Question on method of arriving at conclusions

[Vidyasankar Sundaresan]

Suresh wrote:
>   The very fact that someone takes support of the fact that something cannot
 be
> disproved to stake claim for its truth means that it cannot be proved either.
> So whatever is to be passed of as truth based on the above criterion can
> neither pe proved nor disproved.

This is correct. With respect to the criterion of truth, Sankara maintains
that non-contradictability, not just non-contradictedness should be the
criterion of absolute truth. Non-contradictability means that the truth can
never be denied by anyone at any time, which holds for the Self. "Non-
contradicted"ness only means that it has not been contradicted hitherto, which
does not mean that some argument cannot be given to contradict it in the future.
Contradiction here is obviously more than a statement that contradicts a
previous one: it assumes that the other statement has been proved to be true,
which necessarily means that the original statement must be false.

It is important to note that that which is non-contradictable shares in a
state of non-contradictedness, whereas that which has not been contradicted
is not necessarly non-contradictable. This is very basic to advaita vedAnta's
statements about nirguNa and saguNa brahman.

S. Vidyasankar

ps. Sorry for the very long mail sent previously. Before I realized it, it
was that long!