Editing Nyaya (section)

===''Pratyaksha'' (perception)===
''Pratyakṣa'' (perception) occupies the foremost position in the ''Nyāya'' epistemology. Perception can be of two types, ''laukika'' (ordinary) and ''alaukika'' (extraordinary).<ref name=tror>Troy Organ, Philosophy and the Self: East and West, Associated University Presse, {{ISBN|978-0-941664-80-6}}, pages 91–94</ref> Ordinary perception is defined by Akṣapāda Gautama in his ''Nyāya Sutra'' (I, i.4) as a 'non-erroneous cognition which is produced by the intercourse of sense-organs with the objects'.

Indian texts identify four requirements for correct perception:<ref name=kpmat/> ''Indriyarthasannikarsa'' (direct experience by one's sensory organ(s) with the object, whatever is being studied), ''Avyapadesya'' (non-verbal; correct perception is not through [[hearsay]], according to ancient Indian scholars, where one's sensory organ relies on accepting or rejecting someone else's perception), ''Avyabhicara'' (does not wander; correct perception does not change, nor is it the result of deception because one's sensory organ or means of observation is drifting, defective, suspect) and ''Vyavasayatmaka'' (definite; correct perception excludes judgments of doubt, either because of one's failure to observe all the details, or because one is mixing inference with observation and observing what one wants to observe, or not observing what one does not want to observe).<ref name=kpmat>Karl Potter (1977), Meaning and Truth, in Encyclopedia of Indian Philosophies, Volume 2, Princeton University Press, Reprinted in 1995 by Motilal Banarsidass, {{ISBN|81-208-0309-4}}, pages 160–168</ref>

Ordinary perception to Nyāya scholars was based on direct experience of reality by eyes, ears, nose, touch and taste.<ref name=tror/> Extraordinary perception included ''yogaja'' or ''pratibha'' (intuition), ''samanyalaksanapratyaksa'' (a form of induction from perceived specifics to a universal), and ''jnanalaksanapratyaksa'' (a form of perception of prior processes and previous states of a 'topic of study' by observing its current state).<ref name=tror/><ref>Karl Potter (1977), Meaning and Truth, in Encyclopedia of Indian Philosophies, Volume 2, Princeton University Press, Reprinted in 1995 by Motilal Banarsidass, {{ISBN|81-208-0309-4}}, pages 168–169</ref>

====Determinate and indeterminate perception====
The Naiyyayika maintains two modes or stages in perception. The first is called ''[[nirvikalpa]]'' (indeterminate), when one just perceives an object without being able to know its features, and the second ''[[savikalpa]]'' (determinate), when one is able to clearly know an object.<ref>Karl Potter (1977), Meaning and Truth, in Encyclopedia of Indian Philosophies, Volume 2, Princeton University Press, Reprinted in 1995 by Motilal Banarsidass, {{ISBN|81-208-0309-4}}, pages 170–172</ref> All ''laukika'' and ''alaukika'' ''pratyakshas'' are ''savikalpa'', but it is necessarily preceded by an earlier stage when it is indeterminate. Vātsāyana says that if an object is perceived with its name we have determinate perception but if it is perceived without a name, we have indeterminate perception. [[Jayanta Bhatta]] says that indeterminate perception apprehends substance, qualities and actions and universals as separate and indistinct, without any association with any names, whereas determinate perception apprehends them all together with a name. There is yet another stage called ''Pratyabhijñā'', when one is able to re-recognise something on the basis of memory.<ref name=c>C Sharma, A Critical Survey of Indian Philosophy, Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, {{ISBN|81-208-0365-5}}, pages192-196</ref>