Zen expected to become familiar with the classics of the Zen canon". A review of the early historical documents and literature of early Zen masters clearly reveals that they were well versed in numerous Mahāyāna Buddhist sūtras, including Madhyamaka. Especially the Lotus Sutra played a large role in the development of East Asian Buddhism, including Zen. Nevertheless, Zen is often pictured as anti-intellectual. This picture of Zen emerged during the Song Dynasty (960–1297), when Chán became the dominant form of Buddhism in China, and gained great popularity among the educated and literary classes of Chinese society. The use of koans, which
Attacking Faulty Reasoning the five criteria of a good argument: Each fallacy falls into at least one of Damer's five fallacy categories, which derive from the above criteria. The text also sets forth 12 principles that constitute a "Code of Conduct for Effective Discussion." This code incorporates Damer’s fallacy theory and provides a procedural and ethical standard for the development of an effective intellectual style to be used when engaging in a rational discussion of important issues. Attacking Faulty Reasoning Attacking Faulty Reasoning is a textbook on logical fallacies by T. Edward Damer that has been used for many years in a number