The world of much Abhidharma analysis, as interpreted by Madhyamika, is one of a series of fundamentally, really, existing dharmas, most of which are caused by preceding dharmas and in their turn can cause those which succeed. Nagarjuna begins his Madhyamakakārikā with a critique of causation. The first verse provides a structure termed by later Madhyamikas the ‘Diamond Slivers’ – the argument cuts like a diamond: ‘Nowhere are there any entities which have originated from themselves, from another, from both, or from no cause at all.’ The most succinct explanation of the argument is supplied by Buddhapalita. It is a classic series of prasañgas; indeed it was in commenting on this verse that Bhavaviveka elaborated his attack on Buddhapalita’s use of the prasaṅga and thereby inaugurated the so-called Svatantrika/Prasaṅgika debate: