Śūnyatā to Posthumanism: Indic Philosophical Traditions in Dialogue with Contemporary Thought

Posthumanism has emerged as a critical response to the legacy of Western humanism, which has historically privileged the human subject as the measure of reason, agency, and meaning. By rethinking the human in relation to technology, machines, ecological systems, and nonhuman life, posthumanism destabilizes fixed notions of identity and resists anthropocentric frameworks. This paper suggests that Indic philosophical traditions—particularly Buddhist, Vedanta, Sāṃkhya, and Jaina schools—offer distinctive resources that enrich and complicate contemporary posthumanist debates. Buddhism’s doctrines of anattā (non-self) and pratītyasamutpāda (dependent origination) present a radically relational and non-essentialist account of subjectivity, which resonates with distributed cognition and theories of embodied mind. Jain philosophy, with its epistemological principle of anekāntavāda (many-sidedness), anticipates posthumanist pluralism by affirming the validity of multiple perspectives and diverse forms of intelligence, whether human, animal, or technological. Advaita Vedānta provides a universalist metaphysics in which consciousness (brahman) permeates all existence, thereby dissolving hierarchical distinctions between beings. Meanwhile, Sāṃkhya’s dualism of puruṣa and prakṛti raises enduring questions about embodiment, matter, and the possibility of nonhuman awareness. Placed in conversation with Western posthumanist thinkers such as Rosi Braidotti, Cary Wolfe, and N. Katherine Hayles, these Indic traditions not only challenge anthropocentrism but also foreground ethical responsibility within an interconnected cosmos. Yet, their soteriological orientation toward liberation and their metaphysical commitments pose limitations when extended to technological and ecological futures. The paper ultimately advocates a dialogical method: critically reinterpreting Indic categories in order to enrich posthumanist theory while remaining attentive to historical context. Such an approach moves toward a plural, comparative posthumanism that bridges ancient insights with contemporary challenges in cognition, ecology, and technology.