Standpoint of Nyāya-Vaiśeska on Universal Essentialism and Counter Argument of Buddhism

Abstract

Philosophers who advocate either essentialism and nominalism or conceptualism in both Eastern and Western societies have constantly argued about whether Sāmānya exists or not, and how that question is related with the phenomenal world. This paper aims at examining theories on the substantiality of sāmānya and investigates the counter argument and answers of Buddhism on this matter. Sāmānya for Buddhists is subjective not in superficial terms such as dreams, illusion and imagination but in more profound terms such as the natural or innate form of human reason. In other words, sāmānya is not a random form of individual reason but a product of natural tendencies of the essential concept. Therefore, sāmānya is called saṃvṛtisat. Also, sāmānya is separated from ultimate svalakṣanas. In this ultimate perspective, sāmānya is not there are absolute specifics that do not have universality or similarity, without this assumption, they cannot explain common recognition through language and ideas. It is said that sāmānya is separated through the abstraction of individual beings in humans’ thoughts, but this does not mean that sāmānya is given to the actual existence of beings. Essentialists assume that sāmānya has its own being as the object of the same recognition because it is separated from other objects of recognition uncritically. However, this assumption is not supported by either experience or logic. Sāmānya and individual beings are not recognized as different concepts such as cows or horses and the former is not recognized without the latter. It is unnecessary to assume sāmānya as another existence to explain the same recognition on individual beings because they are explained based on the universal attributes that appear in each individual being.