[Advaita-l] [advaitin] T&D – Avidyā

[Vikram Jagannathan]

Namaskaram,

Completely aligned with Venkatraghavan ji, Sudhanshu ji, and Raghav ji. My
question was directed to Michael ji because he had mentioned a possible
violation of the Law of Excluded Middle (LEM). It is fairly common for
other sampradayas to invoke LEM while critiquing Advaita, but I find it
surprising when Advaitins themselves treat it as a concern.

In my view, there is no need to bring LEM into a discussion of mithya.
Mathematically speaking, LEM applies only when the alternatives are both
mutually exclusive and jointly exhaustive. In several real-world examples
(as noted earlier), that framing simply does not apply. When the criteria
are not met, it is neither a fallacy nor a “violation” to avoid forcing the
issue into an LEM-shaped binary.

Further, as already shown above, Advaita does satisfy LEM in contexts where
the criteria do apply, for example: sublation vs. non-sublation, and the
paramarthika standpoint with respect to sat and asat.

prostrations,
Vikram



On Wed, Jan 28, 2026 at 6:06 AM Michael Chandra Cohen <
michaelchandra108 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Namaste Sudhanshuji and all,
> //It is not correct to say that hare's born is error and sublatable. No
> one mistakes anything for horns of hare. So, when there is no error,
> naturally it is not sublated either.//
> if you cite hare's horn, it can be sublated - I am trying my best to
> sublate!  Both are errors - one seen, the other, not.
>
> //Cognitive error requires mind. //
> Again,, that is distinguishing two illusions as well as reifying time,
> mind pre-exists error. The whole phenomena is adhyasa. All namarupa is
> adhyasa.
>
> The law of excluded middle (LEM) says: for any well-formed proposition P,
> either P is true or not-P is true—there is no third truth-value. In
> classical Indian logic this maps cleanly onto the idea that a cognition
> (jñāna) is either veridical (yathārtha) or non-veridical (ayathārtha);
> there isn’t a third truth-status that is neither.
>
> ON THE LAW OF EXCLUDED MIDDLE/LEM -with ChatGPT:
> What gets interesting in Advaita is that people sometimes try to use
> prātibhāsika-sattā (illusory/appearing reality) as if it were a third
> truth-value—“not true, but not false either.” That is exactly where LEM
> becomes clarifying: prātibhāsika is not a third logical status; it is a
> different mode of appearing,
> ****and it can be analyzed without violating LEM.*** (- law of parsimony
> rules)*
>
> The pressure toward “third status” typically comes from this hidden
> premise:
> (H) Non-being (asat) cannot appear / cannot be cognized.
>
> If you accept (H), then *since illusion appears, it cannot be asa*t;
> therefore it must be “neither sat nor asat” (a third ontological kind).
> LEM helps diagnose this mistake: (H) is not a logical truth; it is a
> metaphysical assumption. And it is empirically false even at the mundane
> level:
>
> 🙏🙏🙏
>
> On Wed, Jan 28, 2026 at 4:55 AM Venkatraghavan S <agnimile at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Namaste Bhaskar ji,
>>
>> "is the mithyA vastu deserved to be called as anirvachaneeya ( IOW an
>> exception to law of excluded middle)"
>>
>> I think you have misunderstood. I did not say it was an exception to the
>> law of the excluded middle.
>>
>> Kind regards,
>> Venkatraghavan
>>
>> On Wed, 28 Jan 2026, 14:16 'Bhaskar YR' via advaitin, <
>> advaitin at googlegroups.com> wrote:
>>
>>> praNAms Sri Venkatraghavan prabhuji
>>>
>>> Hare Krishna
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I was bit hurried as I was in tight official schedule 😊 My question is
>>> very simple, is the mithyA vastu deserved to be called as anirvachaneeya (
>>> IOW an exception to law of excluded middle).  For the anirvachaneeyatvaM
>>> shankara gives the example of foam / water, can this be compared with
>>> Kalpita jneya vastu due to adhyAsa?? Further to explain this :
>>> anirvachaneeyatva occurs only when both the kAraNa and the kArya are
>>> simultaneously perceived (like mrudghata) either by direct perception or
>>> through the shAstra. On the other hand mithyA is related to the wrong
>>> perception of an object. During the bhrAnti samaya we have a deterministic
>>> knowledge that it is satya (though it is bhrAnti jnAna) and after realizing
>>> the existing thing we realize that it was just our mithyA jnAna.  At what
>>> stage do we think that there was / is / will be an anirvachaneeya vastu
>>> existing ??  that too when it is proven that it was just mere Kalpita jneya
>>> vastu due to adhyAsa.  Neither dviteeya Chandra nor sarpa exist to explain
>>> it as a sadasadanirvachaneeya mithyA vastu just coz. sarpa and dviteeya
>>> Chandra mithyA jnAna is sublated.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Hari Hari Hari Bol!!!
>>>
>>> bhaskar
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google
>>> Groups "advaitin" group.
>>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send
>>> an email to advaitin+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com.
>>> To view this discussion visit
>>> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/advaitin/AM7PR06MB6625A57311B3D7164545CFD38491A%40AM7PR06MB6625.eurprd06.prod.outlook.com
>>> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/advaitin/AM7PR06MB6625A57311B3D7164545CFD38491A%40AM7PR06MB6625.eurprd06.prod.outlook.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>
>>> .
>>>
>> --
>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
>> "advaitin" group.
>> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an
>> email to advaitin+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com.
>> To view this discussion visit
>> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/advaitin/CAL34aEmRnW_TM%3DESrofvU1cmj6ms_6ZhLRfkE_gCCM41XMLHag%40mail.gmail.com
>> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/advaitin/CAL34aEmRnW_TM%3DESrofvU1cmj6ms_6ZhLRfkE_gCCM41XMLHag%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>
>> .
>>
> --
> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
> "advaitin" group.
> To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an
> email to advaitin+unsubscribe at googlegroups.com.
> To view this discussion visit
> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/advaitin/CAAz9PvGsQM2PyE1wc%2BOWwzCsN9J7LY7qrS1k1rre6DJniRE_3w%40mail.gmail.com
> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/advaitin/CAAz9PvGsQM2PyE1wc%2BOWwzCsN9J7LY7qrS1k1rre6DJniRE_3w%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>
> .
>