Truthfullness and Truth in Jaina Philosophy

Author(s): Peter Flugel
Publisher: ZZ_Anusandhan

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मार्च २०१०
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a dialethic approach', i.e. the assumption that 'the world is inconsistent'. The Greek word dialetheia (two-way truth) refers to a true contradiction facing both truth and falsity.58 PRIESTROUTLEY (1983: 17) were the first to point out parallels between Jaina logic and modern discussive logic, but argue, like most logicians before them, that Jain perspectivism is predicated on the rejection of the law of contradiction.59 However, GANERI (2002: 274) demonstrated in his reconstruction of the assumptions underlying the method of seven-fold predication (sapta-bhangi), based on an extension of discussive logic via modalised many-valued truth-tables, that Jain logic 'does not involve any radical departure from classical logic ... The underlying logic within each standpoint is classical, and it is further assumed that each standpoint or participant is internally consistent.' The findings of BALCEROWICZ (2003: 64) on the contextual logic of the seven nayas concur with this general conclusion. Both authors show that Jain logic is context-sensitive and a quasi-functional system.
To syād-vāda and anekānta-vāda the Jain catus-koti of the modes of speech can be added, as another example of
Jain logic' which clearly operates within the confines of the law of non-contradiction, and does not need to be interpreted as a form of scepticism, nor of syncretism predicated on the notion of a total truth integration of all viewpoints, as MATILAL (1981) argues. Our brief glance at the Jain interpretation of the third mode of the so-called 'four-valued logic of the catus-koți, applied to language usage, that is, the explicit exclusion of the values 'false' and both true and false', showed that Jain logic' does not 'flatly deny’60 the law of non-contradiction. The examples in Jain scriptures for modes of speech which are both-true-and-false, and their explicit rejection, demonstrate, on the contrary, that Jain philosophy is unequivocally opposed to violations of the law of non
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