- Lived:
- c. 14th century · Mithilā, in the far north of Bihar, India — tradition names the village of Karion, near the Kamalā river
- Tradition:
- Indian; founder of Navya-Nyāya, the "New Logic" — the formal analysis of inference and cognition
- The Big Idea:
- Every thought has an exact structure, and philosophy can only be done honestly once we have a language precise enough to write that structure down.
- In their words:
- "For the sake of those drowning in the mud of bad arguments, this Jewel of Reflection on Truth is composed." — from the opening of the Tattvacintāmaṇi (plain rendering)
- If you remember one thing:
- We know almost nothing about the man — a name, a village, a book — yet for five hundred years, every serious philosopher in India, whatever their school, had to write in the technical language he invented.