Chapter 0: Guide to This Part¶

This part proves a theorem. In its strongest form the central proposition is a single sentence: every metaphysical claim asserting the existence of a real entity with intrinsic nature is self-contradictory. Every word in that sentence has to be given a definition — what counts as existence, what counts as an entity, what counts as real, and whether self-contradictory means a contradiction in the semantics or the self-defeat of the act of assertion. Once the definitions stand clear the argument advances by logic: if the strongest version can be reached, the strongest version is delivered; if it cannot, the verdict falls honestly at the point of demotion, and the demotion proof is itself a theorem-grade result. In point of style this is the most unusual part of the book: the preceding parts are analyses, and this part is a paper written to the standard of modern analytic philosophy, drawing its material from the Mūlamadhyamakakārikā and the Vigrahavyāvartanī.

Format. A word on this first. The chapters of earlier parts run in parallel and can be read singly; the chapters here run in series, links in one chain, each using only what the previous ones have prepared. The exposition is carried mainly by regimented natural language, with the propositions and definitions set out under numbers, and only a handful of symbols is used at all — the existential quantifier, conjunction, negation, the conditional, and the sign for contradiction. In each chapter the numbered proposition blocks come first and the prose explanation follows. The fully symbolic system, the complete derivations, the premise audit table and the assembly graph are collected together in Appendix A at the end of the part.

Two reading tracks. In the Chinese original each of Chapters 1 through 9 is divided by a rule into two halves (Chapter 10 is a first-person account and is not divided): the upper half in strict academic language, the lower half restating the same chapter in plain language, the rule being that only the register changes, that nothing is added, and that the upper half governs wherever the two diverge. The Chinese fast track is to read the lower halves alone. That half is not yet translated, so the English edition carries the upper halves only, and the place where each restatement stands in the Chinese is marked at the rule. What is open to the reader here is the slow track, and a shortened form of it: read the prose that surrounds the numbered blocks and skip the symbolic statements and the derivations, or read everything and then work through Appendix A step by step. Skipping the formal passages entirely costs no conclusion. That is a promise written into the format, and no one need learn logical notation before reading this part.

The ten chapters. Chapter 1 states the proposition: three definitions and one proposition in three versions. Chapter 2 tests the target: the definitions used in the proof are taken word for word from criteria the opponents use themselves (the three conditions of intrinsic nature in MMK 15, the Sarvāstivāda criterion of surviving analysis, Saṅghabhadra's generating a cognition by being an object), and each is redeemed against the original, so that the target is not a straw man of this book's making. Chapter 3 displays the tools: the distinction between the two negations, the distinction between assertion and rejection, the formal readings of the tetralemma; the logical equipment of the whole part is assembled at one stroke. Chapter 4 opens the proof: the legislation of the relationality premise and the core derivation, with the chapter on motion as the worked sample. Chapter 5 blocks the counterattack: the emptiness of emptiness, the result of applying the theorem to itself handled by the hierarchy clause, the Vigrahavyāvartanī in full. Chapter 6 collects the other half: with emptiness, everything stands, and the two truths find their place here. Chapter 7 audits: the anticipated failure modes are tested one by one, and a verdict is given on the fate of each of the three versions of the proposition. Chapter 8 takes the theorem out of the Buddhist setting and tries it abroad once, on the combination of concepts eternal, self-existent, immutable, omniscient, and creating the world by free will. Chapter 9 delivers judgment and hands over three lists: theorem, tools, remainder. Chapter 10 stands outside the proof: a stretch of the author's own history with Madhyamaka, a record of how this theorem came to be sought out, and of what could be seen once it was found. It carries no part of the argument; remove the chapter whole and not one word of the first nine need change.

Independence from Buddhism. One thing said plainly at the outset: if this theorem holds, it rests on no Buddhist premise. The definitions are taken from criteria the opponents use themselves, and the derivation moves by logic alone; the Buddhist material does two jobs in this part and no more — it supplies provenance for the definitions, and it supplies the historical record of the reductios. So if the theorem stands, it is a tool anyone at all may take up, and the trial abroad in Chapter 8 is that claim examined on site. What is left of the Mūlamadhyamakakārikā once this tool has been extracted from it is the question the third list of Chapter 9 has to answer, and it is one of the most interesting questions this book knows.

An arch across the volume. Part II rests on two great set pieces as on an arch: Part 13 treats the Buddha's silence before metaphysical questions, and this part offers a theorem on the positive side. The silence came first and the proof comes after, and the reader may take this part as the late-arriving brief for that silence.

Terms and quotations. As in the earlier parts, the received Chinese technical vocabulary is taken as primary and rendered by settled English equivalents, with the Sanskrit glossed at first occurrence. Quotations from the Mūlamadhyamakakārikā are given on the base of the four-fascicle Chinese translation; both the vernacular rendering and the classical text are in the library, and verse numbers are given in place. Western-language sources are cited with page numbers in place. This part draws on more modern scholarship than those before it, and the rule is unchanged: arguments are absorbed, authorities are not cited as premises.

To Chapter 1. First, every word in that sentence is to be nailed down.