Logical Appraisal of Nagarjuna's Methods of Argument

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The two main aims of this research project is to complete and publish an accurate and readable English translation of the Mulamadhyamakakarika, the main work of Nagarjuna, founder of the Madhyamaka school of Mahayana Buddhism, and to evaluate logically the very destructive arguments found in his works.In this report I first wrote an article (1) "Nagarjuna and the Tetralemma (catuskoti)", in which I clarified that the essence of Nagarjuna's destuctive arguments consists of Method of Enumeration called catuskoti he inherited from Abhidharma masters and Method of reductio ad absurdum perhaps he himself created.Next I inculded a paper (2) "Nagarjuna and the Trilemma or trikalya-siddhi", which I read at International Conference to Commemorate the Centenary of the Birth of Stanislaw Schayer held at the University of Warsaw last October, and in which I analyzed another type of Nagarjuna' s destructive argument called traikalyasiddhi together with the counter-arguments given by the Naiyayikas.The more detailed analysis of Nagarjuna's arguments is given in the fourth chapter of my book Indojin no Ronrigaku (Chuokoronsha, October 1998).When Prof. Mark Siderits visited Hiroshima Universit for two weeks last November and December, he tried to check my English translation of the Mulamadhyamakakarika. Since we could not cover the whole book, we decided to meet regularly and to publish a new English translation of the text in cooperation. In this report I included my rough translation of the whole text and the refined translation of chapter II done by Prof. Siderits. I also included my translations of chapters XXIV and XXVI, which have been checked by another native speaker.