The Subtractive Epistemology of Advaita Vedanta: Negation, Adhyasa and the Dis-Identification of the Non-Self

Abstract

This article examines the epistemological significance of negation in Advaita Vedānta, focusing on Śaṅkara’s account of adhyāsa (superimposition) and the Upaniṣadic method of neti, neti (“not this, not this”). It argues that self-knowledge in Advaita is not primarily the acquisition of object-based knowledge, but the removal of erroneous identification with the body, mind, and other aspects of the non-Self (anātman). Through a philosophical analysis of superimposition, the discrimination between the seer and the seen, the five sheaths (pañca kośa), and the three states of experience (avasthātraya), the article explores how Advaita challenges the objectification of the Self. It proposes Subtractive Epistemology as an interpretive framework connecting the diagnosis of misidentification in adhyāsa with the corrective function of neti, neti. Rather than claiming that Śaṅkara himself formulated this terminology, the article presents it as a contemporary framework for understanding these complementary methods. It concludes that liberation (mokṣa) is understood not as the production of a new state, but as the removal of ignorance that obscures the recognition of the ever-present Self.

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