The Logic of Reality: East Meets West

©David Paul Boaz, 2010

Esoterically considered, Zen, as the Primordial Awareness Wisdom is the heartmind

essence of religion, philosophy and science. The ultimate meaning of philosophy is the
union of love (philos) and wisdom (sophia). The root meaning of ‚religion‛ (religio) in the
Indic Sanskrit of our Indo-European etymological tradition is ‚yoga,‛ union, the linking
or binding together—yin/yang, outer/inner, true/false, spirit/matter—of the opposites of
dualistic reality. In the Greek this unifying force is zygon. The process of the dualistic,
relative mind and its painful egoic resistance to healing these splits must be felt through,
and ultimately transcended in the realization of its nondual supreme source. This seeking
motive, this desire for the supreme happiness that is the realization of ultimate truth,
whether pre-conscious, conscious, or super-conscious, is at the heart of the quests of
science, religion and philosophy. Indeed, this motive, this primordial impulse, is the root
of all of our seeking strategies.
Both science and philosophy are grounded in certain metaphysical assumptions as to the
objective, physical nature of reality (Chap.VII). The metaphysical base of exoteric science (both
physical and psychological) and of speculative philosophy (epistemology, metaphysics,
aesthetics, ethical theory) is grounded in or presupposes that metaphysical, ultimate
primordial ground that transcends yet includes it. How can this be? Zen (Tao) is this prior
nondual unity of subjective observer and object observed and measured. Zen is the supreme
source, the matrix or base of the mind in whom religion, philosophy, science, culture and
everything else arises, and into whom this all returns. Yet Zen , as zazen is also the way or
method or practice (the path) opening into the realization of this great truth of our Primordial
Wisdom Tradition. Thus Zen (and Dzogchen and Mahamudra) is the ultimate nondual
openness, the unbroken wholeness that is the primordial awareness base (Ultimate
Truth/paramartha), ‚Big Mind‛ in whom all relative conventional spacetime reality (Relative
Truth/samvriti), ‚Small Mind‛ arises and participates.These are the ‚Two Truths‛ of our
perennial wisdom tradition. Zen is also the path, the non-seeking, non-action way (wu-wei) of
simply letting Being be. ‚The wu-wei that does not aim atwu-wei is truly wu-wei.... Tao (Zen)
does nothing, yet nothing is left undone‛ (Lao Tzu).
The perceiving, discursive thinking mind, ‚Small Mind,‛ in its intellectual effort to grasp
and to understand the vast expanse of its nondual source—the very Nature of Mind (Big
Mind)—encounters dualism and dilemma at every discrete point. Thinking is a two-valued,
truth-functional (true-false, this or that) binary cognitive operation. Language expresses
thinking and follows the basic laws of thought, the logical structure of syntax. These laws
have been utilized in both the Orient and the Occident for at least twenty-four hundred years.
The "Four Propositions" of Nyaya Indian logic (catushkotika) and Aristotle's "Three Laws of
Thought" express Eastern and Western views of the logic of the thinking or discursive mind.
To better understand the Two Truths and Buddhist dependent arising(pratitya samutpada)and
the strategy and use of paradox in Zen, and especially koan practice in the transcendence of

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dualistic egoic view and experience, let us now briefly digress into the logical syntax of
human language and thought.

The Laws of Thought in the West: Aristotle

The Occidental view is expressed in Aristotle's Three Laws of Thought and is the
foundation of formal logic and mathematics, and of the Western rationalist, realist-
materialist world view.

1. The Law of Identity: A is A. What is, by definition, is.

2. The Law of Contradiction: A is not not-A (contradictories cannot
both be true).
3. The Law of Excluded Middle (tertium non datur): Everything is
either A or not-A (contradictories cannot both be false).

Thus, the Law of Contradiction and the Law of Excluded Middle are deduced from
the definition of contradictories as stated in the Law of Contradiction. The European
Intuitionists and Hindu and Buddhist logicians deny the Law of Excluded Middle. The
meaning of logico-mathematical entities or constructs is derived from their prior base (is
dependent upon their construction). Therefore, according to the Eastern view, the truth of a
particular statement (proposition) is not logically equivalent to the falsity of its
contradictory. Therefore, it is not necessarily true that ‚Everything is either A or not A.‛
Apparent contradictions may both have truth value, that is, ‚Both A and not-A‛ (the Law
of Connection), or neither A nor not-A (the fourth law of Eastern logic, p.199). These laws
permit the ontological interdependence of all arising phenomena, eg. The Buddhist
Dependent Arising (pratitya samutpada), and do not presuppose the existence of A.
In the West, Akos von Pauler (supported theoretically by the Phenomenologists L.E.J.
Brouwer, Hegel, Whitehead, Husserl and others) added this fourth law, the Law of
Connection ("Everything is connected with all other things") to Aristotle’s Three Laws.
The principles of deductive and inductive reasoning are derived from these primary
Laws of Thought.
The laws of Sufficient Reason, Classification, Correlatively, and the Scholastic Dictum
de omini et nullo, (misleadingly called "Aristotle's Law"), the principle of "everything and
nothing," are all recent developments to Aristotle’s Three Laws and aid in the emerging
rapproachment of the logic of East and West.
The Dictum de omini et nullo is the precursor to modern set theory and states that
what is universally asserted or denied of a class (or relation) is asserted or denied of
everything that is included within that class (or relation). The Principle of Classification
asserts that everything that is, can be classified; and the Principle of Correlatively asserts
that all relative phenomena are subsumed in the Ultimate or the Absolute. This is the
Western version of the universal principle of ‚The Two Truths,‛ that Ultimate or

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Absolute Truth (paramartha) subsumes or transcends, yet includes Relative Truth
(samvriti). The Principle of Sufficient Reason states approximately that every effect has a
cause (the Causal Principle), from which the physical laws of motion (change) are
derived. The proper method of philosophical and metaphysical inquiry, according to the
Intuitionists and to Ludwig Wittgenstein, is "reduction", the discovery of the assumptions
underlying, or prior to, our logical, speculative reasoning or thinking about this
phenomenal reality that appears.

The Eastern Mind

In the Oriental tradition, especially in the Hindu, Indian and Tibetan logical systems 9
formal logic closely parallels Western logic. That the categories of reason should be so
similar in cultures with widely disparate world views may be explained, in part, by the
fact that the pre-verbal cognitive base from which both the Eastern and Western thought
and language systems have arisen is the shared prehistoric and historical Indo-European
consciousness with its bent toward objectivity. The logical structure of the syntax of these
systems is similar because the experiential consciousness base is essentially the same. But
this similarity points to a more ultimate connection. All beings, indeed all existence share
the same great primordial awareness consciousness base. Esoterically, we all share the
same origin or source. Thus our cognition—our cognitive structures and functions—are
shared. For the religious consciousness, we all share and participate in the same godhead.
We just experience and describe it a little differently. The urgent inclusion of of the Law
of Connection—the Fourth Law—into the Western logical canon now parallels the
essential Four Propositions of Nyaya in the Vedic-Vedanta and Buddhist traditions:

1. It is A.
2. It is not-A
3. It is both A and not-A (the Law of Connection)
4. It is neither A nor not-A (neti, neti: not this, not this)

If we compare the third law of each tradition we see that the excluded middle
("everything is either A or not-A") of the Western canon may be replaced by the Eastern
Law of Connection, "It is both A and not-A", which is the complimentary to the fourth
law of the Oriental tradition, "It is neither A nor not-A." These two considered together
express the logical, epistemological and ontological uncertainty of the Quantum Theory,
and of the paradoxical truth of Zen/Tao: ‚It is both this and that;‛ therefore, ‚it is neither
this nor that‛ (neti, neti). Therefore it may be non-existent or empty of any essential,
inherent existence (emptiness/ shunyata). Everything arises from Tao / emptiness, and
returns again to emptiness. Indeed, this apparent arising and return are an atemporal
9
Not surprisingly, ancient China, under the practical, moral and mystical influences of Taoism, Confusianism and
Ch‟an Buddhism showed little interest in formal logic.
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unity. Relative spacetime phenomenal existence (samvriti) is never ever actually separate
from the primordial state of union with the perfectly subjective Base of reality that is
Ultimate Truth (paramartha). This coalescence of the Two Truths of our Great Wisdom
Tradition is thus, always a non-conceptual prior unity. There is one truth viewed as two
modes, through two lenses. However, ultimately, not even this assertion can be made
because, as we have seen, all assertions—Eastern or Western—are relative concepts.
Ultimately, truth can only be realized through the pre-conceptual post-critical, ‚pristine
cognition‛ (dharmadhatujnana, chos-ying yeshe), the primordial awareness wisdom (jnana,
yeshe) of Absolute Reality. This ‚Buddha mind‛ is liberation from the limits of the logical
mind. And this realization is the liberation from ignorance that is enlightenment, ultimate
‚Happiness Itself.‛
This Law of Connection correlates the tautological, truth-functional (true-false)
dualism of the other logical laws with the metaphysical necessity of the transcendent
base, the sourceground that transcends yet embraces the entire dimension of relative
truth, including the highly emotional, logical thinking mind. Theologians, philosophers,
and scientists have often referred to this metaphysical Base as the ‚First Cause.”
Physicists call it the "Big Bang." For the religious mind it is the Creator God. This primal
cause begins the linear chain of cause and effect—the arrow of time, from particles to
stars to life—that is the primary assumption of the "Principal of Causality‛, the basis of
our classical scientific and common sense assumptions about reality. This primordial
creation event marks the beginning of the transition from monistic
Pythagorean/Parmenidean perfectly subjective “Being”—the changeless primordial Base
that is ‛Reality Itself‛—to the Heraclitean flux of arising energy/motion that is
‚Becoming‛ objective spacetime reality. Primal, absolute nondual being is always
becoming its relative spacetime particulars. That is its nature. However, the
Cartesian/Newtonian concept of an absolute objective causality and an absolute objective
time in which it occurs, has been recently demolished by the Quantum Theory (the
Uncertainty and Complimentarity Principles, Chap. I). This classical causality with its
linear First Cause is also denied by the Buddhist view of causality, dependent origination
(pratitya samutpada).
Thus, the profound intuition—the impulse—of our primordial sourceground appears
in all its traditions and manifestations. The masters of the three times have told it: this
utterly ineffable ‚supreme source‛ abides at the root of attention, just beyond the logic of
conceptual mind. Yet human reason may approach it, and contemplative practice may
reveal it, not conceptually or logically, but directly, through the senses and the heart.
Shunyata then, is realized as the affirming luminous emptiness by the ‚pristine
cognition‛ of our nondual innate ‚primordial awareness wisdom‛ (jnana, gnosis). The
objects arising from this emptiness Base are entirely devoid of any ultimate essential
intrinsic existence. Yet through this dependent arising appears the often all too real world
of relative spacetime reality, including us, and our rational, logical effort to understand it

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all. Vidya/rigpa is the always present ‚presence‛ of this innate nondual wisdom, this vast
emptiness Base that we are. And this realization waits, awake within each individual
heartmind (kokoro/anjin/hridyam) as we indulge our seeking strategies, our paradoxical
ceaseless search for logical certainty, and for the realization of the indwelling happiness
that cannot be lost. So it is told by the highest teachings of our Great Wisdom Tradition.

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