Mountains Are Just Mountains

Abstract

The previous chapter raised questions about the two truths and their relation to one another, and uses arguments, devices, and the rhetoric of contemporary Western debates about reductionism to address problems about Buddhism's two truths. This chapter addresses problems connected to the two truths as well, and considers one standard Buddhist approach to resolving these problems, the use of the catuskoti, or four-cornered logic. It also adopts the techniques of contemporary logical theory to achieve greater clarity about ideas explored by Nāgārjuna and Zen thinkers such as Hakuin and Dōgen.