A History of Hindu Chemistry from the Earliest Times to the Middle of the Sixteenth Century A.D. v2.c35.90

v2.c35.90

Instances of Vyápti (uniformity) not comprehended under Causality, or the relation of Genus and Species :—The Nyáya points out that the relations of cause and effect and of genus and species do not exhaust the grounds of Inference. There are cases of Inference based on Vyápti (i.e., on invariable and unconditional concomitance) which come neither under Causality (तदुत्पत्ति) nor under Identity of Essence (तादात्म्य). Váchaspati notes that to-day's sunrise and yesterday's sunrise, the rise of the moon and the tide in the ocean, the relative positions of the stellar constellations, are instances of Vyápti (invariable concomitance) between phenomena which are neither related as cause and effect, nor as genus and species. Jayanta adds the conjunction of sun-set with the appearance of the stars, of ants moving in procession (with their eggs) with the approach of the rains,—of the rising of the constellation Agastya (Canopus) above the horizon with the drying up of rivers; of the spring tide with the full moon; and dismisses as sophistical and far-fetched the Buddhist attempt to explain all these cases by means of causality. We have seen that the Nyāya and the Mimānsá reduce most of these conjunctions to cases of co-effects of the same cause, co-effects which may be either simultaneous or successive.