The heart of madhyamaka - kicking away the ladder

Philosophical discourse may be logically, linguistically, psychologically, sociologically and ideologically analyzed. One can question whether philosophical discourse has any claim to veracity or value. One can be amazed by the hubris and confidence of philosophers and question the epistemic or intrinsic public value of the discourse they produce.  One can inquire whether philosophers fail to question the assumptions they tacitly assume, or whether some positions be never stately clearly but only insinuated (cf. Ernst Gellner's Words and Things). One can question whether self-proclaimed "rigorous" philosophy is actually as "rigorous" as it claims to be and question whether such a "rigor" be not entirely illusory and only based on stylistic mimicry and convoluted jargon masking the lack of any possibility of formalization in an axiomatic-deductive system. One can question whether philosophical discourse be not a mere language game (like the crossword) based on vagueness, ambiguity and unconscious association, tolerated due to the loftiness of the object of discourse, the stylistically "scientific" semblance of the discourse itself, specially when focused on technical topics in logic and language. Surely we must reject a game based on the dynamics and structure of human consciousness which yet denies outright the underlying role of human consciousness in the spirit of: pay no attention to the man behind the curtain! Philosophy can well seem scientific yet be not so and produce arguments that on the surface seem to be like a logical mathematical proof but fall utterly short of it. And, most importantly, be completely lacking criteria for veracity and value. And what are we to make of philosophers who downplay  or trivialize introspective psychology, mathematical linguistics and mathematical linguistic analysis (the only way to go beyond circularity in linguistics) or the universal ethical principles of human and animal rights? All human activities with value have  public, objective criteria. Philosophy does not have such criteria. Contrary to most academic critiques of academic philosophy the central flaw is not ignoring fundamental domains of human experience and the human condition (which is a valid enough point) but the claim to be analytical and rigorous while being not so and lacking any objective public criteria of veracity or value. A mathematical proof can be formalized and checked in a proof assistant such as Agda. Introspective psychological descriptions can be confirmed, verified or corrected by comparison and discussion among researchers.  A theory in natural science can be confronted with experimental data and evidence. A medication or medical procedure has the objective criterion of the data of clinical trials.  A work of art is received by the public.. But philosophy has no criteria beyond "deemed acceptable to be published in journal X by the editor and reviewers A,B,C,...". A tacit assumption and error is that the mathematical formalization of (a relevant fragment of) natural language is neither possible nor desirable for philosophy. Another one is (often tied to physicalist dogmatism): introspective psychology (as in Hume, William James and Brentano)  is of little value and not a source of philosophical insight and progress. And if  to this we add to this the rejection of the marvelous metaphoric, poetic and analogical capabilities of natural language, we come to the conclusion that such philosophy is mere verbiage, a linguistic production without veracity or value which merits careful linguistic, psychological and cultural diagnosis and analysis.

A note on the formalization of natural language. When two people sit down to play a game they have reached an agreement. The pieces on the board and the rules will represent the game but are not themselves the game.  The agreement is that the board, pieces and rules will stand for the game. A formalization of a fragment of natural language will take the form of a formal system incorporating a series of formal definitions which a group of people will agree represents a certain fragment of natural language. This group will agree (based on a perceived contextual adequacy) to abide by the rules of the game of such a formal system for the purposes of certain arguments or debates - they agree that the formal system and its moves stand  for the linguistic activity of the debate. The formalization of natural language is in a way a return to the original essence of natural language. Indeed as mentioned in the conclusion of our Analyticity, Computability and the A Priori, it is through the reliving and showing forth of the process of our psycho-cognitive development that we may hope to ultimately see the light regarding the problems of philosophy - without naively confusing the developmental path of a cognitive structure with its intrinsic constitution(*). Just as Kant distinguished between a legitimate and illegitimate use of reason (the transcendental illusion once the basic foothold of logic and introspective intuition are abandoned) so too we must distinguish between a perfectly legitimate use and application of language (in which the adequacy of language is unquestionable, independently of any formalization) and an illegitimate use and domain as exemplified by the naive linguistic productions of philosophy.  The formalization of natural language is a necessary critique, a judgment, a challenge and a sifting.

(*) A complementary method will involve what we described as a "linguistic phenomenology". We are given an object and a restricted vocabulary (which may be or not be a set of proposed semantic primes) and the task is to define, describe or tell a story about that object using only such a vocabulary. 

Anatta

Anatta was indeed the central philosophy of early, authentic buddhism. But is was not fully understood and rapidly compromised and corrupted. Its recovery, preservation and further exposition and development is found nevertheless in various schools of the East and West, both ancient (and even pre-buddhist) and modern.

Our working hypothesis is that original Buddhism was strictly based on ethics, philosophical insight and meditation (bhavana) and had no religious component whatsoever. Metaphysical questions and questions regarding the afterlife were treated exactly as in Pyrrho or Kant's transcendental dialectics. The concepts of karma and rebirth were originally philosophical teachings whose meaning was lost, being corrupted into literal religious beliefs (wherein the bhikkhu ultimately replaced the brahmin). The original teaching on karma (which involves impersonal polarized psychological energies) did not depend in the least on a literal mythological understanding of rebirth. 

Thus for example we can think of human beings as receptors, generators and transmitters of certain psychological energies, and as being immersed in an environment in which such energies can also exist in a free form.  Negative energies and deeds not only rebound with unfortunate consequences in the life of the individual but also, conceivably, during the process of death the sum-total of such an individual's habitual and accumulated energies may be explosively released into the world and thus influence other beings in a positive, neutral or negative way (there might be an analogy with a supernova in astrophysics). Also during the process of death the individual may experience a kind of final dream in which that individual's life-history and sum-total of energies and habits is lived out in a final synthetic way. 

We hold that Anatta is the essence and culmination of TPC and TPP.  We have discussed and highlighted the importance of Pyrrho, Hume, Nagarjuna - and a certain approach to Hegel.

Let us just say that an entity or structure can be inherently not only fragmentary and incomplete but also inconsistent. A fragmented inconsistent being does not have within itself a representation of its own negation, non-being, of a state where it is not. That is to say, there is no true being without self-transcendence. The best that can happen for an entity is to see clearly the circularity of its own inescapable inner contradiction.

The core of TPP is the development of intentional habits and fundamental energies and forces, virtues of consciousness which counteract from a central source and in all dimensions  the limitations, delusions, inconsistencies and self-postulation and self-proliferation of the fragmentary being.

The categories of consciousness (including space, time, locality) are to be transcended.

We must find strong evidence for the presence and practice of this same TPC and TPP among the most diverse places and people in prehistoric, classical antiquity and subsequent history, all in complete agreement with regards to the only necessary central essential core (which in itself as virtually infinite inexhaustible content).

The primordial tradition is not some kind of primitive human culture, rather it is the ubiquitous and timeless presence of the power of complete transcendence of humanity.

 There is not great difference between logic and argumentation and games. These are the factors involved. One accepts a game  G as a game and holds that the game is interpersonally objective and follows publically agreed upon rules.  One fixes a side, a starting point, a choice X in G. Then X is processed by G (in a way which may involve deliberate choice and participation, or not) and eventually yields an element U from a predefined set of possible outcomes. Logic and argumentation involves furthermore that acceptance of a translation-representation between intentional mental-cognitive content and a choice X as well as the reverse translation from U back to meaningful mental content. Furthermore it is often the case that we postulate a principle of continuity in that the processing steps of G are transparent in their mental interpretability though such do not play any role in the processing itself.

The interpretation of Gödel's dialectica translation in terms of games is one of the most interesting developments in logic in the recent decades (a formula is turned into a game-like formula and proofs become winning strategies codified by closed terms in system T) - and should be compared not only with our reconstruction of the debate game in Aristotle's Topics but also with modern proposals for a logic of dialogue.

We observe that in original Buddhism we meet with many suttas which share a logical-argumentation template and dialectical method which is itself far more important than the contingent details. This method involves a combinatoric bringing to light and articulation of possibilities aiming a bringing about a catharsis and detachment (like the Pyrrhonic epokhe).

Thus Buddhist dialectics and Buddhist phenomenology rest both on a subtle hermeneutics of language, that is, language considered as the vehicle and dwelling place of the proliferation and self-reinforcement of the fragmentary entity. Hermeneutics asks the most fundamental questions which lead to the appearance of cracks and tears in the fabric of constructed reality.