Abstract

The Nyāya philosopher Udayana devotes the first chapter of his Ātmatattvaviveka to refuting the Buddhist thesis of universal momentariness—the view that nothing which exists can persist through time—and to establishing the contrary view that things can and do persist. In the course of his critique of the Buddhists' "inference from existence" which purports to establish the momentariness thesis, Udayana is forced to consider the problem of how, if at all, it is possible to meaningfully and reliably think and talk about things which do not exist.In this paper, I offer a close reading of this section of the ĀTV, taking seriously both the philosophical context and commitments of Udayana's work in general, and the...