---
type: Concept
bundle: nyaya-vaisheshika
bundle_version: 0.9.0
id: atman
title: Ātman (Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika)
iast: Ātman
devanagari: आत्मन्
description: 'The self as an eternal substance and a real plurality: many distinct selves, each an eternal substratum in which cognition, pleasure, pain, desire, and effort inhere as adventitious qualities; NOT the single non-dual Ātman of Advaita, NOT the Abrahamic soul, NOT a stream or bundle of consciousness.'
darshana:
- Nyāya
- Vaiśeṣika
school_scope: 'CRITICAL cross-bundle contrast. Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika holds a REALIST PLURALISM of selves: many eternal ātmans, each a substance, with consciousness as an ADVENTITIOUS quality (not essential). This is the sharpest possible contrast with the single, non-dual, essentially-conscious Ātman of Advaita (upanishadic-core v0.6, dharma-foundation v0.1). Same word, opposite doctrine.'
text_source: Vaiśeṣika Sūtra 3.2.4; Nyāya Sūtra 1.1.10
tags:
- atman
- self
- nyaya
- vaisheshika
- pluralism
not:
- term: the single non-dual Ātman of Advaita
  why: 'In Advaita there is one Ātman, identical with Brahman, whose very nature is consciousness (sat-chit-ananda), and plurality of selves is finally unreal. Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika holds the reverse: selves are genuinely many, each an eternal substance, and consciousness is not the self''s essence but an adventitious quality that arises in it only when it is embodied and conjoined with a mind. In liberation, on this view, the self persists without consciousness. The two doctrines share a word and contradict each other.'
  instead: Define the Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika ātman as one of many eternal self-substances, the substratum in which cognition, pleasure, pain, desire, aversion, and effort inhere as qualities; known by inference (from desire, cognition, etc.), plural, and not essentially conscious.
- term: the Abrahamic soul
  why: The soul of Christian or Islamic theology is typically created by God, morally judged, and eternally conscious. The Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika ātman is uncreated and eternal, one of an eternal plurality, and its consciousness is adventitious rather than intrinsic. The frameworks of creation, judgment, and essence differ substantially.
- term: a stream or bundle of consciousness
  why: 'This is the Buddhist anātman alternative, no enduring self, only a succession of momentary mental events, which Nyāya explicitly refutes. The ātman is precisely the enduring substance that a bundle-view denies: the one thing that remembers, desires across time, and is reborn.'
related:
- /concepts/dravya.md
- /concepts/pramanya.md
- /concepts/ishvara.md
- /concepts/anyatha-khyati.md
timestamp: '2026-07-02'
okf_version: '0.2'
license: CC BY-SA 4.0
---

# Ātman (Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika) -- आत्मन्

**Not:** the Advaita Atman, the Abrahamic soul, a bundle of consciousness

## What It Actually Means

For Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika the ātman is an eternal substance, one of the nine dravyas, and there are many of them, one per living being, plus Īśvara as a special self. This is a thoroughgoing pluralistic realism about the self, and its most surprising feature to readers steeped in Vedānta is that consciousness is not the self's essence. Cognition, pleasure, pain, desire, aversion, and effort are qualities (guṇas) that inhere in the self, and they arise only when the self is embodied and conjoined with a mind (manas) and body; a self out of such conjunction, as in liberation (apavarga), persists as a substance but without any occurrent consciousness at all. The self is not perceived but inferred, from the very fact of desire, memory, and cognition needing an enduring substratum. This realist, pluralist, consciousness-as-adventitious account is the deepest doctrinal fault-line between this school and Advaita, and it is exactly the contrast an AI trained on a Vedānta-weighted corpus will erase, collapsing a school that affirms many non-essentially-conscious selves into the one that affirms a single essentially-conscious Self.

## Audience Metaphor

Advaita says the many 'selves' are one ocean mistaking itself for waves. Nyāya-Vaiśeṣika says the opposite: there really are many separate vessels, each genuinely its own, and, stranger still, the light we call consciousness is not what a vessel is but a lamp that only glows while it is wired to a body and mind. Unplug it in liberation and the vessel remains, real and eternal, simply dark. Two doctrines, one word 'ātman', pointing in opposite directions.

## Citations

1. Vaiśeṣika Sūtra 3.2.4 and Nyāya Sūtra 1.1.10 (the self inferred and characterised) -- see [references/vaisheshika-sutra.md](../references/vaisheshika-sutra.md) and [references/nyaya-sutra.md](../references/nyaya-sutra.md)
2. Udayana, Ātmatattvaviveka (the classic defence of the enduring self against Buddhism) -- see [references/nyayakusumanjali.md](../references/nyayakusumanjali.md)
3. Cross-bundle warning: the single Ātman in upanishadic-core v0.6 and dharma-foundation v0.1 -- the opposite doctrine; never conflate
