Inference.

S’abara says that when a certain fixed or permanent relation has been known to exist between two things, we can have the idea of one thing when the other one is perceived, and this kind of knowledge is called inference.  Kumarila on the basis of this tries to show that inference is only possible when we notice that in a large number of cases two things (e.g. smoke and fire) subsist together in a third thing (e.g. kitchen, etc.) in some independent relation, i.e. when their coexistence does not depend upon any other eliminable condition or factor.  It is also necessary that the two things (smoke and fire) coexisting in a third thing should be so experienced that all cases of the existence of one thing should also be cases involving the existence of the other, but the cases of the existence of one thing (e.g. fire), though including all the cases of the existence of the other (smoke), may have yet a more extensive sphere where the latter (smoke) may not exist.  When once a permanent relation, whether it be a case of coexistence (as in the case of the contiguity of the constellation of K@rttika with Rohi@ni, where, by the rise of the former the early rise of the latter may be inferred), or a case of identity (as in the relation between a genus and its species), or a case of cause and effect or otherwise between two things and a third thing which had been apprehended in a large number of cases, is perceived, they fuse together in the mind as forming

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one whole, and as a result of that when the existence of the one (e.g. smoke) in a thing (hill) is noticed, we can infer the existence of the thing (hill) with its counterpart (fire).  In all such cases the thing (e.g. fire) which has a sphere extending beyond that in which the other (e.g. smoke) can exist is called gamya or vyapaka and the other (e.g. smoke) vyapya or gamaka and it is only by the presence of gamaka in a thing (e.g. hill, the pak@sa) that the other counterpart the gamya (fire) may be inferred.  The general proposition, universal coexistence of the gamaka with the gamya (e.g. wherever there is smoke there is fire) cannot be the cause of inference, for it is itself a case of inference.  Inference involves the memory of a permanent relation subsisting between two things (e.g. smoke and fire) in a third thing (e g. kitchen); but the third thing is remembered only in a general way that the coexisting things must have a place where they are found associated.  It is by virtue of such a memory that the direct perception of a basis (e.g. hill) with the gamaka thing (e.g. smoke) in it would naturally bring to my mind that the same basis (hill) must contain the gamya (i.e. fire) also.  Every case of inference thus proceeds directly from a perception and not from any universal general proposition.  Kumarila holds that the inference gives us the minor as associated with the major and not of the major alone, i.e. of the