Write short answers to the following in about 150 words each:
(a) Does the seed contain the tree ? Discuss with reference to Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika Philosophy. (10 marks)
(b) Explain with reference to Nyāya Philosophy, the nature of śabda as the advice of ā

Question

Write short answers to the following in about 150 words each:
(a) Does the seed contain the tree ? Discuss with reference to Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika Philosophy. (10 marks)
(b) Explain with reference to Nyāya Philosophy, the nature of śabda as the advice of āpta (a reliable person). (10 marks)
(c) Is 'inseparability' (ayuta-siddhatva) a necessary condition or a sufficient condition for defining characteristics (lakṣaṇa) of samavāya (inherence) ? Explain with reference to Vaiśeṣika Philosophy. (10 marks)
(d) Distinguish between pudgala-nairātmyavāda and dharma-nairātmyavāda with reference to Buddhist Philosophy. (10 marks)
(e) Comment on the bearing of Cārvāka epistemology on the rejection of transcendental entities by them. (10 marks)

UPSC Answer Check · Accepted Answer

(a) Whether the seed contains the tree is a dispute over causation. Sāṃkhya’s satkāryavāda says the effect pre-exists in the cause, so the tree is already in the seed; the cause is not merely a condition but the substratum of the effect. Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika rejects this. For them, the effect is non-existent before causation (asatkāryavāda); the tree is not identical with the seed, nor contained in it as a real entity. The seed is a material cause, but the relation between cause and effect is not identity. Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika insists that real relations, such as samavāya, are distinct from identity. If the seed were the tree, the cause would already be the effect, making production meaningless; if the tree were entirely absent, causation would be arbitrary. Their position is a middle course: the effect is not pre-existent, but it is not produced from nothing, because it depends on a cause and relation.

(b) In Nyāya, śabda is a pramāṇa when it is the advice of an āpta, a reliable person. It is not every utterance that yields knowledge; testimony may be false if the speaker is ignorant, deceptive, or inarticulate. Nyāya therefore fixes conditions for āptatva: the speaker must know the object, must desire to communicate it, and must express it properly. The hearer’s acceptance is justified by the speaker’s reliability, not by the sound of words. This distinguishes śabda from casual speech and from mere report. Nyāya also classifies śabda into dṛṣṭārtha and adṛṣṭārtha. Dṛṣṭārtha śabda concerns visible objects, as when a reliable person says, “Go to Kāśī”; the object can be verified later. Adṛṣṭārtha śabda concerns invisible or super-sensible matters, such as Vedic injunctions about ritual results; here the authority of the āpta is decisive. Thus śabda is epistemically valuable because it extends knowledge beyond direct perception through a trustworthy source.

(c) In Vaiśeṣika, samavāya is the relation of inherence, as between a substance and its quality, a whole and its part, or a universal and its particular. Its defining characteristic is ayuta-siddhatva, inseparability: the related terms cannot be separated while the relation holds. However, inseparability alone is not sufficient to define samavāya. Many pairs are inseparable in a loose sense without being related by inherence. Therefore Vaiśeṣika adds a further condition, sannikarṣa or niyata-sambandha, a fixed relation or contact. This distinguishes samavāya from saṃyoga, mere conjunction or contact, which is separable and spatial. In saṃyoga, two things touch and can be separated; in samavāya, the relation is non-spatial and permanent for the duration of the entities. Thus ayuta-siddhatva is a necessary condition for samavāya, but only with the additional condition of fixed relation does it become the sufficient defining mark of inherence.

(d) Buddhist philosophy is marked by nairātmyavāda, the denial of a permanent self. The first form, pudgala-nairātmyavāda, denies an eternal, unchanging self in persons. Early Buddhist schools, often grouped as Hīnayāna, including Sarvāstivāda and Sautrāntika, hold that the person is a conventional aggregate of skandhas, not a real soul. Yet they do not deny all reality; they accept dharmas, the ultimate factors of experience, as possessing svabhāva, intrinsic nature. The second form, dharma-nairātmyavāda, goes further. Schools such as Yogācāra and Mādhyamika deny that dharmas themselves have independent, intrinsic existence. For Mādhyamika, all dharmas are dependently originated and therefore empty; for Yogācāra, they are ultimately mind-dependent. Thus pudgala-nairātmyavāda rejects the self while retaining real dharmas, whereas dharma-nairātmyavāda rejects svabhāva in dharmas as well. The latter brings Buddhist thought to śūnyatā, the emptiness of all phenomena, as its culmination. This distinction shows the internal development of Buddhist thought from personal emptiness to universal emptiness.

(e) Cārvāka or Lokāyata philosophy is epistemologically minimal. It accepts pratyakṣa, direct perception, as the only valid pramāṇa and rejects anumāna, inference; śabda, verbal testimony; and upamāna, comparison. This has a decisive bearing on its rejection of transcendental entities. Since ātman, īśvara, mokṣa, karma, and svarga are not directly perceivable, Cārvāka holds that they cannot be established by valid knowledge. Inference is rejected because its logical basis is not certain; śabda is rejected because scripture depends on a reliable source that itself cannot be verified; upamāna is rejected because it adds no new knowledge. Consequently, entities that are super-sensible, such as God, soul, heaven, and liberation, are dismissed as unverifiable. This epistemology underwrites Lokāyata materialism: what is real is what can be experienced, especially the material elements and consciousness. The practical result is a denial of afterlife and moral accountability beyond this life, with emphasis on present pleasure. Thus, in Cārvāka, epistemology shapes ontology and ethics.

Write short answers to the following in about 150 words each: (a) Does the seed contain the tree ? Discuss with reference to…

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