Down at the Knowledge Department

 

Let me ask what may seem to be a foolish question?  Do you use the means of knowledge, the pramana, when we know something.  Is it simply that you know something and on examination you discover that your knowledge has such and such a shape as it were.

I might use an axe to chop wood but I do not use pramana in the same instrumental way.

Knowledge exists and it has this form.  Am I labouring the obvious?

Many elements may be at work in a single awareness.  Is this why in other than the advaitic account of the pramanas categories are conflated.  Presumption (arthapatti) becomes inference (anumana).

You saw that your friend was not present at the expected rendezvous.  Was it that you perceived this or is it a case of non-apprehension of existence (anupalabadhi)?

You go from the thing itself, our knowledge, and then you can see the shape of that knowledge.

Nobody denies (sunyavadins?) perception and the thing itself as an independent entity  which can exist as an unknown object.  That is primary reality or realism pur sang.  There is experience, there is knowledge.  It has a form.  Experience fills the form, so to speak.

Conversation at the Epistemological Counter of the Knowledge Department:

Do you have a form for that?  I couldn’t possibly let you have that experience without a form. In duplicate, one for your mind and the other for the external world.

Upamana once again

The aspects of things that are most important for us are hidden because of their simplicity and familiarity. (One is unable to notice something - because it is always before one’s eyes.) The real foundations of his enquiry do not strike a man at all. Unless thatfact has at some time struck him. - And this means: we fail to be struck by what, once seen, is most striking and most powerful.

Philosophical Investigations #121 by Ludwig Wittgenstein.

I quote this in full because the valid means of knowledge (pramana) known as upamana (comparison) is so fundamental and basic to consciousness of the world, i.e. classification, differentiation, exclusion and inclusion, specification etc., that we no longer see it as such. Moreover the continued use of a single example in its traditional Nyaya explication misleads us as to this global nature. I refer back to my earlier thoughts on the matter at
upamana
but I will reproduce the entry on upamana in Vedanta Paribhasa in full. My present thinking on the matter arises out of my comments on the topic at the blog:cidabhasa


To save going back and forth to my earlier note I will reproduce in full the entry on upamana in V.P.

Now comparison is being described. The instrument of the valid knowledge of similarity is comparison. For instance a man who has seen a cow's form in cities and has gone to a forest, where his eyes have come in contact with a gayal (gavaya - bos gaurus) has the cognition, "This thing is like a cow". Then he has the conviction, "My cow is like this." Here by a process of agreement and difference, the knowledge of the likeness of a cow which exists in a gayal is the instrument, and the knowledge of that likeness of a gayal which exists in a cow is the result.

this is not possible through perception, for then the cow's form is not in contact with the eyes. Nor is it possible through inference, for that likeness of a cow which exists in a gayal cannot be the sign (reason) for inferring the likeness of a gayal in a cow. Nor can it be urged that this is possible through the following inference:

My cow is like this gayal.
Because it corresponds to its likeness existing in a gayal.
That which corresponds to its likeness existing in a thing is like the latter.

As Caitra, who corresponds to his likeness existing in Maitra, is like him.

For even without this sort of inference, the cognition, "My cow is like this," is a matter of common experience, and has also the apperception, "I am comparing the two,". Hence comparison is a distinct means of knowledge.

In my first comment on the general topic at cidabhasa I began at the aspect of genus/species differentiation.
Whenever the example chosen is always the same you can be virtually certain that the proposer does not understand what is at issue and is staying close to the shore of the canonical. Even the translation of upamana sends one in the wrong direction. It’s not really a comparison but more of a slipping back from the specific into the generic. You don’t know, by virtue of having no experience of, a bos gaurus but you do know a bos bos. By falling back into the generic concept of bos, (an unexperienceable conception), divided hoof, horned etc you can recognise another species the bos gaurus. The knowledge gained from a reliable source that there exists such creatures is an unnecessary addendum in my opinion. Zoologists find new species without that.

Why is this a valid means of knowledge not reducible to any other? I believe that it is due to the mystery of how general concepts arise, if in fact they do arise. We know what red, green, yellow objects are by ostensive definition but how is the concept coloured arrived at. This is a concept which is required for the experience of various colours but which itself cannot be arrived at by experience. Wittgenstein in Philosophical Investigations talks of the procedure of going on as in 2, 4, 6, 8 now go on. We know what the answer is but how can we be taught what going on is. All our examples of it assume it.

This may be part of Plato’s puzzlement about universals and curiously enough Shankara in B.S.B. I.iii.28 offers the notion of vedic words which is not a long way off the same aporia.

In short we have a means of attaining valid knowledge which is embedded within us. It is not reducible to any other means of knowledge and is therefore a pramana. This is of course anathema to the empiricist tradition.

In my second comment on Cidabhasa blog I get down to the task of discovering in the V.P. treatment of upamana a deictic demonstration of a facet of differentiation i.e. the discovery of similarity.

The text that I am familiar with on the subject of pramanas is Vedanta Paribhasa and of course the bos gaurus comes out to play there too. Now the question I put to myself is: suppose upamana is a separate pramana distinct from perception and inference etc. Does the classical account bear the weight of this position? The empiricist account with perception as its mainstay seems to be a stronger candidate for the power behind the naming of this strange beast. We have seen domestic cattle, we have seen their hooves and horns, we now see this new creature. By a sort of mental Venn diagram it moves partially into the cow area. Prior to this we have been primed by a reliable source so we can now name it with confidence.

To answer this story I propose the view that you can’t gain the concept of common as in common features without having the concept common already and that is not perceptible or inferential etc. If I accept the notion of upamana as a pramana this is the direction I find I am pushed in. On the face of it this seems to be a sustainable interpretation.

Here by a process of agreement and difference the knowledge of the likeness of a cow which exists in the gayal is the instrument, and the knowledge of that likeness of a gayal which exists in a cow is the result.

(Vedanta Paribhasa)

knowledge of the likeness is the common of common feature

In Vedanta Paribhasa the establishing of the concept of upamana as a means of knowledge not reducible to any other is done by showing that the alternatives are impossible.

This is not possible through perception, for then the cow’s form is not in contact with the eyes. Nor is it possible through inference for that likeness of a cow which exists in a gayal cannot be the sign (reason) for inferring the likeness of a gayal in a cow. Nor can it be urged that this is possible through the following inference:
My cow is like this gayal.
Because it corresponds to its likeness existing in a gayal.
That which corresponds to its likeness existing in in a thing is like the latter.

The latter reasoning underscores the question begging aspect of seeing common features.
(End Comment)

Now that last sentence might be better expressed as the circularity of abstracting the concept ‘common’ from features that we know are common. In short upamana is a power which is innate like perception itself. It might well be said to be the eye of the mind in that it distinguishes ‘forms’/eidoi. Henry Bergson uses the term ‘cut’ for this cutting out of whole cloth. What is this whole cloth? More, much more can be written on this topic. Anon.

Lastly I leave you with an alteration of Leibniz’s Question: Why is there something rather than nothing? -- Why are there some things rather than an undifferentiated continuum?

Upamana

To begin with I think it is worth while quoting the entire treatment of the valid means of knowledge (pramana) knows as upamana as given in the locus classicus of Vedanta Paribhasa by Dharmaraja Adhvarindra who seems to have flourished in the 17th. Century. It will be noted just how short a treatment is given of what I hope to show is an extremely important pramana.

Now comparison is being described. The instrument of the valid knowledge of similarity is comparison. For instance a man who has seen a cow's form in cities and has gone to a forest, where his eyes have come in contact with a gayal (gavaya - bos gaurus) has the cognition, "This thing is like a cow". Then he has the conviction, "My cow is like this." Here by a process of agreement and difference, the knowledge of the likeness of a cow which exists in a gayal is the instrument, and the knowledge of that likeness of a gayal which exists in a cow is the result.

this is not possible through perception, for then the cow's form is not in contact with the eyes. Nor is it possible through inference, for that likeness of a cow which exists in a gayal cannot be the sign (reason) for inferring the likeness of a gayal in a cow. Nor can it be urged that this is possible through the following inference:

My cow is like this gayal.
Because it corresponds to its likeness existing in a gayal.
That which corresponds to its likeness existing in a thing is like the latter.

As Caitra, who corresponds to his likeness existing in Maitra, is like him.

For even without this sort of inference, the cognition, "My cow is like this," is a matter of common experience, and has also the apperception, "I am comparing the two,". Hence comparison is a distinct means of knowledge.

The first thing that must be remarked is the insistence that upamana is a distinct means of knowledge which is to say that it cannot be reduced to anything more basic or primitive. It thus takes its place along with the others such as Perception and Inference. There are 6 in all accepted within the philosophical system known as Advaitic Vedanta. It would take us too far out of our way to go into any detail about the rest of them though later I may offer a note on anupalabadhi or non-apprehension of existence.

Let me first make the point that perhaps 'comparison' may not be quite the apposite word in relation to this means of knowledge. I will be staying with the canonical example of the gayal for the moment. When the cow is seen in the gayal where is there what we would strictly in English call a comparison? When one speaks of comparison one generally requires that there be two things, a eye-witness description and a known individual. The one is compared to the other and a match is declared or a partial match or a mismatch. This seeing of the cow in the gayal seems to me to more like the successful deployment of the concept 'cow'. Our having the concept 'cow' allows us to 'see' the cow in the gayal. There is no comparison as such, having the concept is what enables us to do this, to have this recognition so to speak. For this basic reason I would stay with the term upamana to avoid what I think is an erroneous identification with the notion of comparison.

In Mental Acts Peter Geach speaks of concepts as capacities exercised in acts of judgement. Does exercising the concept just involve 'seeing' the cow in the gayal? Is the notion of comparison a misunderstanding that the translation of upamana underlines? We can construe what we have done as comparison only after the fact. That is what we must be doing we say to ourselves presenting an analysis that makes sense to us. It makes sense to us because of the inherent hankering after empiricist explanations. Evidence is required even if we have to make it up to have a likely story.

Why do we find it hard to accept that there things that we can do, that there are powers we just have and concept acquisition and concept utilisation are those sort of powers or they are perhaps a single power of double aspect. Having the concept 'white' means among other things seeing it in milk and chalk. No comparisons needed.

I am I have to admit ignorant of later speculation about pramanas and specifically this one amongst that school known as the New Logicians (Navya Nyaya) in its later phase. The perennial focus on the gavaya (bos gaurus) by commentators in general leads me to think that the general understanding of what was at issue was not clear. The canonical example is often a lifebuoy to cling to in a sea of incomprehension. My own speculations may be a matter of my own fancy and no better.