The Positive Sciences of the Ancient Hindus c10.47

c10.47

*Nyáya objection to the Buddhist Method of Difference as a means of ascertaining Causality.*—Take for example the Buddhist deduction of Causality in any particular conjunction by means of the negative Method of Difference, or of the Pañchakáraní. The ascertainment of the causal relation by these Methods is open to the following objections: (1) The unconditionality of the antecedent cannot possibly be ascertained. As the Chárváka rightly points out, the Methods enable you to eliminate irrelevant antecedents that are or can be perceived; but the introduction or sublation of latent or undetected antecedents can be imagined, against which the Method of Difference is powerless. In the case of the production of smoke, for example, by fire—what if I say that an invisible demon intervenes in every case between the fire and the smoke, that this demon (पिशाच) is the immediate antecedent and real cause of the latter, and that the fire is an accident which in every such case is brought about by its own causal antecedents? In saying this I do not go counter to the principle of causality, and am landed in no contradiction (व्याघात) such as strikes at the very roots of all practice, or baffles the completed circuit of consciousness, however much I may violate probability.