Answer the following questions in about 150 words each : 10×5=50

(a) Explain the ground on which Cārvāka rejects inference (anumāna) as a valid source of knowledge. 10

(b) Present an exposition of the debate between Naiyāyikas and Buddhists with re

Question

Answer the following questions in about 150 words each : 10×5=50

(a) Explain the ground on which Cārvāka rejects inference (anumāna) as a valid source of knowledge. 10

(b) Present an exposition of the debate between Naiyāyikas and Buddhists with reference to the notion of Pramāṇa and Pramāṇaphala. 10

(c) Delineate the main points of difference between the theory of intrinsic validation (svataḥ prāmāṇyavāda) and theory of extrinsic validation (prataḥ prāmāṇyavāda) in classical Indian philosophy. 10

(d) Examine Rāmānuja's seven objections against Māyāvāda of Advaita. 10

(e) Present an exposition of Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika's theory of causation. 10

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(a) Cārvāka accepts only pratyakṣa. Inference is rejected because its decisive link, vyāpti, is itself unperceivable. To know that smoke is invariably concomitant with fire, one must observe many cases; but such observation already presumes the very inference it is meant to establish, producing anavasthā. Moreover, universal concomitance is defeated by exceptions: smoke may be doubted in wet fuel, where the expected fire is absent or the sign is ambiguous. As reported in Sarvadarśanasaṃgraha and Bṛhaspatisūtra, Cārvāka therefore says anumāna cannot yield reliable knowledge; it merely moves from a perceived sign to an unperceived object without a secure, self-evident connection. The causal mechanism is thus broken: perception gives the sign, but no valid pramāṇa can bridge it to the unperceived, so inference collapses into guesswork. Hence, for Cārvāka, the only ground of certainty is immediate sensory contact; anything beyond it is speculative and cannot be a pramāṇa.

(b) Nyāya distinguishes pramāṇa from pramāṇaphala: the former is the cause or instrument (pratyakṣa, anumāna, etc.), the latter is the resultant valid cognition that is non-misleading. In inference, Nyāya separates svārthānumāna, the knower’s own apprehension of the unperceived object, from parārthānumāna, the five-member syllogism addressed to another. The Buddhist Dignāga, in Pramāṇavārttika, challenges this by identifying pramāṇa and pramāṇaphala with sākṣātkāra, the direct apprehension of the object’s specific character and its capacity to guide action. For him, the cognition is not merely produced by a separate instrument; it is itself the valid act. Thus the debate is causal: Nyāya says an instrument brings about a result, while Dignāga says the result is the instrument’s self-revealing act. The consequence is that Nyāya can retain a distinct epistemic product, whereas Buddhism collapses the distinction into non-misleading apprehension. This also shapes the status of anumāna as a distinct pramāṇa.

(c) Svataḥ prāmāṇyavāda, defended by Kumārila Bhaṭṭa of Mīmāṃsā and by Advaitins such as Māṇḍana Miśra and Dharmarāja Adhyakṣa, holds that a cognition is valid by its own nature. The causal mechanism is immediate: when a cognition arises, it is already trustworthy unless a defect—bad light, disease, or later contradiction—removes that trust. Validity is intrinsic; error is discovered only when a subsequent experience defeats it. By contrast, parataḥ prāmāṇyavāda, especially in Gaṅgeśa Upādhyāya’s Nyāya, holds that validity is not self-evident. A cognition must be established extrinsically through verification, practical success, or anuvyavasthāna. Its corollary, parataḥ apramāṇyavāda, says invalidity too is not intrinsic but is established by external check. Thus Mīmāṃsā and Advaita make the cognition’s own character the ground of trust, while Nyāya makes the relation to later confirmation the ground. The difference is not merely verbal: it determines whether knowledge is self-authenticating or always provisional until verified.

(d) Rāmānuja, in the Śrībhāṣya, argues that Advaita’s māyāvāda is incoherent because avidyā/māyā cannot be neither real nor unreal. He gives seven anupapattis. Avasthā-viśeṣa: if avidyā is real, Brahman is not absolutely one; if unreal, it cannot produce the world. Saṃśaya-doṣa: its ontological status remains doubtful. Pramāṇa-virodha: it contradicts valid cognition, since the world is known through perception. Jñāna-virodha: ignorance cannot be both removed and the ground of experience. Kriyā-virodha: an unreal cause cannot produce real karmic results. Dṛṣṭānta-hāni: the usual examples lose force. The seventh is dṛṣṭāntānupapatti: Advaita cannot give an example for avidyā, because any example would have to be real or unreal, and neither fits. Thus the causal mechanism of māyā fails: it cannot explain how the world arises without making Brahman change or making the world unreal. This is why Viśiṣṭādvaita insists that Brahman’s real qualities and the world are not illusory or merely superimposed.

(e) Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika defend ārambha-vāda, also called asatkārya-vāda: the effect is not pre-existing in the cause but comes into being at the moment of production. The causal mechanism is a combination of five causes. In a pot, clay is upādāna and samavāyi cause, because the pot inheres in the clay through samavāya; the potter is nimitta; the pot’s form and size are asamavāyi; the prior absence of the pot is pratyavāya. Nyāya also speaks of a threefold karaka—upādāna, nimitta and saṃyoga—or, more centrally, of samavāya as the relation binding material cause to effect. This contrasts with Sāṃkhya satkārya-vāda, where the effect already exists in the cause, as thread in cloth. For Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika, causes do not merely reveal a pre-existing effect; they actively produce a new one. Hence production is not transformation of an already present entity but the arising of a new entity from real causes. This preserves the reality of change.

Answer the following questions in about 150 words each : 10×5=50 (a) Explain the ground on which Cārvāka rejects inference…

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