A group blog of scholars exploring Indian philosophy
Compared to the pramāṇa of pratyakṣa (perception) or anumāna (inferential reasoning), arthāpatti (postulation or presumption) has received less attention in contemporary secondary literature. This is unfortunate, since it is broadly recognized as a pramāṇa, whether as a sui generis one, as Continue reading What is arthāpatti?
Our Anand Vaidya has recently raised a very intriguing discussion on modality in Indian philosophy. His post started with the suggestion that modality is less central in Indian philosophy than it is in Western thought. In the comments, several scholars Continue reading Necessity in Mīmāṃsā philosophy
Let us take the abstract form of a Vedic prescription: (A.) Whoever desires to achieve something should sacrifice It is easy for an objector to go on and argue as follows: A Śūdra (i.e., a member of the lowest class) Continue reading Deontic rules at work: A case of conflict
A few days back, I discussed (here) why one should test one’s logical hypotheses against something alien, be it a Medieval paradox or a Sanskrit text (or anything in between). Today, I came back to the same thought while reading Continue reading Why should one engage in non-Western philosophical ideas? Two examples
I am currently working with some amazing colleagues at the Vienna University of Technology on the formalisation of Mīmāṃsā deontic logic (for further information, read this post). One of the problems we are facing is that duties prescribed in Vedic Continue reading Do Mīmāṃsakas think that one “Ought to sacrifice”, or that one “Ought to sacrifice, given the condition x applies”?
In the case of the Śyena and the Agnīṣomīya rituals, violence is once condemned and once allowed, causing long discussions among Mīmāṃsā authors. Similarly, the prohibition to eat kalañja, onion and garlic is interpreted differently than the prohibition to look Continue reading What do I obtain if I refrain from eating onion (and so on)?
The Mīmāṃsā school of Indian philosophy has at its primary focus the exegesis of Sacred Texts (called Vedas), and more specifically of their prescriptive portions, the Brāhmaṇas. This means that the epistemic content conveyed by the Vedas is, primarily, what Continue reading Conveying prescriptions: The Mīmāṃsā understanding of how prescriptive texts function
Hi All, Matthew and Elisa asked me to provide a guest post on a project I am working on. I just spent the last two weeks in Europe, first Belgrade, Serbia and then Aarhus, Denmark working on one of my main Continue reading The Epistemology of Modality: Setting Up the Question for Classical Indian Philosophy–A Guest Post by Anand Vaidya
In a recent exchange with Graham Priest, Massimo Pigliucci (who works mainly in philosophy of science, and Stoicism) takes aim at this notion that most Western philosophers’ disdain for Buddhism has to do with an aversion to contradictions, easily understood if one’s Continue reading Logic, mysticism, both or neither
The datation of Dharmakīrti is a topic I am not competent enough to speak about, but I will nonetheless try to summarise other people’s arguments. The departing point is the traditionally accepted date of Dharmakīrti, namely 600–660, settled by Erich Continue reading (Third day at the IABS:) Franco on the datation of Dharmakīrti and some further thoughts on Dharmakīrti, Dignāga, Kumārila