Gaṅgeśa, the “Great Professor”(mahôpādhyāya), lived in the fourteenthcentury in northeastern India. In Sanskrit, he wrote a philosophicmasterpiece called theJewel solidifying several centuries ofadvances in epistemology and logic within the classical school of“Logic,” Nyāya, and incorporating much of theontology, following Udayana (eleventh century), of a sister school,Vaiśeṣika. By all counts, Gaṅgeśa is one of themajor figures not only in Nyāya but in the whole long and complexhistory of classical philosophy. Gaṅgeśa is traditionallytaken to inaugurate “New” Logic,NavyaNyāya. However, the distinction between “Old” and“New” Nyāya is problematic, since over thetradition’s almost two-thousand-year history there are bothnumerous developments and solid lines of continuity. At no time isthere a decisive revolution, not with Gaṅgeśa, and also notwith Udayana, the Naiyāyika whom Gaṅgeśa follows moreclosely than any other thinker and whom scholars sometimes identify asthe originator of Navya Nyāya. However, Nyāya’smethods of investigation and argumentation on a wide range of topic,and against opponents’ views—Buddhists in the early years,others later—do indeed become increasingly refined, andGaṅgeśa’s work can in several ways be countedpivotal. And however little or great his originality, hisJewel became the central text for Naiyāyikas ofsubsequent centuries, displacing the rich tradition of commentaries ontheNyāya-sūtra (c. 100 CE).

Nyāya is a multi-dimensional system of interlocking views thatbelies the stereotype of Indian philosophy as idealist and mystical inorientation. TheNyāya-sūtra founds a worldviewthat is broadly realist about objects talked about and experiencedeveryday. Gaṅgeśa advances what may be called a reliabilisttheory of knowledge and justification, indeed a super-reliabilism, aninfallibilism for externalists in the sense that sources ofknowledge—perception, inference, analogy, and testimony, hismain focus—are conceived factively. Among his most majoraccomplishments are definitions of knowledge in general and of natural“pervasions” as underpinning inference as well as analysesof conditions governing meaning in knowledge-transfers throughtestimony. He is also known for crisp treatments of the major types offallacy and epistemic defeater. Gaṅgeśa presents, defendingin long passages, (a) an argument for a self as a special type ofsubstance, (b) a theistic argument that illustrates his theory ofdebate and reasoning in great detail, and (c) a defense of thepossibility of “liberation,”mukti, that bothenlivens the views of very early Nyāya—in particularVātsyāyana (c. 400 CE)—and becomes influential inseveral other traditions and schools. Nyāya itself has a livelyliterature that extends to the modern period and, among thetraditionally learned, to our own day.

• 1. Historical particulars
• 2. Categories of possible referent in causal relationship
• 3. Knowledge and certification
  • 3.1 Awareness as presumptively knowledge
  • 3.2 How knowledge is known
• 4. Perception
  • 4.1 Perception as producing knowledge
  • 4.2 Indeterminate cognition of a qualifier
  • 4.3 Apperception
• 5. Inference
  • 5.1 Natural entailment,vyāpti, “pervasion”
  • 5.2 How entailments are known
  • 5.3 The “additional condition,”upādhi, and other fallacies
  • 5.4 Three philosophic inferences
• 6. Analogy
• 7. Testimony
  • 7.1 An irreducible knowledge source
  • 7.2 The meaning of a statement
  • 7.3 “Indirect indication,”lakṣaṇā
• Bibliography
  • A. Primary Literature
  • B. Secondary Literature
• Academic Tools
• Other Internet Resources
• Related Entries

1. Historical particulars

Gaṅgeśa lived in the first half of the fourteenth century,in Mithilā, in northeastern India, where he was a prominentteacher, both of Nyāya, including logic and critical reasoning,and of Mīmāṃsā, the school known for Vedicinterpretation and ritual. Gaṅgeśa endorses Udayana’sVaiśeṣika-infused Nyāya in hisJewel, but hewas also a great master of Mīmāṃsā.Mīmāṃsā is a long-running tradition which, likeNyāya, pronounces on almost every topic imaginable, along withVedic ritual, the school’s specialization, as Nyāya’sis critical reasoning. Gaṅgeśa knew wellMīmāṃsaka positions in both of its major branches, theBhāṭṭa (after Kumārila Bhaṭṭa of theseventh century), and the Prābhākara (afterKumārila’s renegade student, Prabhākara). AndGaṅgeśa may be supposed to have learned the standardcurricula in the grammarian literature, the epic poems, etc., some ofwhich he cites, for example, Pāṇini (c. 500 BCE), and, inseveral places, theBhagavad Gītā.

Bhattacharya cites data from literary and other sources, and in abouta dozen pages devoted to Gaṅgeśa (1958: 96–109)providestermini a quo et ad quem—1300 and 1350 for hisperiod of flourishing—from evidence that has not been correctedto date. Genealogical records kept in Mithilā suggest that he hada wife and three sons and a daughter. One child was the famousNyāya author, Vardhamāna. Gaṅgeśa apparentlyachieved quite some fame during his lifetime, referred to as“jagad-guru,” which would be the rough equivalentof “Distinguished University Professor” for theeducational institutions of his time.

About the person little more is known. AboutGaṅgeśa’s reputation, Bhattacharya says (1958: 109):“The work of Gaṅgeśa became highly popular very soonand was studied and commented upon in various centers of culture ofIndia. It not only cast the works of the old school of logic intooblivion but the neo-logical works of his predecessors also faded intoinsignificance and were gradually were forgotten due to itsoverwhelming popularity and all-embracing character.” Concerningthe part on inference, the learned sanskritist writes (1958: 107,108): “The second part on Anumāna (Inference) is by far themost popular, though the most intricate of the whole book. …The latest phase of Navyanyāya studies in India for about twocenturies flowed through a large number of channels cut by singlesentences or phrases of this part of Gaṅgeśa’s workand by far the widest channel emerged from the general definition ofFallacy. It has now assumed proportions through the efforts of all thebest Indian brains in Navyanyāya, which is a world’s wonderin the field of intellectual feats … .”

TheJewel has four chapters, each devoted to a source ofknowledge: perception, inference, analogy, and testimony. Within achapter are clearly delineated sections on various subtopics includinglong reflections, mainly in the first chapter, concerning knowledge ingeneral and how it is known. Gaṅgeśa is lucid and precise,leading the reader into a preferred position by careful examination ofalternatives.

2. Categories of possible referent in causal relationship

Gaṅgeśa’s central focus is epistemology, not ontologyor metaphysics, but his analyses rely on a centuries-old ontologicalsystem. In all four chapters of theJewel, he addressesontological issues, especially the topics of universals and of theontological relation of qualification that is reflected in knowledgeof something as qualified by a qualifier, “That’s acow,” for instance, which would be an instance of knowledge ofan individual as qualified by the universal being-a-cow.

The system that Gaṅgeśa takes over is inherited inparticular from his “teacher” Udayana. In a dozentreatises, Udayana merges the separate literature and worldview ofVaiśeṣika—its advocates sometimes called“Atomists” —with Nyāya’s. Udayana alsoadded the category of absence to theVaiśeṣika-sūtra’s six, so that thereare seven basic types of things possibly referred to in technicalworks as in everyday life:

1. Substance: four atomic substances, earth, water, fire, and airatoms and their combinations; a “material” substance thatis non-atomic, ether, the medium of sound; time; space; mind(manas); self (ātman)
2. Quality: properties that dwell in, qualifying substances such ascolor, weight, shape, and so on along with relational properties suchas conjunction
3. Motion: movements such as going-up which, like qualities, dwell insubstances
4. Universals: recurrent properties, and meta-properties, thatqualify qualities, blueness, for example, and motions, going-up-hoodas a class characteristic, as well as substances, for example,earthenness and mountainhood
5. Individualizers: properties inherent in individual atoms andselves (individualizer is not a category discussed byGaṅgeśa)
6. Inherence: ontic glue binding qualities, motions, and universalsto the things they qualify
7. Absence: four general types admitting further subdivisions andinnumerable instances: prior absence (the pot the potter contemplatesbefore producing it in the clay, with the pot as the“counterpositive,” i.e., what is absent), destruction (forexample, of a pot), mutual absence (the distinction of one thing fromanother: a pot isnot a cloth), and locatable (called“absolute,”atyantâbhāva, as apot’s not being on the floor, or as my glasses not being on mydesk, where the glasses are the “counterpositive” and thedesk the locus): ‘\(\neg Ha\)’ means \(H\) is absent at\(a\), where “\(H\)” is the counterpositive to the absence(an absence ofall pots on a floor would have pothood as thecounterpositive)

There are also properties and entities that do not fit very well intothe typology. Some philosophers after Gaṅgeśa rework thesystem, but Gaṅgeśa himself is ontologically conservative,presenting arguments for its expansion in various ways withoutendorsement.

Gaṅgeśa also inherits a causal schema that is crucial tohis theory of knowledge. Perception and the other sourcesgenerate knowledge instances, in the sense of being the“chief instrumental cause.” To understand this, we have toknow that there are most generally three varieties of cause-effectrelationship:

1. Inherent, as blue in a lotus, cowhood in cows
2. Co-inherent, “emergent,” as the color of threadsdetermining the color of cloth
3. Instrumental, including both agential causes, such as a potter fora pot, and non-agential, such as the stick used to turn the wheel

Gaṅgeśa, like other Naiyāyikas, also works with thedistinction between the necessary and the sufficient, sufficientcausality being a whole bundle of causal conditions, including generalones such as time and space. A source of knowledge is a process ofknowledge generation, and each has, like all causal processes, adistinct “trigger.” More accurately, this would be themost evident causal factor from our point of view which is typicallythe instrumental cause that, when all the other causal conditionsnecessary for an effect are in place, brings it about. The trigger ofperceptual knowledge is said to be connection of a sensory organ withan object to be known. The trigger of knowledge by inference is saidto be reflection on a property of an object as pervadedby—invariably associated with—another property, the formercalled the prover—the pervaded—and the latter theprobandum—the pervader. The trigger of testimonial knowledge issaid to be the statement of a trustworthy expert as comprehended bythe hearer, a trustworthy expert being defined as someone who knowsthe truth and wants to communicate it faithfully, without lying ordeceiving. Causal relations are especially important because knowledgeof the occurrence of an effect allows the knower to infer any one ormore of its necessary conditions, as perception of smoke rising from amountain allows one to infer fire. Furthermore, recognizing aparticular knowledge source by its trigger is one way to certify aresult, an instance of testimonial knowledge for instance.

Gaṅgeśa often utilizes a simpler ontological schema in hisanalyses of the generation of knowledge: an instance of knowledge isabout, at a minimum, aqualifier-qualificandum, the hyphenstanding for the qualificative relation, also discussed, withqualificanda as property-bearers, anything we can talk about,including universals and supervenient properties such as similarity,and qualifiers as qualities or universals or even mind-imposedproperties that, as suggested, do not seem to have a place in thetraditional layout. No matter, we can deal with these later, seems tobe Gaṅgeśa’s attitude, as he proceeds to focus onknowledge and its generators.

Gaṅgeśa’s Nyāya embraces realism along severaldimensions, realism in the sense of commitment to entities that existindependently of consciousness. There are, however, exceptions in theproperties of a self along with some others that do requireconsciousness to occur. Knowledge itself and other mental phenomenaare counted as reals and knowable intersubjectively, for instance.Realism leads Naiyāyikas to embrace fallibilism from very early,because the transcendence, so to say, of a physical object to theinstruments of knowledge is seen to mean that the possibility of errorcannot be ruled out—except in the case of apperception,according to Gaṅgeśa (see below). TheJewel isfilled out with numerous definitional projects where the definienda(instances of knowledge, for example, as well as physical objects),are realities. And all individuals of whatever fundamental type(substance, quality, motion, universal, inherence, individuator, andabsence) are viewed as reals, although the mind can create fictions.Against Buddhist subjectivists, it is argued that the components offalse and fictional awarenesses themselves indicate reals. Gold andmountains are real but maybe not a gold mountain. More about illusionand other instances of non-knowledge in practically every subsectionbelow.

3. Knowledge and certification

The target of epistemological evaluations in classical India is notbelief but rather cognition, which, however, like belief in the West,is viewed as propositional. Buddhists, Naiyāyikas,Mīmāṃsakas, and others address the issue of how aproposition-laden cognition is known to be true, or false, for thatmatter. Against Mīmāṃsakas in particular,Gaṅgeśa advances an “extrinsicality” position.Although presumptive presentations of “fresh news” throughany of the sources—perception and the others—are naturallyand automatically taken to be veridical, according toGaṅgeśa’s Nyāya, it requires a separatecognitive act to determine whether a cognition is knowledge or“non-knowledge.” An awareness, an “experience”(anubhava, a term used technically in the system), defined aswhat a person takes to be presentation of news—i.e., takesautomatically to be new information without self-consciousness aboutthe matter—is presumptively knowledge but on occasion is eitherfalse or not produced by a genuine knowledge source, perception,inference, or testimony (analogy is, for Gaṅgeśa,restricted to learning the meaning of words). According toMīmāṃsā, certification is intrinsic to theapparent presentation. Gaṅgeśa’s refutation centerson an alleged phenomenology of doubt and knowing that one knows. Ifthe Mīmāṃsaka position were correct, it would not bepossible to doubt the veridicality of, for example, a perception thatis indeed an instance of knowledge, being both veridical and producedin the right way. But it is possible, he says.

Certification happens through success in action as well as sourceidentification, and the sources are known mainly by inference fromcertain tell-tale signs called “merits,”guṇa, while falsification occurs through recognizingtell-tale signs of pseudo-sources called “flaws,”doṣa. Various fallacies, for example, are flaws withrespective to putative knowledge as determined by way of inference. Incertain cases, however, in contrast to the norm, there is practicallyself-certification, as the Mīmāṃsakas claim. Forexample, perception is like that with knowing that there is a smallpiece ofāmalaka fruit in the palm of your hand. Muchdiscussion throughout theJewel centers on certificationconditions, some of which figure in the definitions of the severalsources. There is also much concern with specification of the trigger,or triggers, of the workings of the sources, which not only can serveto define them but whose identification is one way certificationproceeds.

3.1 Awareness as presumptively knowledge

The processes of perception, inference, analogy, and testimonygenerate “awareness,”anubhava, a technical term,as mentioned, meaning “presentation of fresh news.” Nonon-veridical awarenesses are produced from the sources, but there areof course occasions when we are fooled. There are pseudo-sources,processes closely resembling the true ones, but flawed in some way andgenerating wrong results. Consonantly, there are awarenesses that atthe time we take to be telling us something true in the usualfashions—by perception and the rest—but are actually falseor not produced correctly. These are instances of“non-knowledge,”apramā, contrasting withpramā, “knowledge,” entailing truth andright production.

Pragmatic considerations reinforce our natural tendency to take thedeliverances of the sources to be veridical. We couldn’t getalong in the world without knowledge, as Naiyāyikas as early asVātsyāyana stress (1996: 2). This is a recurrent theme.Gaṅgeśa relies on “pragmatic contradiction” torefute a skeptic about inference in theJewel’s“Hypothetical Reasoning” section (2020: 647–51):

When there is doubt, there is no regular pattern of behavior. Whenthere is a regular pattern, doubt does not occur. Thus it has beensaid (by Udayana): “That is doubted concerning which as doubtedthere occurs no contradiction with the doubter’saction.”

For it is not possible at once to resort regularly to fire and thelike for smoke and the like and to doubt that fire causes it. This ishow we should understand the saying.

Thus we may reject the argument that contradiction—understood asnatural opposition (virodha), governing precisely which Fcannot occur along with precisely which G—cannot block aninfinite regress. It is the doubter’s own behavior that provesthe lie to the doubt, that blocks it (pratibandhaka).

It may be true that repeated observation (“even hundreds oftimes”) is insufficient to guarantee knowledge of a pervasion(pervasions underpin the natural entailments on which inferencedepends). Not all things made out of earth are scratchable by iron;diamonds, recently discovered, are a counterexample. Defendingpervasion-knowledge nevertheless, Gaṅgeśa cites this casein admitting that the possibility of a counterexample cannot beeliminated, at least generally speaking. But we do grasp pervasions,and often meaningful doubt can be done away with. Absolute freedomfrom doubt is not required to have knowledge. And knowledge guidesaction. We may be wrong in any particular case, but we act on thebasis of the regularities in nature we take ourselves to be aware of,automatically making inferences producing knowledge.

The same goes for perception, analogy, and testimony. With testimony,for example, we may be aware of a defeater, a speaker’s being aliar, for instance, but in such a case we do not take ourselves to bepresented with news. Perceptual and other awarenesses do not occurwhen blocked, when defeated in this way. A good example is the fallacycalledbādhita, “defeated in advance.” Noinference purporting to show that fire is cold can be successfulbecause we already know it’s hot. But of course some defeatersoccur to us only later, and for a time we are fooled. In the market,we learn that the piece of shell we thought was silver is really onlymother-of-pearl. Awarenesses are presumptively knowledge, but are alsodefeasible. The exception concerns certain matters known byapperception (see below), which, Gaṅgeśa argues, are knownwithout the possibility of being wrong.

In sum, the defeasibility character of Gaṅgeśa’stheory of knowledge centers on the fact that apparently trustworthysources of information at times mislead. But in those cases it is notreally the knowledge sources, perception, and the rest, that are atwork but rather close imitators. Knowledge sources(pramāṇa) themselves are inerrant. This makes theconcept of the apparent source central(pramāṇâbhāsa): “You can’treallysee John from this distance.” Awarenessnaturally taken to be informative is presumptively true but thepresumption can be defeated. It can also be certified. Defeating andcertifying belong to a second-level of knowing where we areself-conscious about justification. But there, too, we give thebenefit of the doubt,bādhakam vinā, “unlessthere is a defeater.” In this way there is no justificationregress as feared by Western foundationalists and alleged by thesecond-century Buddhist Nāgārjuna (1978).

3.2 How knowledge is known

It is difficult to appreciate Gaṅgeśa’s reflection oncertification without knowing something about theMīmāṃsaka positions, called in general“self-certification,” which he attacks. Self-certificationis embraced also by Yogācāra Buddhist philosophers, butGaṅgeśa focuses mainly on the arguments ofPrābhākaras as voiced in particular by the ninth-centuryauthor Śālikanātha (1961). It seems thatMīmāṃsakas would secure the authority of Vedictestimony for rituals and various rules of everyday life effortlessly,one suspects in overview, by maintaining that knowledge isself-certifying. Gaṅgeśa focuses, however, on perceptualknowledge, which, he maintains, can, in certain circumstances, both bedoubted and later certified as knowledge. “I wouldn’t nowbe drinking water, if the awareness had not been knowledge. But I amnow drinking, satisfying my thirst, and the awareness was knowledgeindeed” (translator’s comments,Jewel 2020: 109).In this case, the certification comes by way of an inference. Sourceidentification is another way of capturing the point. It is byinference that one determines that an awareness-generating process isindeed perception, perception that is factively conceived. A genuinesource never misleads. Only “pseudo-sources” do.

There are different signs whereby one knows that an instance ofinferential knowledge is both true and produced in the right way. Dowe really know the premises, in particular the alleged“pervasion,”vyāpti? For testimony,certification conditions are the speaker’s being a trustworthyexpert along with conditions governing what it is to be a properstatement and of course certain hearer conditions. And in certaincases there is, admittedly, self-certification. But theMīmāṃsakas are wrong to take that to be the generalrule.

4. Perception

As with the English word ‘perception’, the Sanskrit‘pratyakṣa’ so translated is used for boththe process of sensory connection with an object perceived and as theresultant awareness. In common Sanskrit, the word‘pratyakṣa’, etymologically “beforethe eyes,” means something like “experientiallyevident” when used as an adjective and “immediateexperience” or “sense experience” as a noun.Internal perceptions as of thought and emotion, pleasure and pain, andindeed of a “self,”ātman, are considered inNyāya to be mediated by a “mind” or, in a bettertranslation, an “internal organ,”manas. Aperception that targets a preceding perception or another cognition ormental event is given a special word,‘anuvyayasāya’, “apperception,”literally an “after-cognition,” a type of perception thatis especially important in cross-school controversy. The internalorgan,manas, also serves the function of channelinginformation from sense organs and bringing it together in perceptualknowledge for a self. Such a mental organ is denied by Buddhistadversaries and others in other schools, and is hotly debated withinNyāya.

4.1 Perception as producing knowledge

The processes of production of sensory awareness vary with modalityand with the type of thing perceived, earthen, watery, etc., universalor particular, a group of things, something external or internal, andin ways peculiar to perceivers. Nevertheless, there are commonalities,especially when it comes to the questions of epistemology, mostprominently that innumerable instances of knowledge are sensorilyproduced. But awareness produced by the senses is not howGaṅgeśa defines perceptual knowledge. If what wasconsidered an instance of knowledge is discovered to be in fact afalse belief, then we say in English that there was no knowledge inthe first place, only a belief that was considered true and warranted.The same logic holds for Gaṅgeśa’s‘pratyakṣa’: if what was considered aperceptual awareness is discovered to be in fact non-veridical, thenit is said that there was no perception in the first place, only anawareness that was considered veridical and produced by an organ ofsense.

Thus there may be here only a verbal unity achieved cheaply, but it isimportant to know that Gaṅgeśa works with thisunderstanding of the term. Perhaps this is why he spends section aftersection in his “perception” chapter examining particularproblems with objects known such as air, the sound of one’s ownson’s voice in a “tumultuous racket,” universals andthe types of sensory relation occurrent in knowledge thereof, apparentsimultaneous perception, and perception of perception itself. Hischapter is full of phenomenological insights, but the science herelies on to understand the operations of the several sense organs isobviously antiquated. Epistemologically, however, the goal is toseparate the pseudo-source that generates non-knowledge (awarenessthat appears to to be true but is not or is not produced in theassumed way) from the genuine, and the science is often not relevantconsidering the signs of knowledge and non-knowledge. The longestsection of the chapter is devoted to a general account of illusion as“appearance of something as other than as it is,”anyathā-khyāti-vāda.

In illusion, Gaṅgeśa says, the presentation ofF-hood—silverhood, for example, in the illusion of“seeing” a piece of shell as silver, and saying,“Silver,” when it’s reallymother-of-pearl—originates in things’ really being F,through previous knowledge of F-hood, real bits of silver in theworld. The silverhood predication in the verbalization of theperception-like experience is available to become illusory predicationcontent through previous experience of silver. It gets fused into acurrent perception-like event by means of a foul-up in the normalcausal process through the arousing of a silverhood memory-disposition(saṃskāra) formed by previous experience ofsilver, or, possibly, by testimony. The content or intentionality ofan illusion is to be explained causally as generated by real featuresof real things just as is genuine perception although they aredistinct cognitive types. To repeat, genuine perception is factive;illusion is a perception-imitator (“You don’t really seeMaitra because that’s Chaitra”).

Perception gets content not only from the object in connection withthe sense organ but also from the classificational power of the mindor self. With the perceptual awareness, “That’s apot,” for instance, the pot as an individual in connection witha sensory faculty is responsible for the cognition of aproperty-bearer, for what is called the qualificandum portion of theperception, without admixture of memory, but the sensory connection isnot by itself responsible for the qualifier portion, the pothood, alsoidentified as the “predication content”(prakāra, the verbalizable “way” somethingappears), the thing’s classification as a pot. Theclassificational power of the mind should not, however, be understoodas innate so much as the product of experience over the course of alifetime. Repeatable features of reality get impressed on the mind orself in the form of memory dispositions. That is, in perceivinga as an F, normally an F-saṃskāra formedby previous knowledge-source-produced bits of awareness of things Fwould be a causal factor. The perception’s own content includesthe repeatable nature of the qualifier through the operation of thisfactor. We see the tree as a tree, and it is a tree in fact.

4.2 Indeterminate cognition of a qualifier

The idea of indeterminate perception is a latecomer in Nyāyatradition. Gautama, Vātsyānana, and Uddyotakara, whosewritings form the core of the early school, do not recognize anindeterminate type of perception. The tenth-century authorVācaspati introduces the notion into the system (1996: 111).Gaṅgeśa is clearly aware of this history, for he opens hisdiscussion by echoing Vācaspati’s commentary onNyāya-sūtra 1.1.4 where, in considering theNyāya-sūtra’s definition of perception,Vācaspati takes the two words‘avyapadeśya’ (“non-verbal”) and‘vyavasāyâtmaka’(“definite”) as indicating two types of perception,indeterminate and determinate. Udayana and Gaṅgeśa followhim, but there seems to have been some dissension among laterNaiyāyikas (Sibajiban Bhattacharyya 1990: 172–6).

Determinate perception, i.e., perceptual knowledge, is concept-laden,a cognizing of a qualificandumthrough a qualifier. Thingshave multiple properties some of which normally go undetected on anygiven occasion of experience. One can see Devadatta without seeing hisback. Wholes are implicit in their parts, the very notion of whichmakes no sense cut off from that of the whole: parts are parts of awhole. If the ontological layering of things having qualifiers werenot reflected in a causal ordering of an indeterminate perceptionfeeding, so to say, the determinate, then perception of aqualificandum should entail that the “thick” particular bepresented, i.e., the thing with all its properties, and, asGaṅgeśa argues, a blind person in touching a yellow pieceof cloth would know its color as yellow (2020: 359–60). The ideaof indeterminate perception picking up just one or another feature ofthings is thus tied to Nyāya realism. The idea historically,however, was taken over from Buddhists, it seems (Perrett: 2016).

In a thought experiment, Gaṅgeśa imagines a childencountering a cow for the very first time (2020: 560). He argues thatthe child can grasp the concept of cowhood and, had she the rightwords, could say, correctly, “That’s a cow,” eventhough she has had no previous experience of cows. The cowhoodpredication content is supplied by what is called“indeterminate” cognition of the qualifier, a first stage,so to say, of the sensory information flow. According toGaṅgeśa, such indeterminate cognition has to be posited tounderstand how we have, on the whole, workable concepts of things. Theargument is that in a typical case of a first-time perceptualawareness of, for instance, a cow, there is a prior stage in thecausal process that is an indeterminate cognition, indeterminate inthat cowness is cognized but not as related to the particular cow, thequalificandum of the ensuing determinate perception. All other casesof cognition of an entity as qualified have a prior cognition of thequalifier as a causal factor. It is thus reasonable that the case of afirst-time perception does as well. But since here clearly we do nothave a mental disposition (saṃskāra) at work,indeterminate cognition has to be posited.

Something like indeterminate perception is posited by moderatefoundationalists in analytic epistemology as helping to solve theproblem of a justification regress, it seems (Phillips 2012: 50). Amental state not embedding an assertion and so immune to questionswhether it is true or false is proposed. BonJour (2003: 20): “… such a state is, as it were, semi-assertive orsemi-judgmental in character: it has a kind of content or cognitivesignificance, but not in a way that would raise a further issue ofjustification.” Such a comparison could be misleading, however.Perception, according to Gaṅgeśa, is a doxastic justifier.The foundations of our worldly beliefs are doxastic in thatdeterminate perceptions embed propositions that say at a minimum thatsomething is some way or another. Concept-free perception may bethought of as Nyāya’s way of rendering our ability to formconcepts merely from perception’s phenomenological side. It is atheoretical posit made to explain how our concepts originate inreality—a problem that is epitomized in cases of a first-timeperception of something as an F, the concept F-hood being previouslyunavailable to the perceiver.

4.3 Apperception

“Apperception,”anuvyavasāya, is defined asa perception taking a preceding cognition or another psychologicalproperty as its object, typically a scoping cognition in relation toanother scoped (Phillips 2012: 48–50). Efforts and desires canbe similarly targeted. Through apperception, Gaṅgeśaclaims, one knows infallibly the intentionality, the“objecthood,”viṣayatā, of thecognition scoped, in its qualificandum, qualifier, and relationalportions. One knows, in other words, what the scoped purports to beabout, and one knows this independently of a determination of thetarget’s being knowledge or not. Gaṅgeśa argues thatsince the sensory connection in this case is not mediated by amaterial organ, apperception is infallible about the contents of thescoped, but not of course about its truth. He devotes a long sectionof his perception chapter to defending this and other views aboutapperception in the face of opponents claiming he is giving up centralplanks of his theory.

Apperception makes certification possible because it sets up the itemto be certified, showing the type of cognition the scoped is. Ourapperceptive ability to determine whether the scoped cognition isputatively perceptual, inferential, analogical, testimonial, or ofanother character has epistemic relevance, since, as with allperception, there would be a presumption in favor of its correctness.Thus there would also be restoration of a presumption of the truth fora scoped cognition that had been brought into doubt were it judged tobe perceptual, inferential, analogical, or testimonial in character,although further examination might prove the identification wong. Notethat if further examination were called for, its direction would bedetermined by the apperception of cognitive type. For, the criteria ofgenuine perception, inference, and the rest vary according to origin.The characteristic epistemic merits and flaws (guṇa anddoṣa) are very different for each knowledge source andthere are also significant differences within species of perception inparticular. Thus apperceptive judgment of putative type directsinquiry, telling us what to check.

Corollary to Gaṅgeśa’s thesis of the apperceptibilityof cognitive types is his view that illusion can be scoped such thatthere too we find, abstractly, a cognition of an object as qualifiedby a qualifier, for example, of a piece of tin appearing to be silver.He also presents the argument that the fact that we can later see thesame thing as really the tin it is shows that the illusion is a singlecognition and not, contra the Prābhākara, two cognitions, aperception and a remembering along with a failure to notice theirdifference. But scoping an illusory awareness is supposed to showthis, too, and in a particularly dramatic way when one knows that thecognition is illusory while it continues, such as apparent sight of adouble moon or a person with hepatitis seeing a wall she knows iswhite as yellow. Although apperception is said not in itself to beable to determine the veridicality of an awareness, in such a case thesubject practically sees one thing (the wall) appearing to besomething it is not (yellow),anyathā-khyāti.

5. Inference

Gaṅgeśa’s contributions to understanding theknowledge source called “inference,”anumāna, and “inferential knowledge,”anumiti, come on top of a long history of advances bothwithin Nyāya and outside, from Yogācāra Buddhistlogicians and epistemologists, in particular, but also others.Gaṅgeśa was a great student of philosophy. Most of thetechnical system can be found in his near predecessor,Maṇikaṇṭha Miśra (1953), and discussions offallacies echo the seventh-century Buddhist Dharmakīrti (1993)and others. However, his treatment of inference is, arguably, moreelaborate than that of any predecessor, and, as is his usual practice,he examines a host of similar definitions of key items, such as“pervasion,” as well as many opponent positions beforedefending one or more of his own.

Considering the development of logic in the West, it important to keepin mind that inference throughout Nyāya is part of epistemology.Something about the world is known by any veritable inference. Aninference must have premises that are themselves known. Nyāyaphilosophers do not distinguish between a formally valid deductiveargument (which may or may not have false premises) and deductivearguments that are “cogent” (with no unjustified premisesand no errors).

A set of logical terms is standard across Nyāya and most of theother classical schools, and Gaṅgeśa both uses them andprovides his own precise definitions:

pakṣa	(a) inferential subject; a mountain in a stockexample
sādhana	(\(H\)) prover (‘hetu’ is a synonym);smokiness
sādhya	(\(S\)) probandum, the property to be proved; fieriness
vyāpti	\(\forall x (Hx \to Sx)\) inference-grounding pervasion; “Wherever smoke, there fire”

For example, he characterizes an inferential subject,pakṣa (2020: 734):

An inferential subject (pakṣa) occurs where there is noknowledge source that has positively established something incoördination with an absence of a desire to know. Thus, that isnot an inferential subject if there is a knowledge source that hasalready positively established whateverand no desire to know(it by inference). … This is what it is to be an inferentialsubject (as a factor in the generation of inferential knowledge).Admittedly, this definition does not differentiate it from anything,since to be an inferential subject is a property with universal scope(anything can be an inferential subject, qualities as well assubstances, universals as well as particulars, and so on).Nevertheless, the way the word ‛pakṣa’ isused has been explained.

A stock example of an inference:

1. \(Ha\) (The mountain is smoky.)
2. \(\forall x (Hx \to Sx)\) (Whatever is smoky is fiery.)
3. \(Sa\) (The mountain is fiery.)

Gaṅgeśa devotes several long sections of the chapter toissues surrounding the inductive support that inferential knowledgepresumes, a basis for the proper formation of the inference-informingsaṃskāra or “mental disposition”responsible for a subject’s being able to remember (in a crucialmental event called “reflection,”parāmarśa) avyāpti or inclusion ofall things \(H\) as also things \(S\). This is the“example.”

dṛṣṭānta

\(Hb,Sb\) & \(\neg Hc, \neg Sc\) pervasion-supportiveexample, a location known to possess both the prover and the probandum(a fiery kitchen hearth); also, a known absence of the prover wherethere is a known absence of the probandum.

Inference-grounding “pervasions,”vyāpti,are of different sorts, but they all obtain in nature, such as thatbetween smokiness and fieriness. Gaṅgeśa and allNaiyāyikas are much occupied with pervasions, their nature andhow they are known.

5.1 Natural entailment,vyāpti, “pervasion”

After rejecting twenty-four attempts—close attempts—todefine the natural relation of pervasion such that the presence of apervaded property at a location proves that another, the pervader, isthere, too, Gaṅgeśa endorses the following characterization(2020: 623):

Pervasion,vyāpti, is a prover \(H\)’s having itslocations shared by a probandum \(S\) so long as \(S\) when specifiedas the counterpositive of an absolute absence (i.e., as \(\neg S\))has shared locations, shared with the absence of the prover (i.e.,with \(\neg H\): no \(\neg S\) occurs on anything that is not also a\(\neg H\)), and if shared with something that is the counterpositiveof such an absence (\(H\)) also does not share it there (in the caseof a non-locus-pervading property).

All \(H\) are \(S\) so long as there are no \(\neg S\) that share alocation with something that is not a \(\neg H\). That is, there willbe pervasion given co-locatedness so long as what the \(S\) is,according to the definition, is not something that in serving as thecounterpositive of an absence—specifically a counterpositivehaving shared locations, a universal, a class character, a repeatableproperty and not a particular instance (firehood as opposed to, say,kitchen fire)—does not share any location that does not alsohouse a \(\neg H\). Goekoop (1967: 111) has a nice paraphrase thatmakes the point a little clearer: “There is a pervasion of \(H\)by \(S\) if and only if \(H\) has a common locus with \(S\) in such away that \(S\) is none of the things that qua class are completelyabsent from some locus of \(H\).”

Gaṅgeśa’s definition is supposed to solve a problemconcerning inferences about non-locus-pervading properties, such as amonkey-conjunction in a tree, a case on which many of the rejecteddefinitions floundered. “This tree possesses amonkey-conjunction,since it is this tree (which always hasmonkeys)” is a good inference even though the tree at its rootshas the ruled-out sort of counterpositive according to the definition.Inferences involving conjunctions are ruled in if the \(S\) is aproperty that while not present at \(l\) along with the \(H\) in somespecified portion of \(l\) is not so overall, that is, at or in allportions of \(l\). The location \(l\) would be something that isindeed \(S\) in some portion, as a tree does have a monkey in itsbranches though not at its roots.

5.2 How entailments are known

Inferences put forth for others (parârtha) make plainthe conditions that work with oneself (svârtha)automatically, and in texts of philosophy little is automatic. Thusbuilt into the conception of the operation of inference are theinductive procedures whereby a pervasion is known. Putatively similarinstances,sapakṣa, are defined as cases known topossess the probandum and thus should also, at least in one (as firstinsisted by the Buddhist Dignāga), exhibit the prover (e.g.,\(Hb\) and \(Sb\))—while putatively dissimilar instances,vipakṣa, are defined as cases known not to possess theprobandum and thus should lack the prover, too (e.g., \(\neg Sc\) and\(\neg Hc\)). The example,dṛṣṭānta,is normally a single instance ofsapakṣa where theprover also occurs (\(Hb\) and \(Sb\)), its citing thus indicatingthat there is inductive support. In other words, by reference to casesthat aresapakṣa —i.e., known instances of theprobandum—where the prover is also found, positive evidence ismarshalled to support an inference-underpinning pervasion(anvaya, “positive correlation”). And byreference to cases that arevipakṣa —i.e., knowninstances of the absence of the probandum—further support isgarnered by our not finding the prover (vyatireka,“negative correlation”). Citing an example is shorthand toindicate that such a procedure supports assertion of avyāpti, “pervasion” or general rule.Gaṅgeśa devotes several sections of theJewel’s inference chapter to elucidating inferencesbased on bothsapakṣa andvipakṣa, aswell as those based exclusively onsapakṣa(“positive-only inference”) and exclusively onvipakṣa (“negative-only inference”). Ingeneral, it is “wide experience,”bhūyo-darśana, that is responsible forpervasion-knowledge. But this term, championed by Udayana, and others,is vague, and Gaṅgeśa devotes several sections to inductivemethod.

There is also “hypothetical reasoning,”tarka,which, although not itself a knowledge source, is said to be able toshift the balance of what it is rational to accept. Its main role isto help people grasp pervasions, and is an important supplement to theinferences that are central to philosophic controversies.Gaṅgeśa explainstarka as a hypothetical argumentrevealing a fallacy or defeater with respect to a position∼p opposed to another positionp that is to beaccepted so long asp has independent evidence in its favor,technically called,pratikūla-tarka. There is, however,alsoanukūla-tarka, “supportive reasoning,”such as economy of conception, that is positive in character. Thetypes oftarka that Gaṅgeśa recognizes are: (1)ātmâśraya, “self-dependence”(begging the question), (2)anyonyâśraya,“mutual dependence” (mutual presupposition), (3)cakraka, “circularity” (reasoning in a circle),(4)anavasthā “infinite regress,” (5)aniṣṭa-prasaṅga, “unwantedconsequence” (contradiction), (6)prathama-upasthitatva, “being presupposed by theother,” the “first established” (a form ofanukūla, “favorable,”tarka), (7)utsarga, “hasty generalization,” (8)vinigamanā-viraha, “differentiationfailure,” (9)lāghava, “economy ofconception,” “theoretic lightness” (another form offavorabletarka), and (10)gaurava, “lack ofeconomy of conception,” “theoretic heaviness”(Bagchi 1951: 151).

Gaṅgeśa devotes a section of his inference chapter totarka where he shows “pragmatic contradiction”also to be included, which was mentioned above in connection with hisrejection of skepticism and defense of knowledge as the default forawareness. That passage begins (2020: 649):

As an example, consider the particular doubt about smoke as pervadedby fire. If smoke is not produced from a set of causes excluding fire,then smoke, as not produced from a causal complex including fire,would not be produced (a conclusion in contradiction, presumably, withthe doubter’s belief that smoke is produced). Now doubt (againstthis hypothetical reasoning): Could the smoke come to be fromsomething that is not fire? Or just in some instances could it come tobe without fire? Or could it come to be simply by chance(ahetuka, “without a cause”)?

Were a subject \(M\) who has ascertained thoroughgoing positivecorrelations (\(S\) where \(H\)) and negative correlations (where no\(S\), no \(H\)), to doubt that an effect might arise without a cause,then—to take up the example of smoke and fire—why should\(M\), as \(M\) does in a rulewise manner, resort to fire for smoke,to food to allay hunger, and to speech to communicate to anotherperson?

Gaṅgeśa argues thattarka is useful for—aswe might say these days—reëstablishing a presumption oftruth in favor of one or another thesis brought into doubt. Forexample, by supposing the truth of an opponent’s thesis andshowing how it leads to unacceptable consequences, one repossesses apresumption of truth, provided one’s own thesis is supported byat least the appearance of a knowledge source and, further, that ithas not itself been ruled out. Thustarka comprises argumentsthat are not in themselves knowledge-generators but capablenonetheless of showing what we should and should not believe. Inparticular, reasoning can show “untoward ramifications”(prasaṅga) of not accepting a conclusion that isevidenced, Gaṅgeśa says. Forms oftarka such asself-contradiction, infinite regress, and circular reasoning areemployed in the dialogic exchanges constructed in theJeweland other works of later and indeed early Nyāya philosophy and,for that matter, all the philosophic schools.

5.3 The “additional condition,”upādhi, and other fallacies

Inferential awareness, like the other types, is defeasible, and whilewe have every right to accept, and act on, undefeated inferences, weare sometimes wrong. In particular, knowledge and justification do notpass from premises to conclusion if we become aware of anupādhi, an “additional condition,” whichwould be a blocker of “reflection” through undermining thegeneralization on which such reflection depends. Thus awareness of anupādhi is a preventer of inferential knowledge, a“defeater,” leading to belief relinquishment by someonewho has hitherto not noticed the condition and who has erroneouslyarrived at a conclusion on the basis of a falsely induced,pseudo-pervasion. A rough (and non-classical) example: I know that Alhas a temper that will flare up in certain circumstances from havingwitnessed many tantrums such that I expect that Al will explode bymaking an inference when I see that the circumstances obtain, buthaving overlooked that it is only with Belle that Al is so irascibleand Belle not being present in the circumstances where I expect, bypseudo-inference, Al’s temper to flare, Belle would be theupādhi, the “additional condition.”Discussion of the concept occupies more than a tenth ofGaṅgeśa’s long inference chapter.

Theupādhi (\(U\)) has a negative character, serving, atleast in the first place, to undermine a putative inferentialconclusion by showing that the pervasion—all \(H\) as \(S\), aprover (\(H\)) as pervaded by a probandum (\(S\))—on which itdepends does not hold. But anupādhi may also serve aspositive restorer of knowledge in that when it occurstogetherwith an original prover (\(H\)) that it undercuts (thus \(H \\&\ U\)), the inferential conclusion is reestablished.

According to a traditional definition which, although refined byGaṅgeśa, suits most purposes, anupādhi is aproperty \(U\) such that

1. \(U\) pervades the probandum, thesādhya, \(S\)(i.e., anything that is an \(S\) is a \(U\),sādhya-vyāpaka): \(\forall x (Sx \to Ux)\)
2. \(U\) does not pervade the prover, thesādhana orhetu, \(H\) (i.e., there is something that is an \(H\) butnot a \(U\),sādhana-avyāpaka): \(\exists x(Hx \\&\ \neg Ux)\)

It follows then that there is “deviation” (the prover issaid to “deviate,” being somewhere the probandum is not)and no relation of pervasion.

3. \(\exists x(Hx \ \&\ \neg Sx)\)

There are lots of other fallacies that Gaṅgeśa discusses.TheNyāya-sūtra lists five“pseudo-provers,”hetv-ābhāsa, whichGaṅgeśa examines at length:

1. “Deviation,” in three varieties:
   1. the “common,” which is knowledge of a counterexample(\(Hb, \neg Sb\))
   2. the “unique,” defined as a putative prover’s notbeing known to occur in places where the probandum is known to occuror not to occur (for example, the “prover,” being-sound,with respect to an inferential subject, sound, since only sound hasthe universal being-a-sound which then cannot prove anything)
   3. the “inconclusive,” where the property specifying theinferential subject is universally locatable such that there can be noevidence outside it (nothing is outside it) without begging thequestion (thus, with a few exceptions, no inference beginning“Everything is \(F\) (momentary, material, etc.)”is acceptable since nothing could count as evidence if the inferentialsubject is everything)
2. the “contradictory,” where \(Ha\) proves the absenceof a putative probandum, i.e., \(\neg Sa\)
3. “counterinference,” which is a putative prover thatwould establish a conclusion \(Sa\) except that its evidence baseconsisting of correlations, positive and negative, between things\(H\) and \(S\), is matched by an opponent’s inference to \(\negSa\) complete with correlations between a counterprover \(J\) and\(\neg S\) (this fallacy reveals a social dimension to knowledge)
4. the “unestablished,” which Gaṅgeśa views asthree separate fallacies:
   1. a putative prover as unestablished with respect to location orproperty-bearer, e.g., \(Ha\)?
   2. its being unestablished with respect to essential nature (e.g.,“The lake is fierysince it is smokey”)
   3. the unestablished by way of not being pervaded by the probandum(said not to be a separate fallacy but reducing to deviation, thecontradictory, or the defeated)
5. the “defeated,” the “defeated in advance,”as it were, a kind of “patent falsehood.”

These “flaws of the prover,”hetu-doṣa, arealso called “constant flaws,”nitya-doṣa,as opposed topuruṣa-doṣa, “flaws of aperson,” which areanitya-doṣa, “occasionalflaws.” Admittedly, Gaṅgeśa contends that sometimeseven “failure to grasp a pervasion is (not a logical flaw but) aflaw belonging to a person or subject” (2020: 884).Nevertheless, the five pseudo-provers are separated out from otherdefeaters called clinchers from theNyāya-sūtra on,because they highlight logical—or in the case of (3)epistemological—rules as opposed to personal failures such asfailing to pay attention. Theupādhi fallacy, too,entails a counterexample and so is a “constant flaw,”although failure to notice one on occasion can be a personalerror.

Two further types of defeater or pseudo-defeater identified in theNyāya-sūtra are, first,jāti,“false analogies,” which seem dismissed byGaṅgeśa (in the voice of an opponent) saying that they arenot good responses in a debate or controversy (2020: 949), in contrastwith, second, “clinchers,”nigraha-sthāna,whose importance in debate is acknowledged but not in any detail takenup (perhaps Gaṅgeśa sees theNyāya-sūtra’s list, as explained byVātsyāyana, as satisfactory). Butjāti aredismissed because, it seems, however they may have been conceived inearly years (Prets 2001), long before Gaṅgeśa they come tobe understood asmisleading analogies and classified astricks of debate or philosophic conundra, not really worthyof inquiry. Ajāti is a pseudo-defeater in the broadsense of a misleading analogy, and there is less agreement about themacross school than about pseudo-provers, clinchers, and, we must add,types oftarka, “hypothetical reasoning,” whichwere reviewed above.

5.4 Three philosophic inferences

Gańgeśa advances three contentious inferences in hisinference chapter, two of them—a theistic inference and oneabout the possibility of “liberation,”mukti—defended at considerable length (all three arereconstructed and examined in Phillips 2012: 65–71). As much assupporting longstanding positions of Nyāya on (a)“self,”ātman, (b) “Lord,”īśvara, and (c)mukti, his treatmentsillustrate his inferential system including defeating and hypotheticalreasoning. Indeed, illustration of the system sometimes seems to bethe main goal.

Although Gaṅgeśa accepts the position of earlyNaiyāyika Uddyotakara (c. 600) that one knows oneselfperceptually as expressed by the word ‘I’ in perceptualjudgments such as “I am seeing a pot” (Taber 2012),presumably he sees proving a self by inference as useful becauseBuddhists, for one, deny it (famously). And at least inYogācāra Buddhism perception is accepted as a knowledgesource, with the insistence that no self is known by it or indeed byany other means.

TheNyāya-sūtra has two arguments: diachronicsynthesis and synchronic. The former is illustrated by therecognition, “This is that Devadatta I saw yesterday,”which could not be an expression of knowledge (and of course it is) ifthe self of the recognizer had not endured (the recognition is fed bya memory of Devadata as seen the day before, and one person does nothave another’s memories). The latter is illustrated by, “Iam touching what I see” (a self is needed to bring together theinformation across sensory modality). In theJewel’sperception chapter, Gaṅgeśa at times refers to or echoesthese arguments, but the argument for a self in the inference chapteris different.

Gaṅgeśa follows Vātsyāyana underNyāya-sūtra 1.1.5 (the “inferencesūtra”): “Every living body (the inferential subject)has a self (the probandum),since every living body hasbreath (the prover),unlike a pot (the example, a pot beingqualified by both absence-of-self and absence-of-breath).” Mysense is that here the main point is as much to illustrate“negative-only” inference as to endorseVātsyāyana’s reasoning, but it is endorsed. Theinferential subject includes all living bodies, and so there is nosapakṣa, no examples of the probandum known outside theset of things that are living bodies. Thus the inference has to benegative-only, based solely on correlations of absences,“unlike a pot,” a pot having neither breath nor self.Fundamental truths of things (tattva), which are captured byphilosophical definitions, seem accessible only through fundamentaldistinctions being known through negative-only inferences, forexample, this inference to self (ātman) as a fundamentalcategory of substance.

In a slightly more more elaborate version, Gaṅgeśa putsforth two steps. First, desires and the like are proved to have alocus, like all qualities. In step two, self is proved to be thatlocus, a distinct substance, different from earth, water,tejas, and so on down the traditional list, by eliminativeargument. Defeaters for the proposition that desire and the likebelong to earth or any of the rest of the items on the ontologicallist consists of hypothetical reasoning such as the following. Ifdesire were a property of earth (or water and so on), then like thecolor that exists in earthen things, it, too, would be perceived.Surveying pots and the like, we find that nothing material has desire,cognition, etc., outside of living bodies. He writes (2020: 803):

Given that desire has been proved to have an inherent cause (by theinference previously stated, “Desire has origins in an inherentcause,since it is an effect,” we formulate a secondinference), being-a-desire occurs in that (namely, desire) which hasas emergent cause a connection,since being-a-desire is auniversal directly pervaded by thequalityhood-that-occurs-in-specific-qualities-grasped-by-an-eternal-organ(i.e.,manas or the organ of hearing),likebeing-a-sound (soundhood, the universal of sound). And this emergentcause, which is a connection, is specified by something, since it is aconnection. (That “something” is the living body.) Ifmerely connection with a self were the origins of desire (withoutrequiring something else delimiting it), then ramifications wouldoverextend. Therefore, having-a-self, which is the specifier of theconnection that gives rise to desire, is proved with respect to theliving body. (That is, every living body is“enselved.”)

The inference for positing anīśvara, the“Lord,” is a little less system-bound than this one for anātman, but its history stretches through several earlierNyāya efforts, in particular by Vācaspati (c. 950). It is aninference to a creator based on both positive and negativecorrelations: “Earth and the like have a conscious agent as aninstrumental cause,since they are effects, like a pot andunlike an atom (whatever is an effect has a conscious agent as aninstrumental cause).” Buddhists point to counterexamples, suchas growing grass. Growing grass has the prover property,being-an-effect, but not the probandum,having-an-agent-as-an-instrumental cause. The Nyāya reply is topoint out that growing grass and all such examples are in dispute,that is to say, fall within the domain of the inferential subject(pakṣa), here “earth and the like,” to wit,anything that is an effect but whose agential cause is not apparent,unlike the comparison class, a pot, for instance, which is clearlyboth an effect and has an agent as an instrumental cause. Nothing thatfalls within the domain of the subject can be used either as anexample supporting the rule ofvyāpti inclusion or as acounterexample, since that would beg the question. The whole point ofinference is to make something known that was not known previously,and here, as with the existence of atoms, the conclusion could not beknown perceptually. The theological inference has the purpose ofshowing that things like the earthand growing grass have anagent within the causal complex that brings them about. This is notsomething that we know without making the inference.

So, by the rules governing proper inference, the putativecounterexample is rejected, and the proof looks pretty good. For,cleverly it divides all things into three categories, asVācaspati remarks (1996: 563). There are uncreated things, atoms,for instance, created things that clearly have an agential cause, suchas pots, and things such as the earth and growing grass that do notclearly have an agential cause. This last set becoming the inferentialsubject is bracketed such that no examples can be pulled from it.

However, another refutation refined by Buddhist philosophers over thecenturies is not dismissed so easily (Mokṣākāragupta1998: 98; Patil 2009). The Nyāya argument falls to anupādhi, in this case the property,having-a-perceptible-body. As we have seen, anupādhi isdefined as a property that pervades the probandum while failing topervade the prover, that is to say, that is entailed by the presenceof the probandum while not being instanced in at least one case of theprover. Having-an-agent-as-an-instrumental-cause, which is the \(S\)or probandum property of the target inference, is pervaded by theagent’s-having-a-perceptible-body, which is the \(U\) orupādhi property: all agents have bodies. But there issomething that is an \(H\) but not a \(U\); something that is aneffect but does not have within its causal complex an agent with aperceptible body, e.g., growing grass. The two conditions being met,it would follow that there is something that is an \(H\) but not an\(S\), something that is an effect but does not have an agent as aninstrumental cause. Thus theupādhi defeats the apparentinference by showing that the required pervasion and entailment do nothold.

Gaṅgeśa’s response is to deny that the putativeupādhi, an-agent’s-having-a-perceptible-body,pervades the probandum of the target inference,having-an-agent-as-an-instrumental-cause, and several rounds ofobjection and response centering on Nyāya’s conception ofthe Lord as an agent without a body are aired. The Lord’screative activity requires, like that of any agent, familiarity withthe material to be shaped, like the potter’s knowledge of clayand of what to do to make a pot. The Lord’s knowledge is to beconceived as appropriate to the tasks to be undertaken, such asoriginally combining atoms, and if the Lord, like us, had to have abody to have knowledge, including the knowledge required to combineatoms, then, since bodies are combinations of atoms, there would haveto be some earlier Creator to make the necessarycombinations—ad infinitum. Simpler than this conceptionis that of a bodiless Creator whose knowledge is appropriate to thematerial forming earth and the like but, unlike our knowledge, is notgenerated. This seems to be the core of Gaṅgeśa’sreasoning, which is complextarka targeting simplicity andfollowing Vācaspati in particular.

An inference to the possibility of “liberation,”mukti, brings theJewel’s inference chapter toa close. It is particularly dense (2020: 1142) and cannot be unpackedin a short space, but its central analogy is noteworthy.

Then the justification (the inference to the conclusion that sufferingcan come to an end for an individual), well, it is that suffering ingeneral, or the suffering in general of Devadatta (i.e., of anyindividual), is the counterpositive of a non-simultaneous destructionexisting in the same locus,since it is a property thatoccurs only as an effect, orsince it is continuous until itsend,like the light of a lamp. This continuity is its being aproperty that occurs only as an effect at distinct times. And in thisway the probandum, the property to be proved (viz., being thecounterpositive of a non-simultaneous destruction existing in the samelocus), is also applicable to pleasure in general and the like:liberation is the breaking up of the causal chain along with itssource.

Translator’s comments (2020: 1142) bring out that the crucialpoint seems to be that something destroyed has no causal power,existing only as an effect, in connection with the destruction forwhich it is the counterpositive. The destruction that ismukti is not of current but of future suffering, thus a“non-simultaneous” destruction. The destruction exists inthe same locus as the suffering that would occur were it not blocked.The suffering does not really occur—it never comesabout—and so its ontological status is problematic. Clearly, itdoes not cause anything. It comes about only as an effect inconnection with the bringing about of the destruction in relation towhich it is the counterpositive. And any destruction is of something(the counterpositive) at a place or locus: \(cDl\). Note that theexample appears to work only with the second of the two proversmentioned: like a lamp’s stream of light that can ceaseabsolutely, the suffering of an individual goes on continuously(through life, death, and rebirth)—in the sense of regularly ifnot without occasional spells of pleasure—until its absoluteend. Pleasure is similar.

6. Analogy

Different schools of classical philosophy have very differentunderstandings of “analogy,”upamāna, and,unlike with perception, inference, and testimony, cross-schoolcontroversies seem often at cross-purposes. For example,Mīmāṃsakas, worried about the criteria for substitutesfor materials enjoined to carry out rituals, talk about similaritiesas objective, whereas Naiyāyikas are concerned principally withword meanings, although Vātsyāyana (1997: 170–1) doesshow the usefulness of analogy to indicate something new, a medicinalplant, for instance, similar to one with which an interlocutor isfamiliar. Gaṅgeśa sees the working of analogy to resultsolely in learning the meaning of words. Nevertheless, appreciation ofsimilarity, which he sees as a supervenient property, is, he says,crucial in the operation of the knowledge source. TheJewel’s chapter on analogy is quite short and lackssubsections, hardly a “chapter” in comparison with theother three.

What comes to be a stock example of analogical knowledge according toNyāya is elaborated inNyāya-sūtracommentaries and textbooks preceding Gaṅgeśa, who fills indetails. A subject \(S\) inquires of a forester about agavaya, which is a kind of buffalo, having heard the word‘gavaya’ used among her schoolmates but notknowing what it means, i.e., not knowing to what‘gavaya’ refers. Questioned by \(S\), theforester replies that agavaya is like a cow, mentioningcertain specifics as also some dissimilarities. To simplify,Nyāya philosophers say that the forester makes an analogicalstatement (“Agavaya is like a cow”), whereby,according to Gaṅgeśa, our subject \(S\) now knows ingeneral what the word means. But \(S\) does not yet know itsreference, which he deems its principal meaning. Later encountering agavaya buffalo, \(S\) says, “This, which is similar toa cow, is the meaning of the word‘gavaya’,” a statement which expresses\(S\)’s new knowledge. Every instance of knowledge has a source,and this one has been generated byupamāna,“analogy.” Gaṅgeśa writes (2020: 1207):

Objection: The question [of the subject to the forester]concerns only the cause of her (eventual) knowledge (quaqualificandum). The answer gives its qualifiers.

Gaṅgeśa: No. Since she does not know the particulars(that would ground use of the word), she would be answered by theforesteralso with reference to a need for a sensoryencounter: “If you go into the forest, you will see.”

Therefore, \(S\)’s questions would concern only the distinctgrounds of employment: “What is agavaya like? On whatgrounds does one employ the word ‘gavaya’?”Since the one asked (viz., the forester) would not be able to showimmediately, directly (sākṣāt), what it is tobe agavaya buffalo, he would talk about similarity,indirectly indicating it (i.e., indicating what it is to be agavaya buffalo). And then later, when an individual has beenseen by \(S\) who remembers the meaning of the analogical statement,she acquires the knowledge: “This thing qualified by what it isto be agavaya is the referent of the word‘gavaya’.” \(S\)’s knowledge is of aparticular that is the grounds for the employment of the word. It isthe result of analogy (as a knowledge source).

7. Testimony

Gaṅgeśa begins his final chapter of theJewel witha defense of the integrity of testimony as a knowledge source,following a long tradition beginning with an extendedNyāya-sūtra passage (2.1.49–56) that elicitedmuch commentary. Like his predecessors, he resists an opponent’scontention that “testimonial” knowledge results frominference of a certain sort such that supposing an additionalknowledge source is unnecessary. Gaṅgeśa’s responseis to argue that testimony works uniquely through language, thatwithout testimony the inferentialist’s premises in thesubstitute inference could not be understood. Furthermore, thecertification conditions for testimony are different. The chapterincludes much reflection on linguistic meaning, including sections ongrammar near the end. How to understand reference is a chief concern,reference being viewed as the primary mode of meaning. But there isalso “indirect indication,”lakṣaṇā, which works by way of a referentindicating something else, as when a poet says, “Themoon,” meaning the face of the beloved. All these are standardtopics in Nyāya literature. Injunctions, which are also talkedabout from the earliest by Naiyāyikas as well as theirMīmāṃsaka champions (the Veda is injunctive incharacter), command a lot of attention. Their supposed ethical forceis wrestled with, as Gaṅgeśa shows his mastery ofMīmāṃsā and resists its view of a moraluniverse.

Nyāya and Mīmāṃsā are referentialist allieswith similar agendas when it comes to knowledge from testimony, bothopposed to a Yogācāra pragmatic theory of meaning. Althoughconcerned mainly with Vedic hermeneutics, Mīmāṃsakaphilosophers pioneer many of the best arguments and counterargumentsagainst Buddhists and others who attack Vedic authority. ButGaṅgeśa does not accept the Mīmāṃsakacontention that the overall purport of a statement or sentence can ingeneral, even in cases of secondary meaning,lakṣaṇā, be understood without an idea ofthe speaker’s intention. We do not have to understand thespeaker’s intention to grasp a statement in all cases, althoughsometimes we do, for example, when multiple meanings are possible andwith some statements employinglakṣaṇā(Iwasaki 2020; later Naiyāyikas tend to disagree, arguing that wedo have to understand the speaker’s intention). But theMīmāṃsaka view that Vedic sentences have no author isfalse.

Gaṅgeśa apparently accepts theNyāya-sūtra’s definition, 1.1.7:“Testimony is the (true) statement of an trustworthyexpert” (Vātsyāyana 1997: 14), which indicatescertification conditions centering on the speaker. He focuses,however, on the conditions wrapped up in what it is to be a (true)statement from the hearer’s point of view. The condition knownasyogyatā, usually rendered “semantic fit,”is given by him a broad interpretation, where not only infelicitousstatements such as “The gardener is watering the plants withfire,” are violations, as is commonly pointed out, but also thehearer’s knowing that the speaker is not anāpta,that the sounds are, for example, from a parrot.

7.1 An irreducible knowledge source

Yogācāra Buddhists have a pragmatic theory ofconcept-formation and view language as at best helping us get what wewant and avoid what we want to avoid. The Buddha’s words are tobe trusted because of his special experience and superior capacity asa reasoner as well as his compassion motivating his most excellentadvice. Gaṅgeśa imagines an attack on testimonial knowledgefrom Buddhist skeptical quarters such that, in fact, there is noknowledge but only helpful or unhelpful advice because there is notruth, no veridicality. Statements do not correspond to facts.Gaṅgeśa’s rebuttal centers on knowledge productionthrough words. Any instance of knowledge has a mode of productiondistinct from one that fails so to produce. The argument thaterroneous utterances fail to generate knowledge cuts no ice, sinceerroneous utterances are not veritable testimony as we Naiyāyikasunderstand it, he says (2020: 1215). We are able to distinguisherroneous and true utterances by the processes that produce them, andthus meet the skeptical challenge.

A different line of rejection of testimony is attributed to theVaiśeṣika school, which is said to admit testimonialknowledge but to see its generation as coming from inference of acertain sort. A hearer reasons: (1) Speaker \(S\) statesp,(2) \(S\) is a “trustworthy authority,”āpta, (3) what such authorities state is true, and so,therefore, (4) \(p\) is true. And if challenged, S could say that sheknows \(p\) because of the inference. Gaṅgeśa’srebuttal centers on how premise (1) could be known. Testimony has tobe admitted as a separate knowledge source to understand how thereductionist’s inference could get started. Just what is theknowledge source for (1)?

7.2 The meaning of a statement

In the long chapter on testimony, one would expect speakercertification conditions to be taken up, but they are not. PerhapsGaṅgeśa sees them as satisfactorily elucidated byVātsyāyana onNyāya-sūtra 1.1.7 alongwith the later commentaries. In any case, theJewel’sfocus is on sentential conditions such as grammaticality and semanticfitness as remarked. Three conditions prominent in the grammaticalliterature are addressed, “expectation,”ākāṅkṣā, “semanticfit,”yogyatā, and “contiguity,”āsatti. Gaṅgeśa also takes uptātparya, “(speaker’s) intention,”disputing the views of Mīmāṃsakas and championingcommon sense. Throughout the chapter, two views of sentence meaningare in view, (a) a “Bhāṭṭa” radicallyreferentialist theory (due to Kumārila) that a word refersindependently of sentential context, and (b) a“Prābhākara” holistic view that has the sentenceas a whole as informational, not words independently of sententialcontext. Although Gaṅgeśa endorses theBhāṭṭa view that a factual relation, not directlyexpressed, accounts for sentential unity, often he frames a pointusing the Prābhākara theory.

Vātsyāyana and company discuss word meaning in terms ofpossible referents (Nyāya-sūtra 2.2.59–69),(i) the individual, for example, ‘cow’ used for aparticular cow, (ii) the universal, cowhood, what all cows have incommon, and (iii) “shape,”ākṛti, aswith a cow-shaped pastry. The settled view is that all three aregenerally meant in a single usage, with predominance varying withcontext. Against this background, Vācaspati (1979) explores fiveviews of sentential meaning including both (a) the “theory ofthe connection of the referents,” the radically, incrementallyreferentialist view espoused by Bhāṭṭas andNaiyāyikas,abhihitânvaya-vāda, and (b) the“theory of reference of the connected,” “holisticreference,” the Prābhākara view of reference asoccurring at the level of the sentence,anvītâbhidhāna-vāda. In hisNyāya-sūtra work (1996), Vācaspati imports theBhāṭṭa view, according to which sentence meaning isderivative from the reference of individual words and other semanticelements taken together, with the overall connection,anvaya,provided by the fact (if the statement is true) of the words’referents being in relation, the “truth-maker.” LaterNaiyāyikas such as Gaṅgeśa follow him, although, torepeat, Gaṅgeśa often talks about sentential unitypresupposing the Prābhākara view that the component words donot individually have referential power but only as connectedgrammatically, with a complex object or fact as that which is referredto by the unifying sentence.

“Expectation,”ākāṅkṣā, “(verbal)expectation,” is the first of three sentential conditions takenup. After rejecting four attempts to define the phenomenon in itsrelevance for the epistemology of testimony, Gaṅgeśaendorses the following (2020: 1259):

Expectation amounts to incompleteness of reference, specifically, anincompleteness of \(Y\) with respect to \(X\); that is to say, without\(Y\) there would be, with respect to \(X\), no generation ofawareness of an overall connection among the meanings of words andother factors taken in their native senses. Words (and other semanticunits) used as nouns, case endings, verbal roots, verbal endings,finite verbs, and words in declension are such that, in a particularinstance, without the one or the other, there would not be awarenessgenerated of an overall connection among all the referents mutually,taking everything in its native sense.

Lists of words do not fulfill the “expectation” condition,for example, “Cow, being-the-object-of-an-action (as designatedby a word in the accusative case), bringing.” Gaṅgeśaadmits that it “could be an instance of knowledge of verbalmeaning, but it would not produce knowledge of an overallconnection” (2020: 1547). Nevertheless, with him the expectationis also somethingfelt by a hearer, whose grasping thereference of one word with its case ending (which also refers,according to him) leads to expectation not just of another word but ofits referent. Thus expectation is a psychological property mediated bywords in reference to a fact. It is embedded in a subject’sunderstanding of words as united by their references comprising thefact that is captured by a statement. SometimesGaṅgeśa’s dialectic, particularly in several sectionson verbal compounds and the like at the end of the chapter, trades onthe difficulty of finding a factual item to which a word wouldcorrespond in its real-world relationality as implicated in theincorporation of the word grammatically into a declarative sentence.Thus while the “expectation” seems to work as a matter ofgrammar, the “grammar” is thought to reflect a fact thatthe words pick out.

Gaṅgeśa often refers to the problem of the word list thatis not unified, several times appearing to reinstate a grammaticalunderstanding of “expectation” as opposed to howobjects—referents—are related in fact. And once (2020:1547) this comes right at the heart of his endorsement of“incremental referentialism” as opposed to theconnectivist, “holistic” variety of thePrābhākara. He says, “… a word endowed withexpectation and meeting the other requirements is what brings about aparticular presentation of an overall connection.” This seems tobe the answer to the problem of the list whose items do not showgrammatical connections although they are just what the thingsthemselves demand to constitute a fact, a truth-maker: “Pot,being-the-object-of-an-action (as designated by the accusative case),bringing, action.” The endings on the words in the list do notrefer to relations that connect up the other things properly. This isthe difference. Each item listed appears incomplete because, forexample, reference to bringing demands not only the meaning of a wordas something that could be brought but a word in the accusative casewith the case ending indicating that it is in the right kind ofrelation objectively. Every base word is by itself“unsaturated,” to use the Fregean term, referring tosomething in the world that has to hook up with something elsereferred to, if there is to be a sentence and statement,abhihitânvaya.

In addition to a section devoted to a second sentential condition,“semantic fit,”yogyatā, Gaṅgeśaprovides a brief definition in other places in part because itsviolation is commonly taken to be the trigger to take a word in asecondary way, not directing us to a “native” referent (healso advances a slightly different view of the trigger whichwe’ll review later). For example (2020: 1228):

Semantic fit (yogyatā) amounts to there being nolegitimate block to understanding a statement.

Included in this is the “Gettier case” of a parrot’ssaying something that a hearer \(H\) would take as true if \(H\) didnot know the sounds were from a parrot. In the scenario, \(H\) failsto put together the sounds as words and as a sentence and does notacquire testimonial knowledge. Knowing that the sounds are from aparrot is a block. Theyogyatā condition is definednegatively and is commonly invoked as a kind a coherence check. Andhere Gaṅgeśa concurs.

He resists, however, the application of the principle to a Vedicinjunction to perform a sacrifice whose result is supposed to be inthe distant future, going to heaven, say, which wouldn’t makesense, the ritualists reason, without elliptical reference toapūrva, a magical “Unseen Force,”adṛṣṭa, that connects the completion of thesacrifice with its goal. According to Gaṅgeśa, noapūrva is thereby referenced (etymologically that whichis “not understood before” comprehension of an injunctionas applying to oneself, say Mīmāṃsakas) and if thereis “Unseen Force” created by a sacrifice or another goodwork it, like all karma, inheres in the self of the performer,affecting, in particular, his or her next incarnation. Thus again heendorses a doctrine of theNyāya-sūtra, which alsorejectsapūrva but accepts karma as popularlyunderstood.

TheJewel’s section on “contiguity” isshort, and special topics such as ellipsis, etymology versusreconventionalization (only lotuses are referred to in Sanskrit by thecompound ‘paṅka-ja’,“mud-born,” although plants like the water-lily are alsoborn in mud), homonymy, and others are treated more or less briefly.But the topic of injunction looms large in the chapter overall alongwith a concern with Mīmāṃsaka views of moral authorityas fundamentally a matter of Vedic injunction.

Injunctions are commonly formed in Sanskrit through use of theoptative verbal form, and a central question is just what does theoptative affix mean. That one should do such and such seems to be thecore meaning about which everyone agrees, but different analyses aregiven of the idea that one should do such and such. A central thesisis that a certain kind of knowledge both prompts and guides any actionthat is voluntary,pravṛtti, whether in everyday lifeor with a ritual. So now since rituals are actions, some of theseaction-prompting thoughts are prompted by comprehending Vedicsentences. Gaṅgeśa’s effort is often directed tointegrating our understanding of Vedic and everyday language, and heuses his criticisms of Mīmāṃsā analyses of ritualactions to illumine the voluntary in general along with “desireto do,” effort, and the knowledge that directs action,including, especially, knowledge of a “means to what’swanted,”iṣṭa-sādhanatā, an ideahotly debated by all factions of Mīmāṃsā. A basicdivision in the school occurs on the issue whether means ofaccomplishing what is enjoined, or contemplated because desired,iṣṭa-sādhanatā, is part of the contentof an injunction (as itself implicated in any “desire todo” as the desire’s cognitive content).Bhāṭṭas insist that it is, but Prābhākarasdemur, claiming that such is known by a separate intellectual act of“presumption,”arthâpatti. ForPrābhākaras, it is simply that something “ought to bedone,” itskāryatā, that is the meaning of aninjunction, with the means to what’s wanted known bypresumption. Gaṅgeśa rehearses extensive arguments on bothsides, and seems generally to favor the positions of thePrābhākaras.

In the end, Gaṅgeśa champions an understanding of theinjunction as expressing a certain kind of knowledge-prompting action,especially “what one ought to do,”kāryatā, which he sees, agreeing with thePrābhākara, as the meaning of an injunction. That is to say,for him, “what one ought to do” is the meaning in part.But he also agrees with the Bhāṭṭa that a means hasto be known or made known, and he adds another factor, effort, and therequirement that the action be known as accomplishable by one’sown effort.

An ethical view centered on Vedic injunctions is embedded inMīmāṃsaka attitudes, and Gaṅgeśa showssympathy for the life regulated by ritual, in particular daily ritualsthat require no special qualifications. But his own ethical outlook isnowhere explicitly stated. At places he shows affinity for asoteriological ethics implicit in a mystical way of knowing the“truth” concerning the “self,”ātman, a self as experienced in a special kind of yogicmeditation. At several places, he quotes theBhagavadGītā, apparently endorsing its karma-yoga teaching ofbenevolent action. Despite sympathy for Mīmāṃsakapositions, when it comes to the striking and long-lasting conflicts,ethical and otherwise, between ritualists and mystics/yogins in thesubcontinent, Gaṅgeśa seems to line up with theyogins—like, it should be noted, Gautama, the author of theNyāya-sūtra and his commentators. Indeed, althoughairing Mīmāṃsā opinion apparently with muchsympathy, Gaṅgeśa sees injunctions to perform rituals astrumped by yogic teachings of the way to self-discovery. But also likemany Naiyāyikas before him, Gaṅgeśa appears to try tofind middle ground in ethics as in other areas of theory. Surely, heis not a radical critic of the ritualists’ moral codes, morelikely one of their number trying to nudge colleagues into broaderpoints of view.

7.3 “Indirect indication,”lakṣaṇā

The longest section in the testimony chapter and indeed in theentirety of theJewel is devoted tolakṣaṇā, which is a second mode of meaningdependent on the first or primary called “denotation,”abhidhāna, i.e. reference.Nyāya-sutra2.2.62 gives about a dozen examples of semantic transference, forexample, “The stands are shouting,” where it is not thestands but the people in them who are shouting. And with “Usherin the sticks,” it is ascetics who carry walking sticks who areto be ushered in. In this example, the primary, denotative meaning isnot entirely transferred since the ascetics would carry their sticksin with them into the dining room, it is presumed. The most commonexample in theJewel is “The village isin-the-Gaṅgā,” where we understand the village to beon the river’sbank (the indicated) because we knowthat no village is actually builtin the Gaṅgā,which is very deep.

The inherited view is that a violation ofyogyatā,“semantic fit,” triggers a hearer to understand asecondary sense. But one of the first comments Gaṅgeśamakes aboutlakṣaṇā rejects this view,bringing up the phenomenon’s relevance to the debate aboutsentential unity,anvaya. He writes (2020: 1250):

… [lakṣaṇā] is not triggered by aviolation of semantic fit (as is commonly held) but rather by aviolation ofanvaya itself, of the overall connection ofwords, the overall construction. For example, by force of context weunderstand from a violation ofanvaya with the word‘stick’ in connection with ‘usher in’(“Usher in the sticks”) that the speaker’s purposeis to feed certain ascetics (who typically carry walking sticks) whowould be ushered in along with their sticks.

In a case where a secondary usage does not involve entirerelinquishment of the primary meaning but retains it in part, as (withthe previous example but also) in “The umbrella-holders arecoming,” it is precisely the context that tells us that thecoming is on the part ofan umbrella-holderand alsothose who arenot umbrella-holders (important people overwhose heads a large umbrella is being held). Because of the violation,the agency of the movement is understood. There would be a violationofanvaya in taking the meaning to apply only to aholder.

Since it is entirely possible that several umbrella-holders arecoming, it must be something broader than “semantic fit”that is violated in this and similar cases.

“Indirect indication” does a lot of work forreferentialism, since there are many, many examples where no directreferent is meant but a hearer comprehends a statement and acquirestestimonial knowledge. And although Gaṅgeśa resistsoveremployment of the notion, he uses it extensively. Further examplesconcern the meaning of certain Sanskrit compounds and grammaticalnumber, when, for instance, a plural form is used while what is meantis a single something or other.

Naiyāyikas are hardly the only theorists who employ the tool.Some Mīmāṃsakas argue that reference is to theuniversal, the individual being indicated bylakṣaṇā. Gaṅgeśa considers theview that it is the universal that is known bylakṣaṇā, not the individual, the universalas specifying the character of the individual. On the dispute aboutreference to universals or individuals, Naiyāyikas want to agreewith all parties, it seems. Importantly, Gaṅgeśa seesreference to an individual as invariably to an individual of a kind,for example “(A) cow,” would be to one qualified bycowhood: “the referent is an entity as qualified by auniversal” (2020: 1576). To focus just on the cowhood would be“indirect indication,” he says, with the indicator beingthe individual cow referred to. Prābhākaras tend to find nouse forlakṣaṇā, since according to themreference is holistic, a matter of the entire sentence, and themeanings of the individual words are united in the hearer’smind. Thus it is the radical referentialists who seem to need itmost.

In a remarkable passage, Gaṅgeśa puts forth a core argumentforlakṣaṇā (2020: 1631):

Objection:
Reference (śakti =abhidhā) is alonesufficient (with no need to posit an additional mode of meaning),since the conventional practice that supports anyone’sunderstanding meaning is common to both (what you call) primary andindicated senses. For, the words (that make up a sentence andstatement) having been put together, an etymological analysis caninform us of the overall connection becauseśakti, thepower of reference, has accomplished a setting in mind, or settings inmind, produced by the words. Otherwise, there could be neithertestimony as a knowledge source nor speaker’s intention, sincethis power governs and regulates them both.

Moreover, if the speaker’s intention is understood (by anyonehearing “The village is in-the-Gaṅgā”), thenonly reference need be imagined as accounting for the communication(no indirect meaning,lakṣaṇā), since thatis the economical position. Like homonyms such as‘akṣa’ (“eye/dice”) andcompany, multiplicity of meaning is alone the right view. Nouneconomical additional mode need be supposed.

Gaṅgeśa:
We answer. If we had to imagine that the word‘Gaṅgā’ is used (as you claim) for thethousands of things that could be indicated by using the word for sucha thing as a bank, then in order to understand a usage we would haveto be familiar with another conventional practice of older persons(who have taught us the conventions of language) in each case amongall the innumerable things that could be indicated. And so this viewis uneconomical, and it is not borne out by experience.

Indirect meaning (lakṣaṇā), on the otherhand, is single, unitary, by nature to be related to what is pickedout. And it does not require us to be familiar with anotherconventional practice of of older persons having the indicated asintentional object. Thus to have an economical position, it alone isappropriately posited.

Withoutlakṣaṇā, reference would have to dotoo much work and could not tie use of a word to a certain type ofthing. It is to save the fixity of the referential tie thatlakṣaṇā has to be posited. Its usefulness asa concept depends on its flexibility.

Gaṅgeśa also swims against the mainstream by eschewingknowledge of speaker’s intention to explain the triggering oflakṣaṇā. He points out that typically onehas to understand a statement before knowing the speaker’sintention in making it. A hearer’s knowing the speaker’sintention is not a necessary factor in the generation of thehearer’s testimonial knowledge through indirect indication, hesays, but he admits that knowing a speaker’s intention could besufficient.

About the principles of transference, he has little to say other thanto point to “relevant context” and “being set inmind quickly.” Indirect indication is preceded by comprehensionof conventional meaning and is directed toward something that isrelated to the conventional meaning. But some cases,“frozen metaphors,” are reconventionalizations where theprimary, original meaning has been forgotten. A “windfall”seems to be a good example in modern English. There is a long andintricate discussion of this. Can we refer to a water-lily by usingthe word ‘mud-born’? No, says Gaṅgeśa. The wordhas been reconventionalized to mean in a primary way only lotuses andif used for a water-lily we would have a case oflakṣaṇā.

Bibliography

A. Primary Literature

Gaṅgeśa

Tattva-cintā-maṇi, (“Jewel”),translated by S. Phillips,Jewel of Reflection on the Truth aboutEpistemology. 3 volumes, London: Bloomsbury, 2020.

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  Translation. V.P. Bhatta. 2012.Perception, thePratyakṣa khaṇḍa of theTattvacintāmaṇi. Delhi: Eastern Book Linkers.

  Translation of sections. Thejnapti-vāda: Mohanty 1989. Theabhāva-vāda: Matilal 1968. Thenirvikalpaka-vāda: Sibajiban Bhattacharyya 1993.Gaṅgeśa’s Theory of IndeterminatePerception, Part Two. New Delhi: Indian Council of PhilosophicalResearch.

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  Translation of sections. Thevyāpti-vāda: C.Goekoop. 1967.The Logic of Invariable Concomitance in theTattvacintāmaṇi. Dordrecht: D. Reidel. Thevyāpti-graha-vāda: Mrinalkanti Gangopadhyay. 1975.“Gaṅgeśa on Vyāptigraha: The Means for theAscertainment of Invariable Concomitance.”Journal of IndianPhilosophy 3:167–208. Theupādhi-vāda:

  1. Erich Frauwallner,Die Lehre von der ZusätzlichenBestimmung in Gaṅgeśa’sTattvacintāmaṇi. Vienna: Österreichische Akademieder Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-historische Klasse,Sitzungsberichte, 266. Band 2. Abhandlung, 1970.
  2. Kisor Chakrabarti 2010. Thepakṣatā-vāda:Dravid 2007. Thekevalânvaya-vāda: Matilal 1968b.Theīśvarânumāna-vāda: JohnVattanky. 1984.Gaṅgeśa’s Philosophy of God.Madras: Adyar.

• Analogy chapter.

  Editions

  1. Ed. Gaurinath Sastri. 1983. With thePragalbhīcommentary by Pragalbhācārya. Varanasi: SampurnanandSanskrit University.
  2. Ed. Kamakhanath Tarkavagish. With theDīpanīcommentary by Kṛṣṇakānta (reprint 1990).Calcutta: Asiatic Society.

• Testimony chapter.

  Editions

  1. Ed. Kamakhyanath Tarkavagish. 1884–1901 (reprint 1990). Withthe commentaries of Mathurānātha and Jayadeva. 2 vols.Calcutta: Asiatic Society.
  2. Ed. S.R. Saha and P.K. Mukhopadhyaya,TheŚabdakhaṇḍa of Gaṅgeśa’sTattvacintāmaṇi, Calcutta: Jadavpur University andK.P. Bagchi. 1991.

  Translation. V.P. Bhatta. 2005. 2 vols. Delhi: Eastern BookLinkers.

  Translation of sections: Thevidhi-vāda: V.N.Jha. 1987.The Philosophy of Injunctions. Delhi: PratibhaPrakashan. Theapūrva-vāda: V.N. Jha, 1986.TheLogic of the Intermediate Causal Link. Delhi: Sri SatguruPublications. The section onyoga-rūḍhi: SubashChandra Dash. 1992.Gaṅgeśa onYogarūḍhi. Delhi: Sri Satguru Publications. Theākhyāta-vāda: Toshihoru Wada, in fourinstallments:

  1. 2007. “Gaṅgeśa on the Meaning of Verbal Suffixes1,” in K. Preisendanz, ed.Expanding and Merging Horizons:Contributions to South Asian and Cross-Cultural Studies inCommemoration of Wilhelm Halbfass. Vienna: Austrian Academy ofSciences, pp. 415–29;
  2. 2012. “Gaṅgeśa on the Meaning of Verbal Suffixes2,” in C. Watanabe, M. Desmarais, and Y. Honda, eds.,Saṃskṛta-Sādhutā: Goodness of Sanskrit:Studies in Honor of Professor Ashok N. Aklujkar. New Delhi: D. K.Printworld, pp. 528–44;
  3. 2013. “Gaṅgeśa on the Meaning of Verbal Suffixes3,”Nagoya Studies in Indian Culture and Buddhism:Saṃbhāṣā 30:1–14;
  4. 2014. “Gaṅgeśa on the Meaning of VerbalSuffixes,”Sanskrit Studies 3: 178–209.

  Thedhātu-vāda: Toshihoru Wada, in twoinstallments:

  1. 2115. “Gaṅgeśa on the Meaning of Verbal Roots(dhātu),”Indologica Taurinensia41–42: 193–218;
  2. 2016. “Gaṅgeśa on the Meaning of Verbal Roots(dhātu),”Journal of UA Foundation forIndological Studies, vol. 2:Festschrift Professor Karl H.Potter, pp. 35–50.

Other Primary Literature

• Dharmakīrti.Vāda-nyāya. Tr. Pradeep P.Gokhale. 1993.Vādanyāya of Dharmakīrti: The Logicof Debate. Delhi: Sri Satguru Publications.
• Gautama.Nyāya-sūtra.
  • Editions.
    1. Ed. Anantalal Thakur, 1997.Gautamīyanyāyadarśana with Bhāṣya ofVātsyāyana, New Delhi: Indian Council of PhilosophicalResearch.
    2. Ed. A.M. Tarkatirtha, Taranatha Nyayatarkatirtha, and H.K.Tarkatirtha, 1936–1944 (reprint 1985).Nyāyadarśanam (Nyāya-sūtra withfour commentaries, theNyāya-sūtra-bhāṣya ofVātsyāyana, theNyāya-vārttika ofUddyotakara, theNyāya-vārttika-tātpārya-ṭīkāof Vācaspati Miśra, and theVṛtti ofViśvanātha), Calcutta Sanskrit Series 18.
  • Translations.
    1. Ganganatha Jha, 1919. With Vātsyāyana’s andUddyotakara’s commentaries.The Nyāyasūtras ofGautama with the Bhāṣya of Vātsyāyana and theVārttika of Uddyotakara, 4 volumes, reprinted Delhi: MotilalBanarsidass.
    2. Mrinalkanti Gangopadhyay, 1982. With Vātsyāyana’scommentary.Nyāya-Sūtra withVātsyāyana’s Commentary, Calcutta: IndianStudies.
    3. Michel Angot, 2009.Le Nyāya-sūtra de GautamaAkṣapāda, le Nyāya-Bhāṣyad’Akṣapāda Pakṣilasvāmin: l’Art deConduire la Pensée en Inde Ancienne; Édition,Traduction et Présentation, Paris: Les Belles Lettres.
    4. Matthew Dasti and Stephen Phillips, 2017.TheNyāya-sūtra: Selections with Early Commentaries,Indianapolis: Hackett.
• Kaṇāda,Vaiśeṣika-sūtra. Ed.(with the commentary of Candrānanda) Muni Sri Jambuvijayaji,Gaekwad Oriental Series 136, Baroda: Oriental Institute, 1961. Tr.Nandalal Sinha. 1911.The Sacred Books of the Hindus (VolumeVI), Allahabad: Pâṇini Office.
• Kumārila,Śloka-vārttika (commentary onpart of theMīmāṃsā-sūtra). Ed.Dvarikadas Sastri. 1978. Varanasi: Tara Publications. Translation, theperception chapter: John Taber. 2005.A Hindu Critique of BuddhistEpistemology: The “Determination of Perception” Chapter ofKumārila Bhaṭṭa’sŚloka-vārttika. London: Routledge. Other chapters:Ganganatha Jha.Slokavartika. 1900, 1908. Reprint. Delhi: SriSatguru Publications.
• Maṇikaṇṭha Miśra,Nyāya-ratna. Ed. V. Subrahmanya Sastri and V.Krishnamacharya. 1953.Nyāyaratna ofMaṇikaṇṭha Miśra. Madras: MadrasGovernment Oriental Series.
• Nāgārjuna,Mūla-madhyamaka-kārikā. Ed. J.W. de Jong.1977. Madras: Adyar. Translation (from the Tibetan): Jay Garfield.1995.The Fundamental Wisdom of the Middle Way:Nāgārjuna’sMūla-madhyamaka-kārikā. New York: OxfordUniversity Press.
• Nāgārjuna,Vigraha-vyāvārttinī.Ed. and tr. Kamaleshwar Bhattacharya. 1978.The Dialectical Methodof Nāgārjuna. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass. See alsoWesterhoff 2010.
• Śalikanātha Miśra,Prakaraṇa-pañcikā. Ed. A. SubrahmanyaSastri. 1961. Banaras Hindu University Darśana Series 4.Varanasi. (Partially) translated: K.T. Pandurangi. 2004. New Delhi:Indian Council of Philosophical Research.
• Udayana,Ātma-tattva-viveka. Ed. VindhyesvariprasadaDvivedin and Lakshmana Sastri Dravida. 1986 (reprint). BibliothecaIndica 170. Calcutta: The Asiatic Society. Translation: N.S. Dravid.1995.Ātmatattvaviveka by Udayanācārya.Shimla: Indian Institute of Advanced Study.
• Udayana,Kiraṇâvali. Ed. Siva ChandraSarvvabhouma. 1911 (reprint 1989).Kiraṇāvalī ofUdayana. With the commentary of Vardhamāna. Calcutta:Asiatic Society. Translation: Tachikawa 1981.
• Udayana,Nyāya-kusumâñjali. Ed.Mahaprabhulal Goswami. 1972. Mithila Institite Ancient Texts Series23. Darbhanga: Mithila Research Institute. Tr. N.S. Dravid,Nyaya-kusumanjali of Udayanacarya. New Delhi: Indian Councilof Philosophical Research, 1996.
• Udayana,Nyāya-vārttika-tātparya-pariśuddhi. Ed.Anantalal Thakur. 1996. New Delhi: Indian Council of PhilosophicalResearch.
• Uddyotakara,Nyāya-vārttika. (1) Ed. AnantalalThakur. 1997.Nyāyabhāṣyavārttikam. NewDelhi: Indian Council of Philosophical Research. (2) See Gautama.
• Vācaspati Miśra,Nyāya-vārttika-tātparya-ṭīkā(“Notes on (Uddyotakara’s) Intention in hisNyāya-vārttika Commentary”). (1) Ed.Anantalal Thakur. 1996.Nyāyavārttikatātparyaṭīkā ofVāchaspatimiśra. New Delhi: Indian Council ofPhilosophical Research. (2) See Gautama.
• Vācaspati Miśra,Tattva-bindu. Ed. and tr.Madeleine Biardeau. 1979.Le Tattvabindu deVācaspatimiśra. Pondichéry: Institutfrançais d’indologie.
• Vātsyāyana,Nyāya-sūtra-bhāṣya (NySB). (1)See Thakur ed. under Gautama. (2) See Tarkatirtha et al. editors underGautama.

B. Secondary Literature

• Bagchi, Sitansusekhar, 1953,Inductive Reasoning: A Study oftarka and Its Role in Indian Logic,Calcutta: Munishchandra Sinha.
• Bandopadhyay, Nandita, 1977,The Concept of LogicalFallacies, Calcutta: Sanskrit Pustak Bhandar.
• Bhattacharya, Dinesh Chandra, 1958,History ofNavya-nyāya in Mithilā, Darbhanga: MithilaInstitute.
• Bhattacharyya, Sibajiban, 1990, “Some Features of theTechnical Language of Navya-Nyāya”,Philosophy East andWest, 40(2): 129–149. doi:10.2307/1399225
• BonJour, Laurence, 2003, “A Version of InternalistFoundationalism”, in Laurence BonJour and Ernest Sosa (eds.),Epistemic Justification, Oxford: Blackwell, pp.3–96.
• Chakrabarti, Arindam, 1992, “I Touch What I Saw”,Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 52(1):103–116. doi:10.2307/2107746
• –––, 1994, “Telling as LettingKnow.” in Chakrabarti and Matilal 1994: 99–124.doi:10.1007/978-94-017-2018-2_7
• –––, 2006, “Knowledge from TrustedTellings and its Preventers”, inŚabdapramāṇa in Indian Philosophy, MajulikaGhosh and Bhaswati Bhattacharya Chakrabarti (eds.), New Delhi:Northern Book Centre, pp. 30–52.
• Chakrabarti, Arindam and Bimal Krishna Matilal (eds.), 1994,Knowing from Words: Western and Indian Philosophical Analysis ofUnderstanding and Testimony, Dordrecht: Kluwer.doi:10.1007/978-94-017-2018-2
• Chakrabarti, Kisor, 1999,Classical Indian Philosophy of Mind:The Nyāya Dualist Tradition, Albany, NY: State University ofNew York Press.
• –––, 1999,Classical Indian Philosophy ofInduction: The Nyāya Viewpoint, Lanham, MD: LexingtonBooks.
• Das, Nilanjan, 2011, “Lakṣaṇā asInference”,Journal of Indian Philosophy,39(4–5): 353–366. doi:10.1007/s10781-011-9132-1
• –––, 2021. “Gaṅgeśa onEpistemic Luck”,Journal of Indian Philosophy, 49:153–202.
• Dasti, Matthew and Stephen H. Phillips, 2010,“Pramāṇa are Factive—A Response toJonardon Ganeri”,Philosophy East and West, 60(4):535–540. doi:10.1353/pew.2010.0005
• Dravid, N.S., 2007,Pakṣatā: the Nature of theInferential Locus, New Delhi: Indian Council of PhilosophicalResearch.
• Filliozat, Pierre-Sylvain, 2000,The Sanskrit Language,Varanasi: Indica Books.
• Ganeri, Jonardon, 1999,Semantic Powers: Meaning and the Meansof Knowing in Classical India, Oxford: Clarendon Press.doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198237884.001.0001
• –––, 2011,The Lost Age of Reason:Philosophy in Early Modern India 1450–1700, Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press. doi:10.1093/acprof:osobl/9780199218745.001.0001
• Graheli, Alessandro, 2020, “Semantic Relations and Causationof Verbal Knowledge”,The Bloomsbury Research Handbook ofIndian Philosophy of Language, Alessandro Graheli (Ed.).Bloomsbury Academic.
• Guha, Nirmalya, 2012, “Tarka as CognitiveValidator”,Journal of Indian Philosophy, 40(1):47–66. doi:10.1007/s10781-011-9148-6
• –––, forthcoming, “On Validity of CausalStatements”,Journal of Indian Philosophy.
• Ingalls, Daniel H.H., 1951,Materials for the Study ofNavya-Nyāya Logic, Cambridge, MA: Harvard UniversityPress.
• Iwasaki, Yoichi, 2020, “The Role of Intention inGaṅgeśa’s Non-Communicational Model of VerbalUnderstanding”,The Bloomsbury Research Handbook of IndianPhilosophy of Language, Alessandro Graheli (Ed.). BloomsburyAcademic.
• Lehrer, Keith and Thomas D. Paxson, Jr., 1969, “Knowledge:Undefeated Justified True Belief”,Journal ofPhilosophy, 66(8): 225–237 doi:10.2307/2024435
• Matilal, Bimal Krishna, 1968,The Navya-Nyāya Doctrine ofNegation, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
• –––, 1986,Perception: An Essay on ClassicalIndian Theories of Knowledge, Oxford: Oxford University Press.doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198239765.001.0001
• –––, 1998,The Character of Logic inIndia, Jonardon Ganeri and Heeraman Tiwari (eds.), Albany, NY:State University of New York Press.
• Mohanty, J.N., 1966 [1989, 2006],Gaṅgeśa’sTheory of Truth, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass; 2nd revised edition,1989; revised edition with Sanskrit, 2006.
• –––, 1992,Reason and Tradition in IndianThought, Oxford: Clarendon.
• Oetke, Claus, 2004, “The Role of the Example in AncientIndian Logic”, in Shoryu Katsura and Ernst Steinkellner (eds.),The Role of the Example (dṛṣṭānta)in ClassicalIndian Logic, Vienna: Arbeitskreis für Tibetische undBuddhistische Studien Universität Wien, pp. 447–539.
• Patil, Parimal G., 2009,Against a Hindu God: BuddhistPhilosophy of Religion in India, New York: Columbia UniversityPress.
• Perrett, Roy W., 2016,Introduction to Indian Philosophy,Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.doi:10.1017/CBO9781139033589
• Phillips, Stephen H., 1995,Classical Indian Metaphysics:Refutations of Realism and the Emergence of “NewLogic”, Chicago: Open Court. Delhi: MotilalBanarsidass.
• –––, 2002, “Ellipsis and PropositionalAnaphora in Gaṅgeśa’sTattvacintāmaṇi”, inTime andSources, F. Grimal (ed.), Pondicherry: ÉcoleFrançaise d’Extrême Orient, pp. 173–186.
• –––, 2012,Epistemology in Classical India:The Knowledge Sources of the Nyāya School, New York:Routledge.
• Potter, Karl H. (ed.), 1977,Encyclopedia of IndianPhilosophies (Volume 2),Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika upto Gaṅgeśa, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.
• Potter, Karl H. and Sibajiban Bhattacharyya (eds.), 1993,Encyclopedia of Indian Philosophies (Volume 6),IndianPhilosophical Analysis: Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika fromGaṅgeśa to Raghunātha Śiromaṇi, Delhi:Motilal Banarsidass.
• Prets, Ernst, 2001, “Futile and False Rejoinders,Sophistical Arguments and Early Indian Logic”,Journal ofIndian Philosophy, 29(5/6): 545–558.doi:10.1023/A:1013894810880
• Raja, K. Kunjunni, 1963 [1969],Indian Theories ofMeaning, Madras: Adyar Library and Research Centre; 2nd edition,1969.
• Shaw, Jaysankar Lal, 2016,The Collected Writings of JaysankarLal Shaw, London: Bloomsbury.
• Siderits, Mark, 1991,Indian Philosophy of Language,Dordrecht: Kluwar.
• Solomon, Ester, 1976,Indian Dialectics, 2 volumes,Ahmedabad: Gujarat Vidya Sabha.
• Verpoorten, Jean-Marie, 1987,MīmāṃsāLiterature, Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz.
• Taber, John, 2012, “Uddyotakara’s Defense of aSelf”, in Irina Kuznetsova, Jonardon Ganeri, and ChakravarthiRam-Prasad (eds.),Hindu and Buddhist Ideas in Dialogue: Self andNo-Self, Farnham, Surrey, Burlington: Ashgate, pp.97–114.
• Tachikawa, Musashi, 1981,The Structure of the World inUdayana’s Realism (including editions and translations ofUdayana’sLakṣaṇāvalī and aportion of hisKiraṇāvalī), Dordrecht: D.Reidel.
• Wada, Toshihiro, 2000, “The Origin of Navya-nyāya andIts Place within the History of Indian Logic”, in Shoun Hing andToshihiro Wada (ed.),Three Mountains and Seven Rivers: Prof.Musashi Tachikawa’s Felicitation Volume, Delhi: MotilalBanarsidass, pp. 439–462.
• Westerhoff, Jan, 2010,The Dispeller of Disputes:Nāgārjuna’s Vigrahavyāvartanī, Translationand Commentary, Oxford: Oxford University Press.doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199732692.001.0001

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