Mithyātvānumānakhaṇḍanam – An Overview
Mithyātvānumānakhaṇḍanam , “Refutation of the Inference of Falsity,” is a brief but technically concentrated work in which Madhvācārya examines the logical argument used to establish the unreality of the world. The disputed inference maintains that the world is false because it is an object of cognition, citing illusory silver perceived in a shell as the corresponding example.
Madhva subjects this inference to a systematic logical analysis. He argues that the proposed conclusion suffers from several defects depending upon how “falsity” is defined. If the world is assumed nonexistent, the very subject about which the inference is made loses its established locus. If falsity is defined as something neither real nor unreal, that supposed indefinable status itself remains unproved. The proposed reason—being an object of cognition—is also inconclusive, since the self too is cognized without thereby becoming unreal.
The argument encounters a deeper difficulty: if the entire experienced world is unreal, the inference employed to prove its unreality would itself belong to that same unreal order. Madhva further observes that the conclusion conflicts with perception, other valid means of knowledge, and scriptural declarations affirming the reality of the universe.
He then constructs counter-inferences: what is known through a valid means of knowledge may instead be affirmed as real. The familiar example of shell-silver does not establish the opponent’s position, because error concerning silver does not demonstrate the existence of an indefinable category between reality and non-reality.
The work concludes by defining essential components of inference—#ispakṣa#is, #issapakṣa#is, vipakṣa , pratijñā , hetu , and dṛṣṭānta — and by affirming the Supreme as eternally manifest consciousness, blissful and possessed of flawless auspicious qualities.
Mithyātvānumānakhaṇḍanam thus exemplifies Madhva’s realist method: metaphysical claims must withstand rigorous logical examination and remain consistent with valid experience and authoritative revelation.
