Vaisesika

Analysis of the Aspects of Reality

The founder of Vaisesika philosophy is the sage Kanada, who was
also known as Uluka, so this system is sometimes called Aulukya.
Kanada wrote the first systematic work of this philosophy,
Vaisesika Sutra. This work is divided into ten cantos, each canto
containing two sections. Prasastapada wrote a commentary on this
Sutra entitled Svartha Dharma Samgraha that is so famous that it
is called Bhasya, which means simply `commentary.' In Indian
philosophical discourse, whenever the word Bhasya is used by
itself without further specification, it is understood to refer to
this commentary. Two well-known explications of Prasastapada's
work are Udayana's Kirana-vali and Sridhara's Nyayakandali. The
significant feature of this system is the introduction of a
special category of reality called uniqueness (visesa). Thus, this
system is known as Vaisesika.

Vaisesika is allied to the Nyaya system of philosophy. Both
systems accept the liberation of the individual self as the end
goal; both view ignorance as the root cause of all pain and
misery; and both believe that liberation is attained only through
right knowledge of reality. There are, however, two major
differences between Nyaya and Vaisesika.  First, Nyaya philosophy
accepts four independent sources of knowledge--perception,
inference, comparison, and testimony--but Vaisesika
accepts only two--perception and inference. Second, Nyaya maintain
s that all of reality is comprehended by sixteen categories
(padarthas), whereas Vaisesika recognizes only seven categories of
reality (see chart).  These are: dravya (substance), guna
(quality), karma (action), samanya (generality), visesa
(uniqueness), samavaya (inherence), and abhava (nonexistence).
The term padartha means "the object denoted by a word," and
according to Vaisesika philosophy all objects denoted by words can
be broadly divided into two main classes--that which exists, and
that which does not exist. Six of the seven padarthas are in the
first class, that which exists. In the second class, that which
does not exist, there is only one padartha, abhava, which stands
for all negative facts such as the nonexistence of things. The
first two categories of reality--substance and quality--are
treated in greater detail in the following discussion than are the
remaining five.

The Category of Substance--Nine Dravyas

Dravya, substance, is that in which a quality or an action can
exist but which in itself is different from both quality and
action. Without substance, there cannot be a quality or an action
because substance is the substrat um of quality and action, and it
is also the material cause of the composite things produced
from it. A cloth, for example, is formed by the combination of a
number threads of certain colors. The threads are the material or
constit utive causes of the cloth because it is made of the
threads that subsist in the cloth.

There are nine kinds of substances: earth, water, fire, air,
ether, time, direction, soul, and mind. The first five of these
are called phys ical elements because each of them possesses a
specific>>>

***[TABLE]***

Vaisesika's Seven Categories (Padirthas) of Reality

Substance (nine dravyas)
Earth, water, fire, air, space or ether, time,
direction, soul, and mind.

Quality (twenty-four gunas)
Color, taste, smell, touch, sound, number,
magnitude, distinctness, union, separation, remoteness, nearness,
cognition, pleasure, pain, desire, aversion, effort, heaviness,
fluidity, viscidity, tendency, virtue, and nonvirtue.

Action (karma)

Generality (samanya)

Uniqueness (visesa)

Inherence (samavaya)

Nonexistence (abhava)

***[END OF TABLE]***

quality that can be perceived by an external sense faculty. Each
of the senses is composed of elements, whose distinguishing
qualities are registered by specific sensory receptors. For
example, smell is the particular property of the earth, and it is
apprehended by the nostrils. Taste is the particular pr