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Indian theories of inference seek to analyse such paradigmatic examples as (a> and @I This is a tree, because it is an oak. There is fire on the mountain, because there is smoke there,

The general schematic form of these inferences is a has P because a has Q, where P and Q are properties, and a is an arbitrary singular term, referring to the locus of the inference. In the Indian tradition inference, like perception and possibly testimony, is a means of acquiring knowledge. At two points the analogy with perception is fairly strong. Firstly, the locution S infers that p, like S perceives that p, entails the truth of the proposition p. Secondly, inferring is a causal process. The occurrence in a subject of the knowledge-event that a has Q causes a second mental event that a has P, and this latter is also a knowledge-event because the process is truth-preserving. The Indian theorists thus seem to accept a type of process reliabilism; an event is one of knowledge just in case it is acquired via a process which is reliable, in fact, 100% reliable. We can divide an inference into two components. The first consists of those aspects of the inferential process which are common to every instance of the general schema. The second consists of those aspects which are specific to the choice of properties P and Q. This second component is said to include the knowledge-event that P and Q stand in a certain relation R (the vytipti relation). The theorists disagree over
Journal of Indian Philosophy 18: 237-247, 1990. 0 1990 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.

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the correct analysis of R and how it is possible to know that it obtains for any given P and Q. Perhaps it is worth noting that since the method by means of which one comes to know that R obtains will include an inductive generalisation from observed instances of P and Q, and since this inductive element is held to be itself part of the inference, these inferences are both inductive and deductive.
II

I shall develop the theory of the philosopher Dharmakirti. He was aware, first of all, that it is not sufficient for an inference that R is the extensional every possessor of Q is a possessor of P. His commentators cite an example of a purported inference meeting only this condition. It is: He is dark-skinned, because he is Haris child. We are to suppose that all Haris children, except this one, are known to be dark-skinned. The problem is that inferences ought to lead to the acquisition of knowledge; in this case, however, one could only know that all Haris children are dark-skinned if one already knows that the child who is the subject of the purported inference is darkskinned. Thus, one would only be in a position to make the inference if one already knew its conclusion. So R needs (a) to entail that every possessor of Q is a possessor of P, but (b) be such that it can be known to obtain without having to survey the entire domain. The commentators diagnose the fault as that being dark-skinned is the result not of parentage, but of the mothers diet!* The general thought then is that P and Q must stand in some sort of causal relation. Dharmakirtis analysis of R is as follows. He claims that R must take one of two forms, exemplified by the two examples with which this paper began. In the first type of case (k&vu), as having P is a necessary causal factor for as having Q. For example, the mountains having fire is held to be a necessary causal factor for there being smoke there. (Ignore the slight strain in treating this example as fitting the general schema.) In such cases, one might see the inference as an inference to the best explanation: the occurrence of fire causally explains the perceived occurrence of smoke.

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The second type of case (svubhtivu) again divides into two. There are the relatively uncommon inferences from a sufficient cause or complete set of causal factors (as having Q) to an effect (as having P). More importantly, there are inferences like this is a tree because it is an oak. To explain this kind of example, it is said that whatever produces an oak, thereby produces a tree. The situation is thus to be viewed as one in which there is a common cause of somethings being an oak and its being a tree. So type-two cases are ones for which as having Q is either a sufficient cause, or the effect of a sufficient cause, of as having P. In both type-one and type-two cases, P and Q stand in some sort of causal relation, a relation in virtue of which every possessor of Q is a possessor of P. When such a relation is known to obtain, it is possible to infer from as having Q to as having P. The outstanding problem now is how such knowledge is possible.

III

There is textual evidence that Dharmakirti thought of the relation between P and Q in type-two cases as being one of metaphysical necessity.4 His use of the term own-nature (svubh&u) to name the relation is itself quite suggestive. It seems to me to be possible to accept this evidence, and to reconcile it with the above analysis of the relation, by attributing to Dharmakirti a certain causal theory of properties. The theory I have in mind has this identity condition for properties: P = Q iff (objects X) (events e) (e causes xs having P ++ e causes xs having Q). Here events are treated, following Kim, as property exemplifications. In order to develop this account, I shall contrast it with a more familiar one. Certain remarks of Locke, according to Shoemaker,s suggest an account according to which properties are clusters of causal powers. More recently, Popper has endorsed the view that all properties are dispositional. Suppose that n is a causal power. Then n has a contextual definition of the following form:

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(x) (XS having zr in C(x) causes M(x)), where C(x) are the circumstances in which x manifests JC,and M(x) is the effect of its manifestation. For example, xs being anti-febrile, in circumstances such that x has just been ingested by y, causes ys fever to abate. Use of a contextual definition seems preferable to the usual practice of saying that an object has a power if its presence in certain circumstances will produce certain effects. For presence in certain circumstances is surely a matter of possessing relational properties, but relational properties are causally inert. Suppose that properties consist in clusters of powers. It then follows that P = Q iff (x) (e) (xs having P causes e * xs having Q causes e). The similarity of this identity condition to the one above suggeststhat a constitutive account of properties can be constructed from that one. Playing an analogous role to causal powers are what I shall call modes ofproduction. If 11is a mode of production then p has a contextual definition of the form (x) (E(x) in C(x) causes xs having p). The best examples of predicates which express modes of production are those of the form made by . . . or originates in . . .. Thus an oak tree may be said to be acorn-made because caused by an acorns germination in good soil. And if the fuel is wet, fire causes smoke. So smoke may be said to be fire-made. The theory of properties to be considered is that properties are clusters of modes of production. Let us call the theory that properties are sets of powers the Extreme Dispositional Theory, or EDT, and the theory that properties are sets of modes of production the Extreme Productive Theory, or EPT. It is clear that both theories stand in need of revision. Against EDT, there is a well known epistemological argument which shows that not all properties are dispositional. The argument begins by noting that it is essential that the attribution of a causal power to an object is possible even at times when the object is not manifesting that power. But such an attribution, it seems,is only justifiable if there is a

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non-dispositional property, a categorical basis, in virtue of the possession of which an object has the causal power in question. The categorical basis is possessedby that object both at times when the power is manifested and at times when it is not, and by at least some other objects which manifest the same causal power. It seems then that there must be non-dispositional as well as dispositional properties. Two further claims are often made. First, it is usually supposed that categorical bases are complex structural properties, for instance having a certain atomic or molecular structure, or in the case of biological objects, having a certain genetic structure. The second claim is that categorical bases are essential properties of
natural kinds.

Let us call the theorist who endorses these claims a Revised Dispositional Theorist (RDT). The RDT states that (a) natural kinds are non-dispositional, structural properties; (b) all other properties are dispositional; (c) the latter are nomologically correlated with the former. Returning to EPT, the Extreme Productive Theory, a revision also seems necessary. EPT denies that any properties are dispositional, but this can only be the result of an unwarranted parsimony with respect to the extent of the class of properties. It is implausible to deny that for example, anti-febrility or mass are not genuine properties. In fact, in ail Dharmakirtis examples, properties are referred to by means of common nouns. This suggests that EPT should be restricted to kinds, both artificial and natural. The theory which emerges, a Revised Productive Theory, states that (a) kinds are clusters of modes of production; (b) all other properties are dispositional; (c) the latter are nomologically correlated with the former. RDT and RPT differ over two classes of properties. Firstly, they make different claims about the essencesof natural kinds. Secondly, they make different claims about non-natural kinds. As an example of this second difference, the noun cook on RDT applies to a person in virtue of their having a dispositional ability to cook. By contrast, on RPT it applies in virtue of that persons having learned to cook. RDTs deliverances in such examples do not seem implausible, but rather than consider these cases in more detail, I shall try to defend its claim about the essencesof natural kinds.

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To begin with, a prima facie defence can be constructed by enlarging upon an idea of Shoemaker.YThere is, he notes, an analogy between on the one hand the relation between an object and its properties, and on the other the relation between a property and its causal powers. He argues that an objects possessing a property immutably (i.e. without there being the possibility of the object ceasing to have that property at a later time) entails that the object possessesthe property essentially, If I and the world, he says, were never such that it was . . . possible for me to become a plumber, it would not be true that I might have been a plumber (218), and he concludes that the reason why the possible history in which a thing has different properties must be a branching-off from the history of the actual world is that the individual essenceof a thing must include historical properties (218219), that is, properties the specification of which must mention past events. Shoemakers proposed analogy leads then to the conclusion that the immutability of the causal powers of a property, which follows from the immutability of causal laws, entails that they are essential to that property. Shoemaker rightly has reservations about the strength of this analogy, though he wants to embrace its conclusion. From our point of view, however, the implausibility of that conclusion clearly shows that the analogy falters. I suggest that there are two sources of immutability: from the fixity of the past, as in the case of an objects historical properties; and from the time-independence of causal laws. Perhaps it is the case that immutability entails essentiality only when the immutability derives from the first source. But we may now note that properties have their modes of production immutably in both ways; that oaks originate from acorns is immutable both because the past is fixed and because it is a causal law. There is thus an analogy much stronger than the one used by Shoemaker, and it leads to the conclusion that modes of production, but not causal powers, are essential to properties. The previous argument depends on an undefended connection between temporal and metaphysical modalities. The thesis in question, RPT, at least as restricted to biological kinds, receives more direct

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support from certain remarks of Dummett I and McGinn. Dummett, commenting on Kripkes necessity of origin doctrine, says that even if creatures exactly like men arose from Dragons teeth, they would not be men, because not children of Adam (144). McGinn analyses this essentialist claim by means of a relation he calls d-continuity, glossed in terms of the concept of one set of things coming from another set of things. D-continuity is that relation of transtemporal identity exhibited by biological things: an organised, law-governed, causally unified process of development (134). He suggeststhat to be of the kind Homo Sapiens is to be d-continuous by descent with a stock of prehominid primates (135). Returning to Dharmakirtis example, we might say that oaks develop from, and so are d-continuous with, acorns. This seems to be just a notational variant of the position I described by saying that being acorn-made is a mode of production of the property of being an oak. The plausibility of this view hinges on the intuition that, if a superscientist produced by chemical reaction in a test-tube, something structurally and qualitatively identical with an oak, we should nevertheless say that her creation was not an oak but merely an artificial oak. We need to ask how that intuition fares when we turn from biological kinds and consider instead physical kinds like smoke, gold, or electron. In the first two cases the rival view is that to be of such a kind is to have a certain composition. Suppose then that we have a sample of artificially produced gold, and a sample of naturally produced gold, and agree that the two samples are structurally identical and have identical dispositional properties. I do not think that it is possible to deny that both samples are genuinely gold. So RDT must assert that every mode of production of Au79 is essential to the property of being gold. We see here one reason why the natural/ artificial distinction does not feature prominently in RPT. The issue then is whether structural properties can be described without reference to modes of production. It seems to be the case, however, that only RPT can provide an account of the kinds to which the structureless constituents of structure, such as electrons, belong. Suppose that there are only three types of fundamental particle, alphons, betons and deltons, and that there are a small number of particle-interaction types resulting in the net production of deltons.

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Perhaps an alphon can decay into a beton and a delton, whilst an alphon and delton can combine to form a beton and two deltons. RPT then asserts that to be an delton is to be produced by some one of these interactions. RDT, on the other hand, seems unable to offer any account of the natural kind d&on.
V

It seems possible then to construct a defence of RPT. Under RPT, the relation R in type-two cases is metaphysically necessary: for example, the modes of production of an oak are a subset of those of a tree. Why might Dharmakirti have adopted a Productive Theory of properties in his theory of inference ?. Perhaps he felt that only if such a theory is true is the obtaining of R knowable. This is a view consistent with Shoemakers claim that only if some causal theory of properties is true . . . can it be explained how properties are capable of engaging our knowledge . . . in the way they do (214). And I have argued that RPT fares better than the alternative causal theory, RDT. Dharmakirti is a V@%inavtidin; in particular, he is an idealist about properties - the existence of properties is not a matter independent of our ability to know about them. However, the text used for this paper, the Nytiyubindu, is neutral between idealism and realism. It was written to be acceptable to both Vijkhwidins and Suutrtintihs. My interpretation would not be correct, therefore, if it was not consistent both with realism and idealism. Now if the claim of the above paragraph is correct, then an idealist must hold a causal theory of properties, for only a causal theory is consistent with our having knowledge about properties. For a realist, on the other hand, the causal theory is just one of many possibilities. A realist who does not adopt a causal theory will be a sceptic about properties; properties will be such that it is not in general possible to have knowledge about them. I conclude that the only position consistent with both realism and idealism is the position entailed by the possibility of knowledge about properties, and the position so entailed is the causal theory.* Finally, the Productive Theory has a bearing on the question of whether there exist eternal entities. Let us say, first of all, that an

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object has a past bound iff there exists a time before which it did not exist, and conversely that it has a future bound iff there exists a time after which it will not exist. There are then three sensesin which an object can be eternal: it is eternal with respect to the future iff it has a past bound but no future bound; it is eternal with respect to the past iff it has a future bound but no past bound; and it is eternal simpliciter iff it has neither a past nor a future bound. Now to possessthe property of existing, that is, to be of the kind existent, is on RPT to have the mode of production has some cause. So existents are products and are past-bounded. If RPT is correct, then it is a priori that nothing is eternal with respect to the past. Dharmakirti makes a further claim. Famously, he defends this inference: Sound is non-eternal, because it is a product. Here non-eternal means non-eternal simpliciter. Given the above, this inference is equivalent to Sound is non-eternal with respect to the future, because it exists. Let us suppose that existents have the causal power has some effect (or is causally efficacious) in virtue of having the mode of production has some cause. The inference then relies on it being the case that whatever is causally efficacious ceases to exist. But while something which has a cause must be past-bounded, it does not seem to be the case that something which has an effect must be future-bounded. We must remember, however, that the first claim only holds because the event which has a cause is the exemplification by the object of the property of being an existent. In the second case, therefore, we must only consider those effects which are caused by that same property exemplification, and not by, for instance, the objects having the property of being gold. Thus the claim to which Dharmakirti seems to be committed is that the only effect that an object can cause by its mere existence is its own destruction. Finally, it is worth noting that the complete inference sound is non-eternal, because it is a product is not a priori for it depends on the nomological correlation of has some cause with has some effect.i3

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NOTES Dharmakirti (1971). There is a difficult translation of Dharmottaras in Stcherbatsky (1962). See also R. Hayes (1987). * There is also a discussion of this example by S?intaraksita (1986), verses 14171425. 3 Note in particular these two lines from the Nycyabindu:
Nyciyabindu@i svabhtivat svasattlimtitrabh&Cni xidhyadharme hetub (II, 13) A svabhava is a hetu (Q) for a scidhyadharma (P) which is dependent upon only the occurrence of itself [the hetu]. tanntkpafttivani~pannasya tatsvabhtivatvribhtivtit (III, 14) If [the stidhya] does not emerge when [the hetu] emerges, then it [the hetu] lacks svabhava-hood.

In my paper, I define the svabhtiva relation in terms of the causal relation. It is possible, however, to reverse the direction of definition, defining the causal relation by taking the svabhiva relation as primitive. In discussion, Matilal pointed out that Dharmakirti actually adopts this policy at times. 4 For a discussion, see Matilal (1986), 23-24. s Shoemaker (1984) 209-210. h See Mackie (1973), 120. Shoemaker follows the usual practice; see p. 211, fn. 9. The contextual definition resembles Carnaps analytic reduction sentence (x) (t) (C(.r, t) + (x has n f* M(x, 1)))but does not leave indeterminate the solubility of anything which is never put in water (Ma&e, 124) because the causal relation holds between events that do not occur as well as ones that do. For example, on Lewiss account, when c and e do not occur, c causes e roughly iff were c to occur, e would occur. See Armstrong (1968), 86. 9 Op. cit. 217-219. I0 Dummett (1981). I McGinn (1976). * For clarification of the points in this paragraph, thanks are due to Paul Noordhof. I3 I am grateful to Prof. B. K. Matilal and Mr. M. Ramachandran for helpful comments. A slightly abbreviated version of this paper was read at the Joint Session of the Mind Association and the Aristotelian Society, Swansea, July 1989, in the Graduate Papers section.

REFERENCES Armstrong, D. M. (1968). A Materialist Theory of the Mind. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Dharmakirti (1971 ed.). Nytiyabindu. With Vinitadevas F/c& reconstructed into Sanskrit and translated into English by M. Gangopadhyaya. Calcutta: Indian Studies Past and Present. Dummett, M. (1981). Frege: Philosophy @Language. London: Duckworth, Second Edition.

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Hayes, R. (1987). On the Reinterpretation of Dharmakirtis Svabhlivuhetu, Journal of Indian Philosophy 15, 3 19-33 1. McGinn, C. (1976). On the Necessity of Origin, J. Phil. 73, 127-134. Mackie, J. L. (1973). Dispositions and Powers, in Truth, Probability and Paradox. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Matilal, B. K. (1986). Buddhist Logic and Epistemology, in Buddhist Logic and Epistemology, ed. Matilal and Evans. Dordrecht: Reidel. .%ntaraksita (1986 ed.). Tattvasamgruha. With Kamalasilas Purijikti, translated into English by G. Jha. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass. Shoemaker, S. (1984). Causality and Properties, in Identity, Cause and Mind. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Stcherbatsky, F. Th. (1962). Buddhist Logic. Volume Two. New York: Dover Publications.

Department of Philosophy, Kings College, University of London