Transcendence (2021)

Why Chemicals Need Rituals

An episode of the How God Works: The Science Behind Spirituality podcast, hosted by PRX, titled "Transcendence (2021)" was published on July 28, 2024 and runs 26 minutes.

July 28, 2024 ·26m · How God Works: The Science Behind Spirituality

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Summary

We've had a lot of new listeners join us of the past year, so while we're hard at work on our next season, we thought we'd share some favorites you might have missed from the archives. For centuries, many cultures have used psychedelics to induce mystical states. And while in the US they’ve mostly been used as recreational drugs, interest in their power to offer a rapid route to transcendence has recently been growing. But in our haste to use these chemicals to alter, and perhaps even heal, the mind, we might be losing sight that with speed comes risk. Join Dave as he talks with author Michael Pollan and researcher David Yaden about the nature of self-transcendent experiences, the science of how psychedelics can bring them on, and the dangers of disregarding centuries of shamanic knowledge about how to use them wisely. Episode info and transcript available here.

Episode Description

We've had a lot of new listeners join us of the past year, so while we're hard at work on our next season, we thought we'd share some favorites you might have missed from the archives.

For centuries, many cultures have used psychedelics to induce mystical states. And while in the US they’ve mostly been used as recreational drugs, interest in their power to offer a rapid route to transcendence has recently been growing. But in our haste to use these chemicals to alter, and perhaps even heal, the mind, we might be losing sight that with speed comes risk.

Join Dave as he talks with author Michael Pollan and researcher David Yaden about the nature of self-transcendent experiences, the science of how psychedelics can bring them on, and the dangers of disregarding centuries of shamanic knowledge about how to use them wisely.

Episode info and transcript available here.