Category Archives: logic

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Permissions for Prabhākara

Is it possible to command someone who is already inclined to act according to Prabhākara? 

Bṛhatī ad 6.1.1 says na pravṛttapravartane prayogaḥ āmantraṇādiṣu vyabhicārāt, literally: “[Exhortative endings] are not used to promote people who are already active, because of the deviant case (vyabhicāra) of invitations”. 

In fact, Prabhākara appears to believe that commands are always imparted on someone who is not yet active and who becomes active upon hearing them. The addressee of a command  desires something already and recognises themselves as the addressee through such desires (see Freschi 2012), but they are not active until they become enjoined.

Now, if Prabhākara means that active people are never promoted to act, why are āmantraṇas a good example? Orders (ājñā) are not used as a standard example because their being a clear case of promoting someone not already active had been attacked by the opponent in the previous line.

As for āmantraṇa, the situation with āmantraṇa is ambiguous, but Śālikanātha takes it as connected to a command uttered among peers (thus, it is not a clear case of a command uttered for people who are not already active). Moreover, what is the role of the vyabhicāra argument? How can a vyabhicāra argument be used to convince someone that something is *always* the case? A vyabhicāra can be used to show that it is incorrect to claim that “All As are B”, since there is at least one A that is not a B, but it can’t be used to corroborate “All As are B” by showing a further case of an A that is indeed B. In other words, why speaking of “vyabhicāra” and not of “yathāmantraṇeṣu” or the like if this was what he meant? The only possible explanation seems to be to think of āmantraṇādiṣu vyabhicārāt as “because the case of invitations, etc., deviates from the [opponent’s] claim”.  

Still, if it is impossible to command someone who is already inclined to act, how can Prabhākara make sense of permissions? When we are already about to light a cigarette and look around and ask whether it is OK and someone tells us “No problem, go ahead!”, isn’t the “go ahead” a command directed to someone who is already active? Could Prabhākara perhaps say that a command cannot enjoin someone who is already active because it would miss the apūrva element?

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Sāṅkhya on śyena

The Sāṅkhya reached its acme before Mīmāṃsā and its position is therefore attacked as a useful departure point for deontic discussions, especially around the case of the śyena in Mīmāṃsā texts (in the following, I will refer to its representation in Veṅkaṭanātha’s TMK).

Interestingly, although the school accepted the authority of the Vedas, Sāṅkhya authors did not insist on their being necessarily consistent and instead highlighted that the prohibition to perform violence should not be overturned, not even in case of sacrificial violence. Accordingly, they understand the sequence:

  • 1. One should not perform violence on any living being
  • 2. If one desires to harm one’s enemy, they should sacrifice bewitching with the śyena

as implying that 1. invalidates 2. Interestingly, Sāṅkhya authors are ready to go as far as stating that this applies also to the following sequence:

  • 1. One should not perform violence on any living being
  • 3. One should sacrifice an animal within the agnīṣomīya sacrifice

Whereas all Mīmāṃsā authors agree that 2. should not be fulfilled (but out of different reasons than the one put forward by Sāṅkhya authors), no one among them would agree in extending this position to 3.

Sāṅkhya authors are therefore presupposing that Vedic commands do not necessarily form a consistent whole and, more importantly, that prohibitions are \emph{unrestricted in their application} (see TMK 5.78). This is connected to a point we will see developed by Maṇḍana, namely the incommensurability of the bad. Transgressing a prohibition involves accumulating pāpa, i.e., bad karman, and this bad output cannot be compensated by any good result one might gather. Prescriptions contrasting with prohibitions are automatically suspended, since prohibitions are unrestricted and always prevail. Only prescriptions not contrasting with prohibitions are valid.

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General and specific rules in Mīmāṃsā?

What happens when commands clash? A standard devise to deal with the topic is the idea of taking one as a general rule and the other as a specific one. In Sanskrit, these are called, respectively, utsarga and apavāda. Mīmāṃsā authors have, however, other devices.

For instance, Kumārila, discusses the prohibition to perform violence and its seeming conflict with the ritual prescription to perform ritual killing within a given sacrifice.
See his Commentary in verses (Ślokavārttika), chapter on Injunction (codanā), vv. 223—224:

तेन सामान्यतः प्राप्तो विधिना न निवारितः ||
फलांशोपनिपातिन्या हिंसायाः प्रतिेषेधकः |
“Therefore the prohibition to killing, obtained in general applied and not stopped by another injunction, prohibits the killing when it pertains to the fruit-portion |

Is this a case of a general rule overturned by a specific one (as claimed in Kei Kataoka 2012, Is Killing Bad?)?

If it were so, we would have the general prohibition to perform violence (F(violence)/T) being overruled by the more specific obligation to perform ritual killing in a specific setting:
F(violence)/T
O(violence)/sacrifice for Agni and Soma

However, this is not the solution adopted by Kumārila. Rather, Kumārila’s point is that the original prohibition to perform violence should be reconfigured as a prohibition regarding only violence as the result of the action, and not regarding instrumental violence.

That is, according to Kumārila, the Vedic prohibition to perform violence should not be read as
F(violence)/T
but as
F(violence as a result)/T
which does not conflict with (instrumental violence)

Comments, as usual, welcome!

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Why do people respond to commands?

Why do people obey to commands? Because they are immediately inclined, in a behaviourist way, to obey? Or because they realise that the action commanded is an instrument to the realisation of a coveted goal? Or are there further explanations?

This question has been debated at length in Sanskrit philosophy, oscillating especially among three main positions. I discussed these positions with some accuracy in previous posts, but this time I would like to try a bird-eye view about what is at stake.

On the one side, Maṇḍana claimed that the only motivator for undertaking actions is the awareness of the fact that the action to be undertaken is the means to obtain a desired goal. On the other, Prabhākara’s followers claimed that we immediately obey to commands because we feel enjoined, and only later analyse what is being asked and why. The role of the mention of the listener’s desire in commands such as “If you want to lose weight, try this shake!” is not meant to say that the enjoined action is an instrument to realise the desired output. Rather, the mention of the desire is meant for the listener to understand that they are the person addressed by the prescription. It picks up the person, who immediately relates with their own desires, but does not describe the existence of an instrumental relation between enjoined action and result. The last position can be connected to Bhartṛhari’s pratibhā theory. As depicted by Maṇḍana, this is a general theory about meaning, which includes both commands and descriptive sentence. According to it, human as well as non-human animals have innate inclinations which make it possible for them to perform activities they could have never learnt but are still able to perform, such as swimming or breastfeeding in the case of a baby. The pratibhā theory can be extended to commands which one would respond to because of an innate inclination.

Maṇḍana’s theory has the clear advantage of being a reductionist theory. By following it, one does no longer need an ad hoc semantic theory for commands, which can be reduced to descriptive sentences explaining the relation between the action enjoined and the expected output. Similarly, Maṇḍana provides a single theory covering all aspects of motivation to act, both in the case of commands and in the case of autonomous undertakings of action. In all cases, one is motivated to act because one thinks that the action is the instrument to get to the expected result. What are the disadvantages of this theory? First of all, Prābhākaras have a point when they describe our first response to commands. We immediately feel enjoined even before starting to analyse the action we have been required to perform. Secondly, Maṇḍana’s theory might have problems when it comes to people who know what would be best for them, but still don’t act. Can this all be explained just in terms of desires and instruments?

As declared at the beginning, the above is my attempt to give a short overview of the debate. Comments are welcome!

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Maṇḍana’s intellectual theory of motivation

Maṇḍana’s thesis is an answer to the problem of how to identify the core of a prescription. What makes people undertake actions? Kumārila’s śabdabhāvanā theory and Prabhākara’s kāryavāda had already offered their answers. Maṇḍana expands on Kumārila’s intuition about human behaviour being always goal-oriented by offering a radical reductionist hypothesis. According to this hypothesis, being a motivator is nothing but communicating that the action to be undertaken is an instrument to some coveted result. In this sense, prescribing X to people desiring Y is nothing but explaining that X is the means to achieve Y.

This cognitive interpretation of what motivates one to act could be accused of intellectualism. What about agents who, though understanding that X would be the appropriate course of action, do not undertake it, perhaps out of sloth?

A possible answer is that Maṇḍana’s theory describes the behaviour of ideal agents, who are able to evaluate rationally what is the best means to a coveted goal. Alternatively, one might suggest (as hinted at at the end of section 11.2) that even such irrational people would be impelled to act, even if they then do not physically undertake any act. The iṣṭasādhanatā is a motivator even for them, although they do not act correspondingly. One might think of the comparable case of someone who intensely desires an ice-cream and comes to know that great ice-creams are available in a given part of the city. They are ready to go there, but undergo an accident and are prevented from going. Although they do not practically act, the knowledge about the ice-cream shop did act as motivator for them.

Correspondingly, pravṛtti is used as a synonym of prayatna `effort’ and indicates the undertaking of an activity, not yet its realisation. Similarly, a person said to be pravṛtta is one who has already conceived the decision to undertake an action, although no movement can be seen yet.

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A preliminary understanding of pratibhā

Within chapter 11 of his masterpiece, the Vidhiviveka `Discernment about prescription’, Maṇḍana identifies the core element which causes people to undertake actions. Maṇḍana expands on Kumārila’s intuition about human behaviour being always goal-oriented by offering a radical reductionist hypothesis. According to this hypothesis, being a motivator is nothing but communicating that the action to be undertaken is an instrument to some coveted result. In this sense, prescribing X to people desiring Y is nothing but explaining that X is the means to achieve Y.

At this point, Maṇḍana introduces some opponents, mainly one upholding pratibhā.

The term pratibhā is found in Bhartṛhari, whom Maṇḍana extensively quotes in chapter 11 of his Vidhiviveka. It is clear that Maṇḍana suggests the pratibhā as an alternative way of making sense of what motivates people to act. In this sense, pratibhā is a pravartaka `motivator’, something causing one to act. It is the key alternative to Maṇḍana’s own proposal that the knowledge that the enjoined action will lead to a desired result is what causes people to act. The pratibhā theory radically opposes this one.

In fact, Maṇḍana’s theory is primarily cognitive (you act with regard to X because you know something relevant about X), whereas the pratibhā theory is almost behaviourist (you act with regard to X because of the pratibhā inducing you to act).

The Prābhākara opponent within Maṇḍana will later appropriate this theory and join it with their own deontological understanding, according to which we act primarily because we are enjoined to do so, thus adding a deontological nuance which was absent in Bhartṛhari’s view of pratibhā.

But what is pratibhā before its Prābhākara reinterpretation? A key passage for the understanding of the pratibhā theory in Maṇḍana before its Prābhākara appropriation is the very sentence introducing it, at the beginning of section 11.3. There, the opponent suggests pratibhā as the thing causing one to undertake an action. An uttarapakṣin asks which kind of artha this is and the answer is at first sight surprising: It is no artha at all (na kaścit). What is it then? It is a cognitive event (prajñā) leading to action.

The point seems to be that there is no mental content, but only the urge towards acting. The pratibhā is a mental state without intentional content.

A further hint is found at the beginning of 11.5, where Maṇḍana responds to the paradox that the pratibhā cognition has no object, but it causes activity. This results, says Maṇḍana, in an undesirable consequence. In fact, if in the case of pratibhā the cognition of the connection between word and meaning plays no role, because the pratibhā has no intentional content, a person hearing a prescription should act independently of any cognition of the meaning.

But can we have purely agentive mental states? Can there be incitement to action without any content?

I am grateful to Hugo David for an inspiring talk on pratibhā back in 2018. This interpretation should, however, not be blamed on him. Similarly, I am always grateful to Elliot Stern for his edition of the Vidhiviveka and for the work we shared in the last 12 months.

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Jayanta on why knowing one’s good is not enough to act

Today I discussed with Sudipta Munsi how Jayanta (9th c., Kaśmīr) speaks of the motivator of exhortative sentences. Why do we undertake activities upon hearing an exhortative sentence?

Among the possible candidates are one’s desire (rāga) for the output of the activity, and the cognition that the enjoined activity is the means to achieve one’s welfare etc. (śreyassādhanatva).

Jayanta thinks that the latter theory is untenable, since one does not undertake activities, even if conducive to one’s welfare, unless one desires it (as we all know when it comes to brushing our teeth or doing daily workouts). The refutation then becomes more technical, because Jayanta explains that the śreyassādhanatva theory is introduced as part of the bhāvanā theory, but this cannot work.

In fact, according to the latter theory, the nature of an action (bhāvanā) consists of three elements (1. thing to be realised, 2. instrument to realise it and 3. procedure). For the śreyassādhanatva, the two relevant parts are the first two. But an activity delimited by these two parts does not have the form of being the means to one’s welfare (śreyassādhanatva) since it is “incomplete” (aniṣpanna). Why so? Because one can only speak of śreyassādhanatva at the end of the process, once the activity is pariniṣpanna ‘complete’. Thus, śreyassādhanatva comes at the end of the process and cannot be the motivator.

Maṇḍana Miśra, possibly because of similar criticisms, inserts the element of desire within the śreyassādhanatva, which he therefore more frequently calls iṣṭasādhanatva, i.e. the idea that an action is the ‘instrument to realise something desired’.

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Various types of bādha (in epistemology, deontics, Śabara, Kumārila…)

As it is often the case for other terms (e.g., nitya or even pramāṇa), various terms which are used technically in the epistemological debates between, among others, Mīmāṃsā, Nyāya, and Buddhist epistemological school, also have a deontic-ritual background. This applies also to bādha, whose epistemological meaning is only the tip of the iceberg of its Mīmāṃsā use.

In epistemology, it seems to mean `invalidation’, whereas in deontics, it means `suspension’ (which could be again brought back to use). Could the two be reconciled? Yes, if only one considers that within the svataḥ prāmāṇya framework any invalidation is necessarily temporary.

As for Śabara’s vs Kumārila’s use of bādha, the first thing one notices is that Śabara deals with bādha within the latter part of the PMS-Bhāṣya, namely within the discussion of vikṛti ‘ectype’ rituals. That is, Śabara primarily discusses bādha as the blocking mechanism in case something of the archetype ritual does not extend to the ectype one. Therefore, Kumārila has to invent a new space for bādha while commenting on the balābala-adhikaraṇa within the first group of books in the PMS-Bhāṣya. There, Kumārila treats bādha as a general device, not related to the prakṛti-to-vikṛti extension. This treatment is then adopted also by later Mīmāṃsā authors (MBP, MNS, Āpadevī etc.).

Jhā (1942, chapter XXIX) mixes the two understandings insofar as he calls bādha `exclusion’ and introduces it as part of the prakṛti-to-vikṛti extension of details (corresponding to its role in the ŚBh), but then moves on (from end of p. 342 onwards) and discusses it in the light of later sources, influenced by Kumārila’s approach.

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Maṇḍana’s revolution: From deontic to descriptive interpretation of injunctions

Maṇḍana’s Vidhiviveka `Discernment about injunctions’ deals with chiefly two topics at length:

  1. What is the nature of a prescription? After many discussions, examining the positions of Prabhākara and Bhartṛhari, the answer is that a Vedic prescription is just the statement that the action prescribed is the instrument to get a desired output.
  2. If the above is true, how can one distinguish between fixed and elective rituals?

Let me now elaborate on both topics.

First, a sacrifice is considered by Maṇḍana to be an iṣṭasādhana, i.e., an instrument to something desired. A sacrificial injunction is therefore just the communication that the sacrifice is such (i.e., an instrument to something desired). Thus,

O(x/desire for y)

means

x is an instrument for y

This would work also for negative obligations, e.g.,

O (not eating (x)/desire for y)

means

forming the intention not to eat x is an instrument for y

Please notice that this could also cover cases of negative obligations which apply to everyone (in this case, according to the Viśvajit-metarule, one postulates heaven, i.e., happiness, as result):

O (not doing x/T)

is re-read as:

O (not doing x/desire for heaven)

This, in turn, means:

forming the intention to refrain from doing x is an instrument for heaven

This means that omitting the enjoined action (that is, not forming the intention to refrain from x) only leads to the non-obtainment of heaven. The situation would have been different had the same action x been forbidden, as will be explained immediately below.

What about prohibitions? They communicate one that the action prohibited is an instrument to something undesired, i.e., suffering (duḥkha).
Thus,

F (x/T)

means

x is an instrument for something absolutely undesirable

For instance, the prohibition to perform violence on any living beings (na hiṃsyāt sarvā bhūtāni) has the structure:

F (violence/T)

and not

*O (not violence/T)

because, if respected, it does not lead to any positive result (unlike an obligation), whereas, if transgressed, it leads to a negative output.

This means that prohibitions and prescriptions have a similar structure (both state that a given action is an instrument for something, respectively desirable or undesirable). Prescriptions are, however, in general effective only on people who desire that outcome, whereas prohibitions are effective on everyone, since the forbidden action would lead to outcomes which are absolutely undesirable (pāpa, which will interfere with all of one’s future undertakings).

The main advantage of this structure, as I can see it, is that one avoids the main problems of having a deontic logic, by translating deontic statements into descriptive ones.

What about the śyena, which prescribes one to perform a sacrifice leading to violence? śyena is anartha, i.e., in Maṇḍana’s understanding, it is also an instrument for something undesired, that is suffering (duḥkha). Thus, it should not be performed because it has this structure:

Śyena–»violence

and given:

F(violence/T)

we know that:

violence–»something undesired

Thus,

śyena–»something undesired

Thus, the choice to perform a śyena would be based on a misjudgement of what is at stake, since the positive output (the death of one’s enemy) is anyway less positive than the negative sanction that will follow.
NB: The target reader of Maṇḍana appears to be a rational agent who is completely able to judge the outcomes of their actions (unlike in the case of Prabhākara).

This leads to a problem, however, because if all sacrifices are considered to be just instruments to something desired, how can one account for the difference between elective and fixed results? It would indeed seem that all sacrifices are just recommended if one wants to achieve a given result, no more than that. Why would one perform some every day and some others only on given occasions? If the performance depended on the desire, an opponent suggests, then there would be no fixed sacrifices, since as soon as one gets what one desired, one would stop performing the sacrifice.

Maṇḍana examines various scenarios, including one that says that if one omits the performance of fixed sacrifices, one obtains pāpa (demerit), which will then block any further enterprise. Thus, fixed sacrifice would have as a positive result only the reduction of pāpa, whereas the their omission has a negative result, i.e., accumulation of further pāpa.

But what about the auxiliaries of fixed and elective sacrifices? According to all Mīmāṃsā authors, the former have to be performed as much as one can, the latter exactly as prescribed. Why this difference, if both sacrifices are just the same thing, namely instruments to something desired? Maṇḍana explains that the Vedic prescriptions enjoining fixed sacrifices prescribe them “as long as one lives”. This means that in their case the fixedness does not depend on the nature of the desire (i.e., they are not fixed just because one fixedly desires their output) but rather on the Vedic prescriptions prescribing them.
Thus, due to the metarule that says that the Veda cannot prescribe meaningless things and due to the metarule that only possible things can be prescribed, the “as long as one lives” clause cannot mean to perform auxiliaries exactly as prescribed. Thus, auxiliaries of fixed sacrifices are to be performed only as much as one can.

One might wonder: What about elective sacrifices to be done in order to obtain heaven? Given that heaven is happiness and every one desires happiness all the time, such sacrifices are potentially also to be performed all the time. Should one perform also their auxiliaries as much as possible?

The answer is no, because each elective sacrifice is incumbent on one every day anew and as such one is responsible to perform it (adhikārin) only if one has all relevant sacrificial ingredients. If one lacks them, one is not the adhikārin and therefore does not have to perform the sacrifice. Thus, there is no need to perform a sacrifice as much as one can.

By contrast, in the case of fixed sacrifices, one needs to perform them every day, since they are fixed, one is therefore always the adhikārin of them simply by being alive. Therefore, if one lacks, e.g., a relevant ingredient, one just performs the sacrifice as much as one can.