Let's not get into "misunderstanding their misunderstanding" and whether its them that have misunderstood,me, or you. Instead let us concentrate on the question of what the belief of the fundamental non existence of physical reality is called...?

Haha true! Surely there is a term for this particular branch of insanity lol?

I think he misunderstands things. He thinks it is loosing identity it isnt, you are right in that he mistakes it for identity-denial. But he needs understands things more deeply imho.

All that is not identity falls away and are seen as manifestations of the identity.

A problem with people is that they are identified with manifestations of their identity, their job, their social class, their story etc...its like mistaking the flowers of a tree for its roots. The flowers are manifestations of the roots, they are not the origin of the tree.

Peoples identity is the formless observer behind their false, constructed identity.

Hence "identity-denial" is innacurate description of what OP is suggesting.

The realisation of this identity does not occur on the intellectual level, it is an experiential event. Meditation and observation of ourselves leads to this insight. :)

That is a brilliant reply!

I only ask about how second hand knowledge is treated/discussed as i need to write about it in regards to first hand accounts and need to know what research to do lol thankyou for your help :)

I believe eckart tolle, mooji etc get to the root of these questions.

All i can say about the ego is i think it is what i would describe as "evolutionary biological programming" that constructs an artificial identity so as to facilitate it expressing its biological drives like jealousy, vengence, violence, hate etc.

To say we are nothing but ego is to not understand the formless presence that can observe the ego. To say we are nothing but ego is to reduce the human form to purely what arises from our biology.

I am having similar thoughts recently. Good luck :)