Buddhapālita

Buddhapālita was a Madhyamaka commentator of roughly the 5th–6th century CE, author of a commentary on Nāgārjuna's Mūlamadhyamakakārikā. His method—establishing emptiness purely by drawing out the absurd consequences of opponents' views (reductio) rather than by advancing independent theses—was criticized by his contemporary Bhāviveka and later defended by Candrakīrti, and the dispute gave the (retrospectively named) Prāsaṅgika–Svātantrika distinction within Madhyamaka. He is a genuine historical thinker, though biographical detail is thin and his dates traditional.