian Philosophy ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Classical Indian Philosophy ◽  
Daya Krishna ◽  
Contemporary Indian Philosophy ◽  
The Way

Abstract This essay debates the way Daya Krishna reinterpreted some dialectic elements of classical Indian philosophy, with a special focus on “dialogue” and “counterposition.” The essay subsequently analyses the consequence of this reinterpretation on contemporary Indian philosophy.1

Knowing by Doing: The Role of Geometrical Practice in Aristotle’s Theory of Knowledge

Elenchos ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-88 ◽  
Author(s):  
Monica Ugaglia
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Knowledge ◽  
Theory Of Knowledge ◽  
States Of Mind ◽  
General Process ◽  
The Real ◽  
Analogical Model ◽  
Primary Function ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Way

Abstract Aristotle’s way of conceiving the relationship between mathematics and other branches of scientific knowledge is completely different from the way a contemporary scientist conceives it. This is one of the causes of the fact that we look at the mathematical passages we find in Aristotle’s works with the wrong expectation. We expect to find more or less stringent proofs, while for the most part Aristotle employs mere analogies. Indeed, this is the primary function of mathematics when employed in a philosophical context: not a demonstrative tool, but a purely analogical model. In the case of the geometrical examples discussed in this paper, the diagrams are not conceived as part of a formalized proof, but as a work in progress. Aristotle is not interested in the final diagram but in the construction viewed in its process of development; namely in the figure a geometer draws, and gradually modifies, when he tries to solve a problem. The way in which the geometer makes use of the elements of his diagram, and the relation between these elements and his inner state of knowledge is the real feature which interests Aristotle. His goal is to use analogy in order to give the reader an idea of the states of mind involved in a more general process of knowing.

How Things Are

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Siderits
Keyword(s):  
Prior Knowledge ◽  
Indian Philosophy ◽  
Causal Relation ◽  
Abstract Objects ◽  
Buddhist Tradition ◽  
Common Strategy ◽  
Classical Indian Philosophy ◽  
Recent Debate ◽  
Specialist Knowledge ◽  
The Common

This work is designed to introduce some of the more important fruits of Indian Buddhist metaphysical theorizing to philosophers with little or no prior knowledge of classical Indian philosophy. It is widely known among non-specialists that Buddhists deny the existence of a self. Less widely appreciated among philosophers currently working in metaphysics is the fact that the Indian Buddhist tradition contains a wealth of material on a broad assortment of other issues that have also been foci of recent debate. Indian Buddhist philosophers have argued for a variety of interesting claims about the nature of the causal relation, about persistence, about abstract objects, about the consequences of presentism, about the prospects for a viable ontological emergentism. They engaged in a spirited debate over illusionism in the philosophy of consciousness. Some espoused global anti-realism while others called its coherence into question. And so on. This work is meant to introduce the views of such major Buddhist philosophers as Vasubandhu, Dharmakīrti, and Nāgārjuna on these and other issues. And it presents their arguments and analyses in a manner meant to make them accessible to students of philosophy who lack specialist knowledge of the Indian tradition. Analytic metaphysicians who are interested in moving beyond the common strategy of appealing to the intuitions of “the folk” should find much of interest here.

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