Identity and Identity-Based Generalizations: A Critique of the Buddhist Doctrine of Tadatmya-Vyapti (An Old and Rare Book)

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How can one arrive at a generalization? The problem has plagued and is still plaguing the minds of philosophers. The ancients, owing allegiance to the different schools of Indian Philosophy, tried to solve the problem in the respective ways that suited their metaphysical considerations. The Naiyayikas say: Generalization is a kind of mental perception based on the observation of concomitance of two properties and the non-observation of any deviation¹. According to the Mimarmsakas like Parthasarathimisra generalization is achieved through inference. The Buddhists fall back upon either tadatmya (identity) or tadutpatti (causality) for its determining factors. As the very title indicates, the dissertation we propose to undertake concentrates upon the role of tadatmya in the process of generalizing. An analysis of the concept of tadatmya is required as an unavoidable step. Vyapti is the relation of pervasion, which, as the foundation of anumana, is needed to be grasped in a general way. Universality is a must, since our knowing this much that a particular smoke is pervaded by a particular fire in a particular locus (suppose an oven) is of little assistance in inferring another particular fire from another particular smoke in another particular locus (suppose a mountain). Anumana needs a passage from what we have perceived to what we have not perceived, from some to all That is why the ascertainment of the relation of pervasion in the context of anumana is necessarily a case of generalization. Yet a general character is not enough. Invariability is another indispensable factor. How can a person infer A from B, if he is not confident that A is fixed or invariably related (pratibadhha or niyata) to B? So vyapti or the relation of pervasion is considered to be an invariable concomitance and "vyaptigra- topaya is the method by which one may arrive at the knowledge of invariable concomitance"4.

At the very outset, I offer sincere thanks to my colleagues in A the Department of Philosophy, Jadavpur University, but for whose active assistance I could hardly complete my work. They include Prof. Tapan Kumar Chakraborti, Prof. Sukharanjan Saha, Prof. Kalyan Sengupta, Prof. Hiranmoy Banerjee, Prof. Sephali Moitra, Prof. Amita Chatterjee and Dr. Madhumita Chattopadhyay, who helped me much either through various books and articles or through their valuable advice and suggestions. The library staff of that Department too deserve my heartiest thanks. No language, I think, is sufficient for expressing my heartfelt gratitude to the late Professor Pranab Kumar Sen who, apart from enlightening me on many Western views, did not hesitate to lend me even an unpublished paper written by himself. I am really grateful to Prof. R. I. Ingalalli of Dharwar who, from a distant corner of our country, not only made a very quick response to my academic queries, but also gave some effective suggestions to me-a person personally unknown to him.

I can, in no way, repay the depth of inspiration I have got from my teachers, Prof, Ramaranjan Mukherji, the late Professor Gopikamohan Bhattacharya and the late Professor Krishnanath Chatterjee. I remember with a heavy heart, the late Professor Rabisankar Banerjee, who, as the co-ordinator, Department of Special Assistance in Sanskrit, encouraged me to undertake the work as a D.S.A. project. My gratitude goes to Prof. V.N. Jha of Pune for adjudicating the work as being fit for publication.