A group blog of scholars exploring Indian philosophy
What do nouns mean? And what is the difference between nouns and verbs? Pūrva Mīmāṃsā authors are rightly known as having conceived the first textual linguistics in South Asia. In this sense, their theory differs from the Vyākaraṇa one, as Continue reading What is the difference between nouns and verbs (according to Mīmāṃsā authors)? Diaconescu vs. Clooney
Who are the opponents in Kumārila’s Ślokavārttika (henceforth ŚV), chapter on sentence-meaning? And did the ŚV set the standard for all further discussions on the topic?
Who invented the apoha theory? If you, like me, are prone to answer “Dignāga” and to add that Dignāga (as shown by Hattori) was inspired by Bhartṛhari’s theory and that Dharmakīrti and Dharmottara later fine-tuned Dignāga’s one, you are ready Continue reading Who invented the apoha theory? On Kunjunni Raja 1986
Who is the most productive scholar on Indian Philosophy? Kei Kataoka is surely in the top-10 (have a look at his publications here).
There are fields in which the contribution of applied ethics and deontics are more than needed, such as that of the programming of artificial intelligence connected to robots which might interact with human beings. Chaudhuri and Vardi (their article can Continue reading Possible applications of Mīmāṃsā deontics: on Chaudhuri and Vardi
पूर्वमीमांसासूत्रे सू॰ १।१।६ अरभ्य सू॰ १।१।२३ पर्यन्तम् शब्दस्वरूपविषये नैयायिकानां पूर्वपक्षाः प्रदर्शिताः (१।१।६–१।१।११) प्रतिवदिताश्च । १।१।६ विषयं प्रतिजानाति “कर्म एके तत्र दर्शनात्” इति । एके − नैयायिकाः मन्यन्ते, शब्दः कर्मैवास्ति, प्रयत्नानन्तरदर्शनाद् इति यावत् । १।१।७ सूत्रे द्वितीयो हेतुरुक्तः “अस्थानात्” इति । Continue reading मीमांसान्याययोः शब्दविषये विवादः -१-
As I noted some time ago, the principal language of Indian philosophy was Sanskrit. For some thinkers, Sanskrit’s status as a philosophical language was a direct consequence of its privileged position with respect to meaning and truth: the Sanskrit language Continue reading Linguistic accommodation and philosophical debate
The term tuccha means in Classical Sanksrit “worthless”, “insignificant”. In Vedānta, however, it gets a more specific technical meaning, to denote the absolute unreality of chimeral entities, such as the khapuṣpa (flower in the air), which will not and cannot Continue reading What is unreal?
Several years ago I had some pain in convincing a friend working on Husserl that the “phenomenologist” J. Mohanty which he knew too well was the same as the scholar of Sanskrit Philosophy J.N. Mohanty (I had similar problems in Continue reading Will the journey ever come to its goal? On Clooney 2013
Veṅkaṭanātha (traditional dates 1269–1370 (see Neevel 1977 for a convincing explanation of these too long life spans) is a complex figure who can be interpreted in different ways according to the facet one is focusing on. What is sure is Continue reading Veṅkaṭanātha’s contribution to Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta