Addendum on reviews

After the two posts (see here and here) I dedicated to reviews, it came to my mind that I had recently read some quite frank reviews of books.
One of them is by Amod Lele and analyses the hidden claims in Donald S. Lopez, Jr.,'s Buddhism and Science. A Guide for the Perplexed. I would not subscribe to what seems to me the key claim of the review, that is, that —pace Lopez— Buddhism and Science are compatible and must be so. However, the review is well-argumented and, though not agressive, it is not timid. Here is the link to the review. Readers might be interested to have a look also at the comments to the post, since they highlight the risks implied in the hard work of writing "true" reviews.
The other frank review I recently read has been written by Jayarava and is about Vishvapani Blomfield's Gautama Buddha. I have suggested to the reviewer that some of his criticisms might be off-mark, since they regard the reviewer's interests and not the author's and the readers' ones. But, again, the review is honest, frankly put and accurate until the details.

Interestingly, both reviews have been published on blogs. Moreover, they have been published by authors who do not seem to aim at an academic position.
Does it mean that, once again, the Academia depends for its needs on external volunteers? In fact, reviews are not accessory to the quality of the scientific production. If I were Lopez or Blomfield, I would be grateful to my reviewer and would strive for further suggestions to improve my work (but I might a bit extreme in that…).

Here and here are the two posts on reviews. As for the general problem of the amount of external support the Reserach needs in order to survive, see here.

Where could "real" reviews be published?

Yesterday I have been discussing with a colleague about the need of "real" reviews, reviews which could influence in a positive way the studies in a certain discipline, because they would point out the actual flaws of a book or a project. Reviews are usually not written in this way since one does want to review in a positive way books written by people of one's "school", people one feels indebted with and people whose favour one wants to acquire (and vice versa). Could blind reviews be the solution? Perhaps, but why should one engage in writing them, if one could not even gain the glory of having them published with one's name on them?
Hence, my colleague suggested the following solution: an ad hoc journal, which should specialise in reviewing in a sincere way the most important books, so that one could anyway be proud of being reviewed in it. Since the journal would programmatically review honestly all sorts of author, the risk of vindicts should be lessened.
I would add that the beginning might be the most difficult point of the project. Perhaps it would be easier to have well-known scholars writing the first "harsh" reviews?

What do you think? Could it work?

On the topic of reviews, see here.

What is the purpose of reviews?

Since one of my methodological commandments is to "read more", I also wrote several book-reviews. Writing helps me think in a clearer way and encourages me in reading more.
However, I cannot overlook the fact that I have received many review-offers also because most of the well-known Sanskrit scholars are too busy to write just a simple review. Hence, their younger colleagues and students are asked to write on their behalf. Younger scholars, however, might tend to be more indulgent, since they might be afraid of attacking a senior colleague. Or, they might tend to be less indulgent with scholars belonging to a different "school" but not with the ones belonging to their own one.
This is human and might also have some positive effects. If only one first considers this preliminary question: What is the use of reviews?
In my opinion, reviews are written for the sake of readers and authors and one of the reasons why contemporary Indological studies are in need of improvement is that their weak points are not consistently pointed out by acute reviewers. I understand that one might not want to ruin one's academic career from the very beginning, but one can surely find a way to both avoid being too harsh and make one's point in a persuasive way.
If they just praise their objects, reviews may loose their social and ethical significance. Hence, I suggest that one should avoid personal criticisms and have as many interesting remarks as possible, so that the bare data could speak. In this way, reviews may also become interesting in their own right and not just a sub-genre.
Good luck with your reviews!

What strategies do you adopt?
As for my commandment of reading more, read here. As for my other methodological commandments, see here.

Exclusion as the meaning of a sentence

Buddhist Pramāṇavādins maintain that a word, such as "cow" does not denote an external referent, but the exclusion of whatever is not a non-cow. But can this thesis also explain how are sentence-meanings conveyed? Kumārila claims that they can, because exclusion, if applied to sentence-meanings, contradicts one of the very basic tenets of the Buddhist thought, i.e., instantaneity.
Discussing the sentence "the cow is white", Kumārila writes (ŚV vākyādhikaraṇa 20cd-21ab):

If the notion of a cow would continue to exist at the moment of the arousal of the notion of white |
then, it would be excluded from the other [notions] or joined with this (notion of "white") [but it cannot continue to exist, due to momentariness] ||
(yadi dhriyeta gobuddhiḥ śuklabuddhijanikṣaṇe || 20 || tato 'nyābhyo nivarteta saṃsṛjeta tathānayā |)

Pārthasārathi Miśra's commentary is even clearer:

In the sentence "the cow is white" the notion born out of the word "cow" extends to all cows, white, black, etc. If the arousal of the notion "white", produced by the word white would last long enough, then it could be connected to the notion "cow" and it could be excluded from the other notions of the individual black etc. But it does not last, because it is instantaneous.
(gauḥ śuklaḥ ity atra gośabdajanitā buddhiḥ sarvagavīṣu śuklakṛṣṇādiṣu prasṛtā yadi śuklaśabdajanitaśuklabuddhijananaṃ yāvad dhriyeta tatas tayā saṃsṛjyeta anyābhyo vā kṛṣṇādivyaktibuddhibhyo vyavacchidyeta na tu sā dhriyate kṣaṇikatvād iti.)

In other words, apoha might work for single words, but in the case of a sentence, one should imagine that "the cow is white" means the exclusion of whatever non-non-cow is not non-white. But how can the notion of a non non-cow last long enough to exclude whatever is not non-white?

Struggling with one's preliminary understanding

One of the dilemmas of every philosophical paper is that it has to presuppose a general understanding of the terms it wants to investigate upon. This preliminary understanding is the conditio sine qua non that enables one's investigation but at the same time it hampers it because it is pre-critical and because its users might not be aware of its philosophical burden. So, one might want to describe the phenomenological approach to the ethical aspect of the sacrificer in Prābhākara Mīmāṃsā and provisionally call the latter a "soul". In this way, each reader will project onto it lots of other thoughts (of Jewish or Christian origin, of Aristotelian or Cartesian influence…) and reify into an ontological category what was meant to be an ethical one. Even more risky is the fact that s/he will do it without being aware of it, just because of the intrinsic power of the word one has chosen.

However, one cannot define each word if not through other words. Hence, one will never be able to speak a natural language whose terms are not at all carrying the burden of their history. What to do? First, I suggest, one should be aware of the history of the terms one is using, in order not to be mislead in the same way as the naive reader described above. Second, one might choose to add a word of caution for the readers in case of particularly significant terms. The following is what I would say in the case of the Prābhākara "soul":

In the present case, terms such as “subject” will be defined in a closer way in due course and it will be eventually shown that the Prābhākara understanding of them might at times be strikingly different than the one common in contemporary Western thought. For the time being, suffice it to say that “subject” and any other term referring to it (such as “psychic”) are used just for lack of any better option and that they are to be intended in a very neutral sense, as referring to the “agent” (once again, an ambiguous term) of actions, acts of will and acts of cognition.

What do you do in your philosophical translation and essays?

On the importance of an historical approach, see here. On the Prābhākara concept of "subject", see here.

In an ideal world

In an ideal world, the State would finance public education and research,
which means that everyone would finance, by paying taxes, public education and research.
In an ideal world, even the ones who will never attend a class,
even the ones whose children will work as farmers and will never go to university,
would be happy to finance public education and research,
because they would know that one day they might need a doctor —and that they would be glad they paid her perfect training—
because they know that their children will need a qualified teacher everyday,
because they know that more often than not educated people are also likely to be better politicians, administrators, citizens.
To sum up, in an ideal world everyone would be happy to pay taxes for financing public education and research, since even other people's education and research would enhance one's own well-being.

But,
since the State (every State, it seems, more or less) wants to save money, especially as for public education and research
and since people rather seem to wish to pay less taxes,
should not WE be responsible for public education and research? If WE do not engage in the front line, do not we risk to end up with private (and expensive —check the comments here) universities on the one hand and nothing at all on the other?

If you think I am right, please consider donating here.

How does an order act over us?

Do orders convey the idea that "it is good to do X"? Or do they radically differ from descriptive sentences such as the above one? In Indian philosophy, Maṇḍana proposed the former and the other Mīmāṃsā authors the latter. They maintained that an order conveys two things, on the one hand the action and on the other the order to perform it. But Prābhākara thinkers claimed that two contents would be two much to be conveyed by the only element which is distinctive in an exhortative sentence, i.e., the verbal ending. Hence they believed that only the order to perform is conveyed.
In his Nyāyamañjarī, Jayanta discusses various Prābhākara views about the way orders function. According to the first group, the prescription (i.e., order) itself has to be performed. There is hence no need for something else (namely, the action) to be conveyed by the same verbal ending. The order requires an object to be performed, but that object is the order itself. Hence, if I am not wrong. "cook!" would only require the execution of the order. That the order regards the action of cooking is something one understands out of one's background and contextual knowledge. The idea of a single level works nicely for sentences which only have a linguistic dimension, such as "I baptize you…":

Also in its (the prescription's) regard, there are two different opinions. Some admit that language consists of impulsion. Only the prescription has to be performed, because it is understood in this way through the verbal endings of optative etc., because no other duty is understood, and because of the extreme feebleness of the thesis according to which the duty is the sheer meaning of the verbal theme.
Hence, [the prescription] has to be done.

The mainstream Prābhākaras, on the other hand, claim that the prescription is understood by each of its listeners as something to be done. And this "to be done" cannot but consist in an action:

Others, by contrast, resort (saṃśrī-) [to the view] that the [injunction] induces [people] to undertake actions, since the injunction (niyoga) is apprehended (pratī-) as something to be done. The duty, once understood, enjoins [each] person to its own realisation. In fact, once he has understood "this has to be done by me", a person undertakes an action for the sake of its realisation.

For further references to posts dedicated to Jayanta and to his linguistic theories, see here. On duty in Prābhākara Mīmāṃsā, see here and here. On how Sacred texts can convey their orders according to the Prābhākaras, see here.