[Advaita-l] Apaurusheyatva of Vedas.

[श्रीमल्ललितालालितः]

*श्रीमल्ललितालालितः <http://www.lalitaalaalitah.com>
lalitAlAlitaH <http://about.me/lalitaalaalitah/bio>*



On Fri, Sep 16, 2011 at 18:36, Raghav Kumar <raghavkumar00 at gmail.com> wrote:

> This does not automatically imply that yoga-sUtras posit that shabda
> "depends" on pratyaxa etc to generate the primary auditory data.


replace 'auditory data' with 'validity of knowledge generated shabda'.
To be clear for further postings :
pramA : valid knowledge , i.e, anadhigata-abAdhitArtha-viShayakaM GYAnam.
pramANam : cause of pramA, i.e, eye, words, etc.
prAmANyam : Validity , a special quality of knowledge which makes it valid.


> Omkar ji wrote: Sure, I agree with you. But that doesn't imply that shabda
> should be considered svataH-pramANa. It actually leads to what you have
> said
> next: (i.e, mutual dependence of the svataH-pramaNa-s)
>

A bit of misunderstanding.
read : (i.e, mutual dependence of pramANa-s to determine prAmANyam in each
other.)


> (Raghav's comment: Omkar ji, I understand you to be saying that: since each
> svataH-pramAna depends on non-conflict with every other pramANas for its
> validity, so even in svataH-pramANya-vAda, there is mutual dependency
> between pramANa-s and a thus a sort of infinite regress; an accusation
> usually levelled at paratastva-prAmANya-vAda.


As I've made clear, I was actually talking of prAmANya-paratastva-vAda and
not svatastva-vAda. So, this part is not correct.


>  He is saying that - the words pramANa ("pramA-karaNam pramANam" i.e.,
> instruments of knowledge ,viz., the eyes etc) and prAmANyam (data gathered
> through eyes etc) need to be distinguished.


prAmANyam is made clear above. Please see.


> but to be sure, there is a certain
> non-finality to any knowledge.


Yes.
But, that is not important. We don't have any idea about future conflicts
while knowledge is generated and we do our works based on it, so we do our
works based on that knowledge without any problem. The 'non-finality' is
only revealed when we apply logic as we are doing here.
So, clearly any tradition, either of mImAMsaka-s or others, was talking
about pramANa-s which are useful to determine 'artha' for 'vyavahAra'. We
never specially talked about 'absolute' pramANa, prAmANyam, etc. We talked
in general which applied to 'absolute' pramANa, prAmANya, etc. too.
This is what Omkar is missing while saying - 'The observation in itself does
not prove that svataH-prAmANya is the 'right' epistemology.' He is expecting
to decide absolute validity and absolutely valid knowledge, while we were
talking about 'valid till refuted' knowledge and validity till refutation.
I expected him to point out. But, it's rAgahv who has given me a chance to
say that. Thank you again, rAghav, for reading my posts.

All knowledge derived from the
> svataH-pramANa-s


replave 'svataH-pramANa-s' with 'pramANas' .

(including pratyaxa) is provisional


provisional = valid till refutation


> since *future*
> conflicts cannot be ruled out. (except in the case of the antyam-pramANaM
> vedanta which sublates pramatRtvaM itself.)


Very true.


> Therefore the
> uncertainty/provisionality you spoke of regarding shabda-pramANa is the
> bane
> afflicting all the pramANa-s. (barring Vedanta-shabda.)


Nice. Good observation.


> 5. lalitaalaalitaH ji said > We don't test every >knowledge, whether it is
> born of eyes or shabda. We just have >faith=determination that 'this
> knowledge is valid'. So,
> >prAmANya-paratastva-vAda is opposed to experience.>>>He is suggesting that
> svataH-prAmANyam is actually, if anything, the default epistemology we are
> all born with.


Yes. We are talking about 'default' thing and not 'absolute'.

I hope traditional views and their logic is quite clear now.