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Thus Shan- sta
Law of contradiction
estimation of the principle of our dialectic movement as applied to thought and being
-a form of reasoning which originally and exclusively belongs to the Jain philosophy.
To begin with, therefore, so far the fundamentals of our doctrine as summarised by Shankar are concerned, we must at once admit that he is not guilty of mis. representation.
But when he starts his criticism with the
startling remark that, being and non-being kar lays stress on the cannot co-exist in one and the same thing,
we beg to differ from him. Shankar puts all through his arguments, a great stress on the Law of Contradiction. And as it is a law of thought which cannot be transgressed without committing ourselves to contradictions and inconsistencies as the Formal Logic teaches, any theory which does the same, he says, cannot be accepted as having any worth at all.
When the Formal Logic laid down the Law of Contradiction as the highest law of thought, what it evidently meant is simply this that distinction is necessary for thought. Unless things are definitely
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