Our sense of time is notoriously subjective and thus dependent upon the quality of our attention, whether of interest or boredom, and upon the alignment of our behavior in terms of routines, goals, and deadlines. Here the present is self-sufficient, but it is not a static present. It is a dancing pr…
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The Joyous Cosmology: Adventures in the Chemistry of Consciousness
There is no difference in principle between sharpening perception with an external instrument, such as a microscope, and sharpening it with an internal instrument, such mescaline, LSD, or psilocybin. If they are an affront to the dignity of the mind, the microscope is an affront to the dignity of th…
Slowly it becomes clear...
The lowbrow way of forgetting oneself is to get drunk, to be diverted with entertainments, or to exploit such natural means of self-transcendence as sexual intercourse. The highbrow way is to throw oneself into the pursuit of the arts, of social service, or of religious mysticism. These measures are…
For a long time we have been accustomed to the compartmentalization of religion and science as if they were two quite different and basically unrelated ways of seeing the world. I do not believe that this state of doublethink can last. It must eventually be replaced by a view of the world which is n…
In the first Reformation, the Bible was translated into the common vernacular, printed, and mass-produced, providing direct access to the 'word of God,' which had previously been protected by the priests. With psychedelics, many people now have direct and unmediated access to the mystical and vision…
You poor baby! And yet—you selfish little bastard! As I try to find the agent behind the act, the motivating force at the bottom of the whole thing, I seem to see only an endless ambivalence. Behind the mask of love I find my innate selfishness. What a predicament I am in if someone asks, 'Do you re…