KARYA-KĀRAṆA VĀDA AS THE PHILOSOPHICAL BASIS OF SAMPRAPTI: A CONTEMPORARY SCIENTIFIC APPRAISAL

Abstract

Samprapti - the Āyurvedic doctrine of pathogenesis - is not a self-standing clinical schema but the enacted clinical expression of a deeper philosophical doctrine: Karya-Kāraṇa Vāda, the theory of cause and effect. The present paper argues that Karya-Kāraṇa Vāda, in its Satkāryavāda formulation, constitutes the irreducible philosophical basis upon which every structural feature of Samprapti is built - and that appraising this relationship against contemporary pathophysiology reveals not merely analogical resemblance but genuine ontological convergence. The five canonical arguments of Sāṃkhya-Satkāryavāda - Asadakaraṇāt, Upādānagrahāt, Sarvabhāvāpatteh, Śaktasya Śakyakaraṇatā, and Kāraṇabhāvāt - are shown to be structurally encoded within the six stages of Samprapti (Ṣaṭkriyākāla), such that each stage of pathogenesis is the clinical actualization of a specific philosophical proposition. This triangular argument - Philosophical Doctrine → Samprapti Structure → Contemporary Biomedical Science - is sustained through systematic comparison with molecular genetics, allostatic load theory, the multi-hit pathogenesis model, network medicine, and the disease-health continuum. The paper further elaborates how correctly identifying Karya-Kāraṇa Vāda as the philosophical foundation of Samprapti has direct and non-trivial consequences for the design of stage-specific treatment protocols, positioning Samprapti-Vighaṭana (disruption of the pathogenetic chain) as a philosophically coherent and scientifically grounded therapeutic imperative. It is concluded that Samprapti is comprehensible as a rational system only when its Karya-Kāraṇa basis is made explicit - and that making this basis explicit constitutes a genuine contribution to translational medicine.