Mind according to Nyaya is regarded as a separate sense and can come in contact with pleasure, pain, desire, antipathy and will. The later Nyaya writers speak of three other kinds of contact of a transcendental nature called samanyalakshana, jnanalakshana and yogaja (miraculous). The contact samanyalakshana is that by virtue of which by coming in contact with a particular we are transcendentally (alaukika) in contact with all the particulars (in a general way) of which the corresponding universal may be predicated. Thus when I see smoke and through it my sense is in contact with the universal associated with smoke my visual sense is in transcendental contact with all smoke in general. Jnanalakshana contact is that by virtue of which we can associate the perceptions of other senses when perceiving by any one sense. Thus when we are looking at a piece of sandal wood our visual sense is in touch with its colour only, but still we perceive it to be fragrant without any direct contact of the object with the organ of smell. The sort of transcendental contact (alaukika sannikarsha) by virtue of which this is rendered possible is called jnanalakshana. But the knowledge acquired by these two contacts is not counted as perception (1).

Pleasures and pains (sukha and duhkha) are held by Nyaya to be different from knowledge (jnana). For knowledge interprets, conceives or illumines things, but sukha etc. are never found to appear as behaving in that character. On the other hand we feel that we grasp them after having some knowledge. They cannot be self-revealing, for even knowledge is not so; if it were so, then that experience which generates sukha in one should have generated the same kind of feeling in others, or in other words it should have manifested its nature as sukha to all; and this does not happen, for the same thing which generates sukha in one might not do so in others.

Moreover even admitting for argument’s sake that it is knowledge itself that appears as pleasure and pain, it is evident that there must be some differences between the pleasurable and painful experiences that make them so different, and this difference is due to the fact that knowledge in one case was associated with sukha and in another case with duhkha, This shows that sukha and duhkha are not themselves knowledge. Such is the course of things that sukha and duhkha are generated by the collocation of certain conditions, and are manifested through or in association with other objects either in direct perception or in memory. They are thus the qualities which are generated in the self as a result of causal operation. It should however be remembered that merit and demerit act as concomitant causes in their production.

The yogins are believed to have the pratyaksha of the most distant things beyond our senses; they can acquire this power by gradually increasing their powers of concentration and perceive the subtlest and most distant objects directly by their mind. Even we ourselves may at some time have the notions of future events which come to be true, e.g. sometimes I may have the intuition that “To-morrow my brother will come,” and this may happen to be true. This is called pratibhanajnana, which is also to be regarded as a pratyaksha directly by the mind. This is of course different from the other form of perception called manasa-pratyaksha, by which memories of past perceptions by other senses are associated with a percept visualized at the present moment; thus we see a rose and perceive that it is fragrant; the fragrance is not perceived by the eye, but the manas perceives it directly and associates the visual percept with it.

According to Vedanta this acquired perception is only a case of inference. The pratibha-pratyaksha however is that which is with reference to the happening of a future event. When a cognition is produced, it is produced only as an objective cognition, e.g. This is a pot, but after this it is again related to the self by the mind as “I know this pot.” This is effected by the mind again coming in contact for reperception of the cognition which had already been generated in the soul. This second reperception is called anuvyavasaya, and all practical work can proceed as a result of this anuvyavasaya (2).

1.Siddhantamuktavali on Karika 63 and 64. We must remember that Gangesha discarded the definition of perception as given in the Nyaya sutra which we have discussed above, and held that perception should be defined as that cognition which has the special class-character of direct apprehension. He thinks that the old definition of perception as the cognition generated by sense-contact involves a vicious circle (Tattvacintamani, pp. 538-546). Sense-contact is still regarded by him as the cause of perception, but it should not be included in the definition. He agrees to the six kinds of contact described first by Udyotakara as mentioned above.
2. This later Nyaya doctrine that the cognition of self in association with cognition is produced at a later moment must be contrasted with the triputipratyaksha doctrine of Prabhakara, which holds that the object, knower and knowledge are all given simultaneously in knowledge. Vyavasaya (determinate cognition), according to Gangesha, gives us only the cognition of the object, but the cognition that I am aware of this object or cognition is a different functioning succeeding the former one and is called anu (after) vyavasaya (cognition), “idamaham janamiti vyavasaye na bhasate taddhakendriyasannikarshabhavat kintvidamvishayakajnanatvavishishtasya jnanasya vaishishtyamatmani bhasate; na ca svaprakashe vyavasaya tadrisham svasya vaishishtyam bhasitumarhati, purvam visheshanasya tasyajnanat, tasmadidamaham janamiti na vyavasayah kintu anuvyavasayah.” Tattvacintamani, p. 795.

desire, direct contact, jnana, perceptions, pleasures, pleasure pain, senses, virtue, visual sense