4.4 Classical Indian Philosophy of Education: A Pedagogic Approach to Ultimate Meaning and Purpose in Human Existence

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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Self or No-Self? The Ātman Debate in Classical Indian Philosophy I am extremely grateful to John Taber, Isabelle Ratié, Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad, Luke O’Sullivan and Jim Duerlinger for comments on an earlier draft of this article. I have also benefitted greatly from audience responses to versions presented in 2013 at St. Stephens College (Delhi), Harvard, Berkeley, Columbia and the University of Chicago; I would like to mention in particular Mark Siderits and Michael Allen.

Indian Epistemology and Metaphysics ◽

10.5040/9781474219112.ch-012 ◽

2017 ◽

Keyword(s):

Indian Philosophy ◽

University Of Chicago ◽

Audience Responses ◽

Classical Indian Philosophy ◽

The University

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Desire and Deviance in Classical Indian Philosophy: A Study of Female Masculinity and Male Femininity in the Tamil Folk Legend Alliyarasanimalai

Women’s Sexualities and Masculinities in a Globalizing Asia ◽

10.1057/9780230604124_3 ◽

2007 ◽

pp. 47-66

Author(s):

Kanchana Natarajan

Keyword(s):

Indian Philosophy ◽

Female Masculinity ◽

Classical Indian Philosophy

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Classical Indian philosophy: a reader

Contemporary South Asia ◽

10.1080/09584935.2014.880239 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 22 (1) ◽

pp. 110-110

Author(s):

James Madaio

Keyword(s):

Indian Philosophy ◽

Classical Indian Philosophy

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Vātsyāyana

10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199314621.013.15 ◽

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.

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