Lokāyata (substantive) along with its derivative lo(lau) kāyatika (adjective) is often encountered both in Pali and Sanskrit, and as logāyata, logayaya or loyāyata in Prakrit. The word does not seem to be Vedic. In Sanskrit it first occurs (indirectly) in the Pāṇinīya Gaṇapāṭha 23; in Pali in the Tipiṭaka itself. The word, both in Prakrit and Sanskrit, has generally been taken to mean the materialist system of philosophy, later known as the Cārvāka and that is how it is generally rendered in English.

T.W. Rhys Davids, however, noticed that on many occasions in the Pali Sutta-s, the rendering, viz. “materialism”, does not suit the context. Accordingly the PTS Pali English Dictionary decided to omit this meaning altogether. It glossed lokāyata as

The Dictionary also refers to Rudolf Otto Franke's German translation of the DN in which lokāyataṃ is rendered as “logically proven explanation of nature” (logisch beweisende Naturerklärung).

Thus the chief meaning in Pali and Sanskrit seems to have diverged into two altogether different ways, having no apparent relation to each other. It is not that such a case is unprecedented. What is interesting to note is that the gloss provided in the PTS Dictionary never found favour with any Pali scholar excepting Rhys Davids himself.