Objection · Case 07 · Philosophy

You admit paraconsistent logic and dialetheism exist, and some Eastern philosophies reject the excluded middle in religious contexts. So when non-contradiction is used against “all religions are true,” can’t a Buddhist simply decline the premise?

One objection from the free evidence repository at apologetics.pro.

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Response

A sophisticated Buddhist or Hindu interlocutor might make this move, and it deserves an answer. Dialetheists themselves hold that true contradictions are rare and isolated (the liar paradox, certain boundary cases), and no dialetheist claims that ultimate reality is personal and ultimate reality is impersonal can both be true. Anyone who does claim that has abandoned the possibility of saying anything false about religion, including the claim that Christianity is wrong. The move buys nothing for the pluralist that it does not also cost.

About this exhibit

This objection is to Non-classical logic, the honest limit.

Intuitionist logic, developed by mathematicians in the early 1900s, rejects the unrestricted law of excluded middle. Paraconsistent logic and the view called dialetheism go further and allow that…

Under Claim 03: Two of the three classical laws of logic trace back to Aristotle, and together they remain the basis of ordinary reasoning, though modern logicians have challenged them at the edges.