106 CONCEPTIONS OF ULTIMATE REALITYthe Atman theory (AT). According to the other of these theories, all that exists is
Brahman without qualities; we will call this the Brahman theory (BT). We then
get something along these lines:
The Brahman Theory
1 Brahman exists and has no qualities at all.
2 Nothing but Brahman exists.
3 Every atman that exists is identical to Brahman.
The Atman Theory
1 There are individual atmans (dependent persons).
2 There is a personal Brahman and so Brahman has qualities.
3 No atman is Brahman.
4 Each atman has mental qualities.
5 There are physical objects.
6 Physical objects have physical qualities.
There are problems with this as an account of Advaita Vedanta. The Brahman
Theory has almost no descriptive content, and no explanatory content. One
cannot use terms from AT to shore up BT, since this mixes the theories; it would
remove the alleged purity of the theoretical languages from being tainted by one
another. The account requires descriptive and explanatory parity of two logically
independent theories or theoretical languages. BT and AT lack such parity.
Further, the account requires that the theories be equally justified. But according
to Advaita Vedanta, BT and AT are not equally justified or equally accurate. Thus
this does not seem a successful program for stating Advaita.
A causal theory of perception account
Perhaps one can approach matters in this way. Consider the sort of causal account
of perception that John Locke offered.^10 On this view, a veridical perception of a
tree is analyzed like this. Suppose it is true that Manindra sees a tree. What makes
this true is there being a tree which causes certain images in Manindra’s mind.
These images represent, and in limited ways resemble, the tree. Perception occurs
when a perceivable object has the right sort of causal impact on a perceiver.
Then whittle the account down. Locke himself held that, for example, color
qualities were the product of interaction between object and perceiver; the tree
itself has no color properties. But the tree itself does have shape properties, and
the shape properties of the image must resemble the shape properties of the tree if
Manindra, by virtue of having the images, is seeing the tree. But suppose one
thinks that there is no tree, and indeed nothing with shape properties that caused