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however, is an agnostic position which, in its extreme form is self-contradictory. If all knowledge about its contents is false, then the contention of the agnostic becomes unsubstantial itself. The agnostic moots out his theory; he insists that his theory be accepted as correct; but how can it be acknowledged to be valid, if all knowledge is invalid? Then again, the agnostic contends that all knowledge is false; the falsity of knowledge implies a standard of truth, of which the false knowledge falls short; but how can we have a correct idea about that objective standard of truth, if all our knowlege of the outside reality is essentially false Lastly, the agnostic may contend that although knowledges about outside reality are wrong, a knowledge which is selfconsistent, without any reference to the outside objects, may be taken to be valid. Even this position of the agnostic Buddhist is untenable. For, self-consistency of knowledge implies the validity of the laws of thought and these laws of logic transcend knowledge and are independent of it; accordingly, you cannot talk of the selfconsistency of knowledge without admitting the validity of the logical laws; and this contradicts the fundamental position of the agnostic that all knowledge of what is independent of knowledge, is false.
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