My study concerns the works of William James (1842--1910) and the Buddhist thinker Vasubandhu (circa fifth c.). In both cases there is a detailed examination of consciousness which looks at its physiological concomitants. Where James is concerned, this physiological study is found mainly within his Principles of Psychology (1890). In Vasubandhu's case the physiological preconditions of conscious life is inherited from traditional Buddhist psychology (skandhas), but are expanded into the Yogacara concept of the alaya-vijnana (storehouse consciousness). This novel form of consciousness has been interpreted as both a soul theory in Buddhism, and a form of metaphysical idealism. It is these elements that I juxtapose with similar notions found in Jamesian studies (self and idealism). Thus, Chapter One examines consciousness from the isolated perspective of each thinker, Chapter Two moves to an examination of self, and Chapter Three looks at the possibility of Idealism which is explicitly rejected by James, and is rejected also by many interpreters of the alaya-vijnana.
