[Advaita-l] Advaita Siddhi series 032 - sopAdhikatva nirAsah (part 1)

[Venkatraghavan S]

Namaste
After having discussed the paksha, sAdhya and hetu in the mithyAtva
anumAna, we will now proceed to refute the various defects cited by the
nyAyAmritakAra against this anumAna proposed by the advaitin.

The first of these is sopAdhikatva - that is, the mithyAtva anumAna of the
advaitin is flawed because it is afflicted by upAdhi, a disturbing
condition. The anumAna uses the hetu to prove the presence of the sAdhya in
the paksha - critical to this is the vyApti, or invariable concomitance,
between the hetu and the sAdhya. When the anumAna is sopAdhikam (afflicted
by upAdhi), it affects the anumAna in two ways:
1) It weakens the vyApti between the hetu and the sAdhya. If the inference
has an upAdhi, then the hetu does not invariably prove the sAdhya. Even if
the hetu is sometimes present, the sAdhya may be absent. For instance, the
inference of smoke from the presence of fire (the reversal of the
time-tested inference of fire from the presence of smoke) is affected by
upAdhi of wet fuel. If fire is present, but the fuel is not wet, then no
smoke will occur. Thus it is possible that fire (hetu) is present, but
smoke (sAdhya) is absent, hence vyabhichAra. upAdhi introduces vyabhichAra
to the inference.
2) The absence of the upAdhi in the paksha, leads to the absence of the
sAdhya. Where wet fuel is absent, smoke is absent. Thus, once the
pUrvapakshi proves that the anumAna has an upAdhi, all he needs to disprove
the sAdhya is to prove the absence of the upAdhi.

ननु - दृश्यत्वादिहेतव: सोपाधिका: The nyAyAmritakAra alleges that the
mithyAtva anumAna proved by the various hetus such as knowability are
sopAdhika, with upAdhi.

He will argue that various upAdhis are present in the anumAna. As a
reminder, upAdhi is that which is necessarily present with the sAdhya, but
is not necessarily present with the hetu. The methodology that we can adopt
to detect upAdhis is to look at the drShTAnta, the example, and the paksha,
the case under question. Both the pUrvapakshi and the siddhAntin agree that
the hetu (knowability) and sAdhya (mithyAtva) are present in the drShTAnta
(shell-silver). They also agree that the hetu (knowability) is present in
the paksha (the world). The item under debate is whether the sAdhya
(mithyAtva) is present there or not.

To prove that something is an upAdhi, we will need to examine whether it is
present in the drShTAnta (which contains the sAdhya), but is absent in the
paksha (which contains the hetu).

तथाहि  - स्वबाधकाभिमताबाध्यदोषप्रयुक्तभानत्वं, स्वबाधकाबाध्यबाधकं प्रति
निषेध्यत्वेन विषयत्वं वा विपक्षाद्व्यावृत्तं समव्याप्तम्, अतएव
व्यतिरेकव्याप्तिमदुपाधि: -

स्वबाधकाभिमताबाध्यदोषप्रयुक्तभानत्वं - an object that appears due to
defects that are not sublated by the cognition that is considered to
sublate the object.

drShTAnta: The shell appears like silver, because it is shiny like silver.
When light reflects on the shell, it appears to glisten like silver,
leading the viewer to think that silver is present. Thus, the defect that
causes the shell-silver (स्वं) to appear (दोषप्रयुक्तभानत्वं) is the
shininess off the shell. The cognition that sublates shell-silver
(स्वबाधकं) is said to be (अभिमतं) the knowledge "this is a shell". However,
that cognition does not sublate the shininess of the shell
(स्वबाधकाभिमताबाध्यदोषं), which leads to the appearance of shell-silver.
Thus स्वबाधकाभिमताबाध्यदोषप्रयुक्तभानत्वं is present in the drShTAnta,
along with the sAdhya of mithyAtva.

paksha: The world (स्वं) appears, according to the advaitin, because of the
ignorance of Brahman (दोषप्रयुक्तभानं). The cognition that sublates the
world is said to be the knowledge "I am Brahman" (स्वबाधकाभिमतं). When this
cognition arises, it not only sublates the world, but also the ignorance of
Brahman (स्वबाधकाभिमतबाध्यदोषं), because of which the world appears. No
defects remain after the rise of brahma jnAna. In other words,
स्वबाधकाभिमताबाध्यदोषप्रयुक्तभानत्वं is absent in the paksha, where the
hetu of drShyatva is present.
Therefore where the sAdhya is present (drShTAnta), the upAdhi is present,
but it is not always present where the hetu is present (paksha). This meets
the criterion for upAdhi.

Let us take the next candidate - स्वबाधकाबाध्यबाधकं प्रति निषेध्यत्वेन
विषयत्वं - being the object of  negation in the sublating cognition which
cognition is itself unsublated by the sublating cognition of the object.

drShTAnta: The sublating cognition of shell-silver (स्वं) is the cognition
"this is not shell-silver" (स्वबाधकं). A cognition that is not sublated by
the sublating cognition of shell-silver is "there is no shell-silver here"
(स्वबाधकाबाध्यं). This is also the sublating cognition of shell-silver
(स्वबाधकाबाध्यबाधकं). The object of negation conveyed in such a cognition
is the shell-silver (स्वबाधकाबाध्यबाधकं प्रति निषेध्यत्वेन विषयत्वं). Thus,
the drShTAnta is endowed with स्वबाधकाबाध्यबाधकं प्रति निषेध्यत्वेन
विषयत्वं.

paksha:  The sublating cognition of the world (स्वं) is brahma jnAna
(स्वबाधकं). There is no cognition that is sublated by brahma jnAna. Thus
there is nothing which is स्वबाधकाबाध्यं, because the akhaNDAkAra vritti
(impartite knowledge of brahman) not only sublates the world and its cause,
ignorance, it sublates all effects of ignorance, including itseld.
Therefore, we can conclude that the paksha is not endowed
with  स्वबाधकाबाध्यबाधकं प्रति निषेध्यत्वेन विषयत्वं.

Therefore, this too meets the test of an upAdhi.

विपक्षाद्व्यावृत्तं समव्याप्तम्, अतएव व्यतिरेकव्याप्तिमदुपाधि: - The two
upAdhis are absent in that which is not the paksha (Brahman and asat) and
therefore these are not merely exclusions the paksha. Therefore these
upAdhis are samavyAptam - ie they are co-extensive with the sAdhya, equally
pervade with the sAdhya. The upAdhi will always be present where the sAdhya
is present, and where the upAdhi is absent, the sAdhya also will be absent.

According to udayanAchArya, only that which is a samavyApta can be an
upAdhi. For example, any inference (even a valid one) can be said to have
'being other than the paksha' (पक्षेतरं) as upAdhi. This merely excludes
the paksha, and will necessarily be present in everything, except the
paksha. The drShTAnta will not be the paksha, so 'being other than the
paksha' will be present there, whereas the paksha itself cannot be 'other
than the paksha'. If this is not remedied, no inference would be valid.
Hence, according to udayanAchArya, only that which is samavyApta
(co-extensive with the sAdhya), i.e, not merely a negation of the paksha,
is fit to be an upAdhi. These two upAdhis are samavyApta. Where the sAdhya
is present, they are present. Therefore, the absence of the upAdhi, will
necessarily imply the absence of the sAdhya, which is the vyatireka vyApti
(reversal of the syllogism, where the sAdhya is present, the upAdhi is
present).

The siddhikAra's responses to these arguments will be taken up in the next
post.

Originally posted on 10th April 2018.

(Continued).