section_path: Indian philosophy/Orthodox schools/Nyāya
section_name: Nyāya
paragraph_text: Nyāya
  
  The Nyāya school of epistemology explores sources of knowledge (Pramāṇa) and is based on the Nyāya Sūtras (circa 6th century BCE and 2nd century CE). Nyāya holds that human suffering arises out of ignorance and liberation arises through correct knowledge. Therefore, they sought to investigate the sources of correct knowledge or epistemology.
  
  Nyāya traditionally accepts four Pramanas as reliable means of gaining knowledge – Pratyakṣa (perception), Anumāṇa (inference), Upamāṇa (comparison and analogy) and Śabda (word, testimony of past or present reliable experts). Nyāya also traditionally defended a form of philosophical realism.
  
  The Nyāya Sūtras was a very influential text in Indian philosophy, laying the foundations for classical Indian epistemological debates between the different philosophical schools. It includes, for example, the classic Hindu rejoinders against Buddhist not-self (anatta) arguments. The work also famously argues against a creator God (Ishvara), a debate which became central to Hinduism in the medieval period.