To

Prof. Y.S. Rao, Chairman, ICHR and all Members of the Council

2 December, 2014

Esteemed Mr. Chairman & the Council Members,

This is in response to what Jakob De Roover wrote by way of his reaction to my comments
on Prof. Balagangadharas MAML delivered on 11 November, 2014

At the outset let me state with gratitude that it is immensely gratifying to see Roovers
interest in reacting to my comments. I appreciate his profuse coinage of the word
ignorance all along his reaction, as an outlet of annoyance, but notwithstanding the defect
of being over-defensive. Also, may be, calling someone critically responding ignorant is part
of the basic ethics of intellectual debate for him. He has inadvertently posed himself wiser
and more learned than me, and I have no quarrel over there. Nonetheless, I disagree with
all the charges he puts on my comments.
1. Roovers first charge is that I am ignorant of simple facts of history such as the fact
that major philosophers in the history of Western philosophy used no framework of
comprehension. Is it so simple a fact ? Anyway, I was referring to philosophers
committed to thinking about culture and society today, who invariably follow a
framework of comprehension or an array of them by ignoring the problem of being
eclectic. I was not referring to those in the past. However, the argument that Michel
De Montaigne or Voltaire ------- had no framework of comprehension is exposing
Roovers unfamiliarity of their mode of knowledge production. Michel De
Montaignes framework of comprehension was that of Renaissance critical
analytical reasoning at the instance of a fusion of classical Hellenic intellectual
formations and exposition based on historically contingent casual anecdotes.
Voltaires was of the framework engendered by Enlightenment. Roover can re-read
Voltaires essay Considerations on the Causes of the Greatness and Decline of the
Romans, which makes his framework of comprehension clear through the analysis
of the social, political and geographical causation of Rome. Interestingly, in the rush
of exposing my ignorance, Roover does not recognise the fact that he is questioning
Balagangadharas main thesis i.e., the central framework of comprehension of all the
Post-Renaissance intellectuals is Protestant Theology.
More baseless is Roovers argument about methodology. I was pointing out the
absence of any statement of the framework of comprehension and methodology in
Balagangadharas lecture. Roovers accusation exposes his unfamiliarity about
studies in the history of modes of knowledge production. I never mentioned about
the existence of the defined methodology. Roovers position that there is no such
thing called methodology may be a philosophical quibble. A student of history, I do

not see any scholar in the past to have produced knowledge without one or the
other kind of methodological pre-occupation. I am surprised to see that Roover is
forgetful of the history of methodology from a-priori through a-posteriori, axiomatic,
inductive, systematised heuristic, and hermeneutic to hypothetico-deductive over
the centuries ? In Europe as well as in Asia self-reflexive inquiries into premises,
inferential logic, nature of evidence, and concept of truth about the constitution of
knowledge existed. Several scholars have studied the historical development of
scientific knowledge with reference to epistemic concepts like objectivity,
rationality, and methodology. Adherence to epistemological principles such as
rationality, objectivity, verifiability, proof and notion of truth has always been part
of any enterprise of knowledge production. I hope that Roover is aware that there is
an emerging area of specialisation called historical epistemology.

2. His second issue is my ignorance about language use. He may be right, because
English is an alien language to me and I am not ashamed of admitting me not skilful
in building sentences semantically and syntactically. However, my point was that a
scholar obsessed with the Sanskrit word paramrtha in the context of a binary must
be using vyvahrika rather than conventional. As regards, adhythma Roover
failed to get the context. I was speaking about the fact that traditional India always
had theoretical formulations in the connection with the constitution of serious
knowledge. India did not just produce kvyas like Rmyaa, Mahbhrata and
Puras alone as Balagangadhara had us believe in his lecture. In that context I
incidentally referred to Aphasiddhnta, Spavda, Panchasandhi and Vyaktivivka.
As an instance of serious methodological reflexivity I mentioned Mahimabhaas
Vyaktivivka that prescribes analysis of knowledge at three levels lkam
(vyvahrikam), vdam (pramrthikam) and adhytmam (adhi-tmam = that which
is there in oneself, i.e., ones own hermeneutic ingenuity). What I meant was to
distinguish it from spiritual, the popularly made out meaning. There is no wonder
that it made no sense to Roover, who misunderstood me teaching the uninitiated. I
was only reminding the knowledgeable audience of what several of them knew.
3. Roovers third problem is my ignorance of the meaning of the term epistemology,
for I used a phrase epistemological encounter which makes him presume that I
do not have any clue about the meaning of the term. His explanation of the term as
rendered plausible in an undergraduate philosophy classroom is well taken. I used
the expression relationship of epistemological encounter to mean relationship of
encounter between one system of knowledge and another in terms of epistemic
meanings, measures and parameters. Since Balagangadhara had postulated the
binary of the West >< India in the context of conceiving the past, my reference was
to the encounter between the West and India. I had also used expressions such as

epistemic injustice in the context of my reference to the imposition of Western

epistemology. It surprises me that Roover is hearing the phrase epistemological
encounter for the first time ! I can only sympathise with him.

My mention of the colonisers imposition of a kind of epistemology on us makes

no sense to him. He is asking which epistemology ? I liked his differentiation across
empiricists, sceptics, realists ----. I have perfect agreement on his making the case
for plurality. In fact, he should go a polemicist against Balagangadhara who
discovers Semitic/Protestant theological reflection in all these. Nevertheless, the
context of my reference was of colonialism/imperialism, which I had made quite
clear. I meant imposition of Western epistemology, ordained as universal normative,
through the colonial/imperial channels of dissemination. I was referring to this
epistemology of epochal dominance, which was the huge current that made all
antithetical eddies in them immaterial. Roover may please re-read Foucaults The
Order of Things and The Archaeology of Knowledge to learn what the Western
epistemological imposition means. There is a fairly good body of writings on
epistemological violence of the West upon the East today.

He has a related quarrel over my coinage of the expression emotion-ontology

and he gives a definition to educate me. I need hardly tell Roover that ontology does
not mean just the philosophy of being or the metaphysics of what exists when we
use the term today. He thinks the expression methodological accessing of ontology
nonsense. Anything unfamiliar to Roover is nonsense for him. He says, there is a
simple way of accessing an ontological theory, namely reading a text. Roover may be
familiar only with the simple reading of texts. I was referring to textual analytical
reading of texts enabling to reach out their sub-texts, amenable to formulation of
hyper-texts through hermeneutics and theorisation of the context. Is it not
methodological ? I meant this methodological evaluation of ontology and I had made
the context clear by relating it to epistemology. My argument is that
Balagangadharas approach is emotional and what he builds up by way of
knowledge is emotion-ontology bereft of epistemological validity. Roover must be
familiar with ontologically subjective object of analysis leading to the production of
epistemologically subjective knowledge. It is not subjectivity that I dispute but the
emotion-ontology (anti-Semitic/anti-Christian emotion-ontology, to be explicit)
like felt-ontology, which does not inform theory. I argue that it is epistemologically
invalid. It is a logical argument and not just a matter of opinion. There is no
category mistake in my approach, but Roover can revisit what he disputes to know
where he is dubious and how.

4. His fourth discovery is my fundamental ignorance about science. Roover seems to

have failed to follow what I said, may be because of his unfamiliarity of the branch

namely, philosophy of science. He has quoted me wrong. I said that Modernity was
founded on Physics, not the other way. Let me summarise what I hurriedly tried to
put across: First of all, I wanted to convey that the Modern is synonymous with
Science and Science with Physics, and Physics with Newtons Principia that
represents fundamental knowledge about the knowable in the universe, and
fundamental knowledge as knowledge about the underlying principles or laws
behind the natural phenomena. Knowledge of fundamental principles/foundational
laws is the ultimate knowledge and science to Newton. Science thus became logocentric knowledge of authority, authenticity, openness, transparency, finality,
certainty and universal credibility. It is this accomplished knowledge of
Renaissance Versatility that the Modern embodied. Roover thinks all this
nonsensical and raises questions exposing his unfamiliarity in the history and
philosophy of science. Roover strains at the leash to show that there is no one
common rational platform to recognise knowledge. All that I argued was about the
existence of a set of rational epistemic universals for identifying knowledge today,
despite new tools of observations, methodological innovations, and frameworks of
understanding.

5. His fifth point is my ignorance of the relevance and irrelevance of making certain
statements. I am alleged to have said: Saying something as a prolegomena will not
justify what is said after that. I am quoted wrong here. My comment was that
Balagangadhara referred to hermeneutics in the prolegomena, but did not take it up
in the main body of his lecture. I said that I expected a hermeneutic exercise from a
philosopher like him. Roover failed to understand the relevance of what I said.

6. His last discovery is my ignorance of the basic ethics of intellectual debate. I admit
that I was provoked and that was what Balagangadhara declared as his avowed
objective of the lecture. Roover complains that I did not talk about the speakers talk
and his studies. Was there anything sensible in his lecture ? I, therefore, began my
comment by saying how difficult it is to respond to such a lecture. Nevertheless, I
did comment on the summum bonum of his studies. All that I said critically was
against it. Roover tiered of sorting out says that there are many other kinds of
ignorance, which my words reflect. One thing that he cannot omit mentioning is my
ignorance of the basic requirements of consistency. An example is my reference to
loss of foundation in science and talking about uncertainty. I was referring to
Heisenbergs Principle of Uncertainty turning science into no theory of certainty
exposing a major limitation of scientific knowledge, which deprived knowledge
generated in social sciences and humanities under Modernity of its foundation. I
had in mind Schrodingers thesis of the object-subject split a figment of the
imagination, making the objectivity claim of knowledge in Modernity unfounded;

also Feynman acknowledging imprecision as an inevitable aspect of scientific

communication, which disproved the belief of societies in Modernity that language
could be rational and transparent and that there could be a connection between the
objects of perception and language of communication. Uninitiated in philosophy of
science, Roover found my statements irrelevant and excluding each other. He felt
utter lack of knowledge and understanding on my part. Hi Roover, let me ask you,
who decide what knowledge is and what understanding means. He concludes his
reaction with an unashamed insinuation against historians of India. Anyway, Roover
should never take me at all an instance of the excellence of Indian historians. I ask
him to tell Balagangadhara not to be kind like this anymore when he in his
blindness, addresses historians of India.
Warmly,
Rajan Gurukkal