The Concept of Exclusion (Apoha) in Buddhist Philosophy

Abstract

This article critically examines the Buddhist semantic theory of apoha (lit. “exclusion”), by means of which Buddhist nominalists have attempted to resolve the question of the status of universals (sāmānya) and abstract entities in disputes with their opponents, who were metaphysical realists. The concept of apoha is methodologically based on a double negation, in which the generic term X refers to all the entities that are not non-X. Through the exclusion of everything that is not a cow it is possible to refer to a particular cow without accepting the existence of the universal term “cow”.