Mimamsa

According to the seventh-century C.E. philosopher Kumārila Bhat.t.a, epistemic agents are warranted in taking their world-presenting experiences as veridical, if they lack defeaters. For him, these experiences are defeasibly sources of knowledge without the agent reflecting on their content or investigating their causal origins. This position is known as svatah prāmāṇya in Sanskrit (henceforth the SP principle). -/- As explicated by the eleventh-century commentator, Pārthasārathi Misŕa, this position entails that epistemic agents know things without simultaneously knowing that they know them, (...) or being in a position to know that they know. In contrast, some contemporary Anglo-analytic philosophers argue for the “knows-knows principle” (KK principle), in which if someone knows that p, then that person also knows that they know that p, or that person is in a position to know that they know p. Despite some apparent similarities, the SP principle is not a version of the KK principle, nor would Pārthasārathi’s Kumārila have held the KK principle. -/- Recently, Daniel Immerman (2018) has argued that the SP principle is a position-to-know version of the “knows-knows principle” (KK-pos principle). By examining Kumārila’s response to his Buddhist opponent, who challenges the veracity of Vedic testimony, we will see that Kumārila understands higher-order knowing as involving an independent check on one’s epistemic processes, through an epistemic instrument known as postulation (arthāpatti). This precludes him from holding the KK-pos principle. (shrink)

Mīmāṁsā, an Indian hermeneutics provides an exhaustive methodology to interpret Vedic statements. A formalism namely, Mīmāṁsā Inspired Representation of Actions has already been proposed in a preliminary manner. This paper expands the formalism logically and includes Syntax and Semantics covering Soundness and Completeness. Here, several interpretation techniques from Mīmāṁsā have been considered for formalising the statements. Based on these, instructions that denote actions are categorized into positive and prohibitive unconditional imperatives and conditional imperatives that enjoin reason, temporal action and goal. (...) These instructions are evaluated to three values S, V and N. If the instruction is executed with the intention of goal, then it acquires the value of S; if the intention of goal is present and the instruction is not executed, then it assumes the value of V; and if there is no intention of goal, then the instruction is evaluated to N. This formalism has also been applied in different computational settings such as AI planning, Robotics, task analysis and classification of natural language instructions. An outline of these applications and the comparison of this formalism with other relevant theories are also presented in this paper. (shrink)

This article is first in a series dedicated to issues in the intellectual history of Mīmāṃsā in early modern India and part of a larger effort to broaden the basis for understanding the new formulations of central topics of the Mīmāṃsā textual-ritual complex in this period. It examines how the Varanasi scholar Khaṇḍadevamiśra makes use of Navyanyāya tools of analysis by putting under the microscope the example of his investigation and new formulation of the signification of agent and agency by (...) the verbal affix in his ample analysis of the cognition of the meaning elements of a sentence. Authors of Mīmāṃsā works in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries gradually and selectively adopt the tools and techniques of cognitive analysis and the characteristic new idiom elaborated by Navyanaiyāyikas a few centuries earlier. This process of adoption arises on the sidelines of the Advaita–Dvaita Vedānta controversy in South India, then subsequently flourishes in Varanasi, as I have followed elsewhere. In his analysis of the topic studied here, Khaṇḍadeva uses the new tools to revisit the Mīmāṃsā tradition in order to advance his new formulation while refuting certain Navyanyāya rival positions. (shrink)

Conceptual Metaphor Theory, an approach to human thought and language that began with the work of Lakoff and Johnson, claims that metaphor is not merely a linguistic phenomenon, but is implicated in structuring human thought. On this view, that people use words like "attack" and "defend" to describe argumentative moves demonstrates that they think of argument as a kind of war. This is opposed to the view that some words like "attack" are polysemous, sometimes meaning to engage in physical warfare (...) and sometimes meaning to argue against a position. One implication of CMT is that nearly all human concepts are understood metaphorically, so that reasoning about argumentation turns out to involve concepts of... (shrink)

Arthâpatti is a pervasive form of reasoning investigated by Indian philosophers in order to think about unseen causes and interpret ordinary and religious language. Its nature is a point of controversy among Mimamsa, Nyaya, and Buddhist philosophers, yet, to date, it has received less attention than perception, inference, and testimony. This collection presents a one-of-a-kind reference resource for understanding this form of reasoning studied in Indian philosophy. Assembling translations of central primary texts together with newly-commissioned essays on research topics, it (...) features a significant introductory essay. Readable translations of Sanskrit works are accompanied by critical notes that introduce arthâpatti, offer historical context, and clarify the philosophical debates surrounding it. Showing how arthâpatti is used as a way to reason about the basic unseen causes driving language use, cause-and-effect relationships, as well as to interpret ambiguous or figurative texts, this book demonstrates the importance of this epistemic instrument in both contemporary Anglo-analytic and classical Indian epistemology, language, and logic. (shrink)

The History of Indian Philosophy is a comprehensive and authoritative examination of the movements and thinkers that have shaped Indian philosophy over the last three thousand years. An outstanding team of international contributors provide fifty-eight accessible chapters, organis[=z]ed into three clear parts: knowledge, context, concepts philosophical traditions engaging and encounters: modern and postmodern. This outstanding collection is essential reading for students of Indian philosophy. It will also be of interest to those seeking to explore the lasting significance of this rich (...) and complex philosophical tradition, and to philosophers who wish to learn about Indian philosophy through western philosophical and contemporary comparative lens. For complete Contents and authors' abstracts per chapters go to title of the book under Routledge Taylor & Francis ; it is a usual http link not allowed to enter here.> Click on the External Links below . (shrink)

In this paper, I examine Kumārila Bha ṭṭ a's account of figurative language in Tantravārttika 1.4.11-17, arguing that, for him, both metonymy and metaphor crucially involve verbal postulation, a knowledge-conducive cognitive process which draws connections between concepts without appeal to speaker intention, but through compositional and contextual elements. It is with the help of this cognitive process that we can come to have knowledge of what is meant by a sentence in context. In addition, the paper explores the relationship between (...) metonymy and metaphor, the extent to which putatively literal language involves metonymy, and the objective constraints for metaphorical interpretation. (shrink)

Abstract The word Padaartha, used as a technical term by different Indian schools of thought with different senses will be brought out. The meaning and intonation of the word Padaartha as used in the Upanishads, Brahmajnaana, Advaitha Philosophy, Sabdabrahma Siddhanta (Vyaakarana), the Shaddarshanas will be discussed. A comprehensive gist of this discussion will be presented relating to human consciousness, mind and their functions. The supplementary and complementary nature of these apparently “different” definitions will be conformed from cognitive science point of (...) view in understanding and a modern scientific model of human cognition and communication, language acquisition and in terms of brain modulation and demodulation will be presented. (shrink)

The intellectual culture of India presents us with highly elaborated theories of verbal cognition, known in Sanskrit philosophical literature under the generic name of sabdabodha. The theory explored in this book represents the content of the cognition derived from linguistic utterances as a paraphrase centered on a meaning element-the principal qualificand, which is qualified by other meaning elements. Thinkers of the Mimamsa, Nyaya and Vyakarana schools concern themselves with this topic, situated at the interface between epistemology, linguistics, scriptural exegesis and (...) logic, and deeply embedded in wider conceptual networks. The three competing versions of the theory and the intriguing questions they raise have never received extensive and historical treatment. -/- Debating Verbal Cognition expounds the debate between the philosophers of the three schools, setting the arguments in their philosophical, doctrinal and historical context. It provides a timeline through the history of this debate, revealing the complexity of argumentation and drawing in particular attention to the bigger picture beyond the purely linguistic stand. The central argument focuses on the capacity of the initial contexts, with the network of issues to which the theory is connected, to render intelligible the presuppositions and aims behind the complex justification of the late stages. -/- This book is an attempt to understand the rationality and internal coherence of each position, and to make sense of the reasons why the thinkers of the three schools have continued over the centuries to hold on to three mutually exclusive positions, despite the fact that none of the schools can give an all-comprehensive and unitary form of the theory. (shrink)

This article aims to follow the process of adoption of Navya-Nyāya techniques of cognitive analysis in the school of Vedic hermeneutics, Mīmāṃsā, in the sixteenth and the seventeenth centuries, in the larger context of the spread of these techniques in India. I shall argue that this process arises in Mīmāṃsā on the sidelines of the Advaita-Dvaita Vedānta controversy in South India, then subsequently flourishes in Varanasi. These techniques are adopted gradually and selectively, for not all the Mīmāṃsā thinkers choose to (...) use them. (shrink)

Contributed articles on Vedanta, Mimamsa and Nyaya philosophy; previously published in Journal of the Indian Council of Philosophical Research.

The Book Is The First Of Its Kind To Study The Purvamimamsa System From The Point Of View Of Philosophy Of Language. It Contains Three Lectures On The Subject-Theory Of Language, Function Of Grammar And The Role Of Speaker`S Intention In Verbal Understanding.

Sanskrit work presenting Jaina epistemological approach to verbal testimony.

The Mīmāṃsāka doctrine of "svatah prāmānya" has seldom been given the serious philosophical attention it deserves. This doctrine in fact grows out of a sophisticated critique of epistemological foundationalism. This critique, as well as the larger project that it serves, has striking similarities with the philosophical project advanced in William Alston's "Perceiving God". A comparison of the two helps to highlight the strengths and the problems of both projects, and shows, perhaps more importantly, that the Mīmāṃsāka doctrine is in fact (...) still relevant, as it resembles one of the more interesting positions currently in play in contemporary philosophy. (shrink)

Treatise on Mimamsa philosophy; critical edition.

Introduction By the late fifth century BCE Panini had composed the Astadhyayi, consisting of nearly 4000 rules giving a precise and fairly complete ...

Festschrift honoring Mandana Misra, b. 1929, Sanskrit philosopher; comprises articles chiefly on Mimamsa school in Hindu philosophy.