30 Philosophers, Chapter 6, Buddhism, Touchstone 15: Illusion: Self and Non-self.
In Eastern thought, the term Atman is the idea of a “true self,” and the term Anatman is the Buddhist doctrine of non-self. To understand the Buddhist idea of non-self, you need to understand emptiness as the idea that nothing exists permanently. In my writing, I write about this as impermanence and sometimes as flux. In Buddhism, they use the impermanence to point out that you do not have a permanently fixed self.
Your self, or Atman, is your true deeper soul. Sure, your surface self changes, but Atman is the enduring reality within. Your soul. In some schools, like Advaita Vedanta, Atman is ultimately connected to Brahman, the deepest reality of all: a type of Eastern monism. This is where Buddhism turns.
The idea of non-self, or Anatman, in Buddhism does not deny that you exist. You are still here, thinking, loving, and suffering. But it challenges the deeper claim of a permanent “I.” In Buddhism, the flame of life is real, but always changing.
Buddhism uses these ideas to help people overcome suffering in this life. The mistake they focus on is that we grip the self as permanent. We say this is me, this is mine, this is who I am, and then we suffer when life proves otherwise. The Buddhist path loosens that grip.
To be clear, TST does not take a position on souls. It never asks you to embrace one public answer for anything unknowable. Those are deep worldview claims. But publicly, we still need common ground. We all share this material world during this life. Together we build our public truths, public beliefs, and public systems within this material world, during this life.
