This post and its successors discuss the need for a transcendental logic, so that we can reason with our transcendental ontology and arrive at correct conclusions regarding spiritual life. If you find it difficult to understand, you should review the other posts on transcendental ontology in our podcast series and the Intro to Ontology course. Then you will have the necessary background to follow our line of thought herein.

Western scientific logic is actually three-valued or ternary logic. While it is based on two-valued or Aristotelian logic, scientific method admits the existence of a third truth value: unknown, indeterminate or undetermined.

"We propose that spiritual inquiry must be at least on the basis of scientific thought and method; that is, an empirical inquiry based on ternary logic, with great sensitivity to and tolerance of the ambiguity and indeterminacy natural to any subjective phenomena."

Ternary logic is a great improvement over Aristotelian two-valued logic. It inspired the Enlightenment and enabled tremendous scientific and technological progress in a comparatively short time. Nevertheless, even ternary logic is inadequate for reasoning about the ultimate questions of self-realization, the spiritual world and the Supreme Personality of Godhead. Unfortunately, most religious thought and theological debate still use Aristotelian logic, despite its serious shortcomings even in elementary material reasoning.