Buddhist Illogic: A Critical Analysis of Nagarjuna’s Arguments - Couverture souple

Sion, Avi

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 1495928624 ISBN 13 : 9781495928628

Editeur : CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2014

Synopsis

The 2nd Century CE Indian philosopher Nagarjuna founded the Madhyamika (Middle Way) school of Mahayana Buddhism, which strongly influenced Chinese (Ch’an), Korean (Sôn) and Japanese (Zen) Buddhism, as well as Tibetan Buddhism. Nagarjuna is regarded by many Buddhist writers to this day as a very important philosopher, who they claim definitively proved the futility of ordinary human cognitive means.His writings include a series of arguments purporting to show the illogic of logic, the absurdity of reason. He considers this the way to verbalize and justify the Buddhist doctrine of “emptiness” (Shunyata). These arguments attack some of the basic tenets and techniques of reasoning, such as the laws of thought (identity, non-contradiction and the excluded middle), conceptualization and predication, our common assumptions of self, entities and essences, as well as our beliefs in motion and causation.The present essay demonstrates the many sophistries involved in Nagarjuna’s arguments. He uses double standards, applying or ignoring the laws of thought and other norms as convenient to his goals; he manipulates his readers, by giving seemingly logical form (like the dilemma) to his discourse, while in fact engaged in non-sequiturs or appealing to doubtful premises; he plays with words, relying on unclear terminology, misleading equivocations and unfair fixations of meaning; and he ‘steals concepts’, using them to deny the very percepts on which they are based.Although a critique of the Madhyamika philosophical interpretation and defense of “emptiness”, Buddhist Illogic is not intended to dissuade readers from Buddhism. On the contrary, its aim to enhance personal awareness of actual cognitive processes, and so improve meditation. It is also an excellent primer on phenomenological epistemology.

A propos du livre

À propos de l'auteur

Avi Sion (Ph.D. Philosophy) is a researcher and writer in logic and philosophy, including original writings on the theory and practice of inductive and deductive logic, phenomenology, epistemology, aetiology, psychology, meditation, ethics, and much more. He resides in Geneva, Switzerland.

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
• Date d'édition: 2014
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 1495928624
• ISBN 13: 9781495928628
• Reliure: Broché
• Numéro d'édition: 1
• Nombre de pages: 232
• Coordonnées du fabricant: Manufactured by Amazon on behalf of the author; https://www.amazon.fr/hz/contact-us; ; c/o Amazon Media EU S.à.r.l., 38 Avenue John F. Kennedy; Luxembourg; L-1855; Luxembourg