[Advaita-l] Apoureshyatva - Faith or Logic?

[Balasubramanian Ramakrishnan]

On Wed, Jun 27, 2012 at 3:31 PM, Rajaram Venkataramani
<rajaramvenk at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Wednesday, June 27, 2012, Balasubramanian Ramakrishnan wrote:
>
>> On Wed, Jun 27, 2012 at 3:59 AM, V Subrahmanian
>> <v.subrahmanian at gmail.com <javascript:;>> wrote:
>>
>> Unfortunately this quote refers to the true nature of reality or
>> brahman which cannot be settled by tarka and is quite different from
>> the way it is being used here (in the realm of "creation" or rather
>> transformation of one thing into another). Ramesh has already referred
>> to the passages on creation and the interpretation by Sankara in the
>> sUtra bhAShya. There seems to be a concerted effort in misinterpreting
>> what Ramesh is saying - all he is saying is that the vedantic view is
>> *not contradicted* by theories of evolution. Whys is this so difficult
>> to understand?
>>
>
> RV: Sringeri Acharya could have said,"You can have any view regarding
> creation of life. It does not contradict Vedantin view". It would have been
> a populist stand as we can then have two models of formation of life forms
> or ignore complicated questions taking shelter of ajati vada. But he did
> not. He stuck to teaching the  traditional belief that life forms were
> created. He gave his reason for that based on sastras. Sri Mani Dravid
> Sastrigal boldly rejected the theory of biological evolution on the grounds
> that it is based on logic. Most traditionalists on this forum also stated
> that they reject the biological theory of evolution. In the worst case,
> they are all wrong but even then they are true their belief and tradition.
> By saying that the theory of biological evolution can fit in to Vedic view
> of creation, we are true to neither the tradition nor the scientific
> method.

First of all, as Ramesh pointed out these are questions bereft of
context and we have to be careful in using such conversations.

That said, using your own logic, Sankara could have told the SankhyA
that there is no pradhAna since life was created and given some vedic
statements in support.  But no - all he says is that pradhAna cannot
be *independent* of brahman and also clearly adds that if the sAnkhyA
wants to posit a pradhanA which has that function they want of it, but
is subservient to brahman, he is acceptable to that view. It all boils
down to the fact that theories of creation are orthogonal (to use
Ramesh's phraseology) to what is important.

> They dont say that veda apaureshyatvam is to be accepted as a given. They
> use pratyaksha and anumana to establish that. If I was totally convinced by
> it, I would not have posted on the forum. I was not because their model
> will be challenged by linguists and evolutionists.
>
> In its own right, their model fails to argue convincingly why Vedas are
>  considered apaureshya and not any vakya. Any sentence is a flow of
> knowledge (jnanapravagam) and the words in the sentences have connection
> with objects, which we can say is eternal as objects and the words exist in
> the source. Any further post on this is useful to me only if it answers
> this.

Can I ask you if you have actually read any pUrva-mImAmsA arguments on
apauruSheyatva? If yes, can you tell me which part of  the argument is
contradicted by any theory of evolution, be it the pradhAna of sAnkhyA
or the modern evolution theories?

Rama