No Self, No Problem: How Neuropsychology Is Catching Up to Buddhism

by Chris Niebauer

This reverence for thinking is in stark contrast to the tenets of Eastern philosophy found in traditions such as Buddhism, Taoism, and certain schools of Hinduism. These traditions at best advocate a distrust of the thinking mind and often go further to claim that the thinking mind is part of the problem rather than the solution.

Buddhism has a word for this concept—anatta, which is often translated as “no self”—which is one of the most fundamental tenets of Buddhism, if not the most important.

Mistaking the voice in our head for a thing and labeling it “me” brings us into conflict with the neuropsychological evidence that shows there is no such thing. This mistake—this illusory sense of self—is the primary cause of our mental suffering. What's more, I contend that it blocks access to the eternal, expansive thread of universal consciousness that is always available to us.

To be clear, mental suffering is different from physical pain.

What we discuss here will show that specific studies in neuroscience and psychology strongly suggest what Eastern philosophies have been saying for millennia: namely that this idea of “me” or the “self” that most of us take for granted doesn't exist in the way that we think it does.

Gazzaniga determined that the left side of the brain created explanations and reasons to help make sense of what was going on.1 The left brain acted as an “interpreter” for reality. Furthermore, Gazzaniga found that this interpreter was often completely and totally wrong.

Here is what's most important about this: the talking left side of the brain easily came up with a plausible and coherent, but completely incorrect explanation based on the evidence it had available.

The left brain was simply making up interpretations, or stories, for events that were happening in a way that made sense to that side of the brain

Neither of these explanations was true, but that was unimportant to the interpretive mind, which was convinced that its explanations were the correct ones.

These studies strongly suggest that we live our lives under the direction of the interpreter, and for most of us the mind is a master we are not even aware of. We may become angry, offended, sexually aroused, happy, or fearful, and we do not question the authenticity of these thoughts and experiences. While it is clear that these experiences are happening to us, we somehow retain the idea that we are still in charge of it all.