Vada in Theory and Practice: Studies in Debates, Dialogues and Discussions in Indian Intellectual Discourses c8.s5.38

c8.s5.38

Dharmakīrti employs a series of arguments in refutation of generality (*sāmānya* or *jāti*). These arguments fall into three categories — intuitive, metaphysical and logistic. Acceptance of the generality is beset with the “one–many” problem, i.e. generality is said to be present in one object and at the same time in many as well, and then it is *vyabhicāra* (defect of variance). The universal would share the multiple natures of the various particulars, that too would be at variance, therefore to Dharmakīrti it is a pseudo-entity. Describing *jāti* as a fiction, he says: