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Dr. Currie argues that framing the effectiveness of shamanic medicine in terms of placebo effects alone does not do justice to the sophistication of shamanic practice. The latter, she maintains, is based on a complex, multi-tiered metaphysics whereby cause and effect relations beyond the visible material world are deliberately exploited by the shaman.
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In this rigorous and absolutely clear essay, which might as well have been published in an academic journal, Haswell shows that Eliminativism—the notion that the qualities of experience don’t really exist—contradicts not only the most obvious pre-theoretical facts of nature, it also contradicts itself in a manner that cannot be remedied.
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In this conversation with Hans Busstra, the legendary CPU inventor explains his quantum theory of consciousness in more detail and outlines some of his novel ideas, to be presented in his upcoming new book. He discusses, for instance, how we should regard our material universe: “spacetime and matter are the permanent memory of the experience of the self knowing of One.”
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In this remarkably observant essay, Brian Fang shows that the mathematics of the ubiquitous Fourier transform—which ties the words of events and frequencies together—provides a formal grammar for understanding how temporality is a facet of eternity, and vice-versa. As such, perhaps what we call “the world” is not fundamentally made of matter unfolding in time, but of patterns that admit atemporal readings. This does not prove idealism, but makes it less strange. If being can be fully captured in structural terms, then perhaps the ultimate constituents of reality are not particles in motion, but intelligible patterns that merely appear temporal when viewed from within.
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In this conversation, neuroscientist Dr. Christof Koch, philosopher Dr. Bernardo Kastrup, and Hans Busstra explore what it means to take mystical experience seriously without abandoning scientific rigor. Both Koch and Kastrup emphasize that some psychedelic experiences exhibit a striking degree of specificity and convergence across individuals, pointing toward possible archetypal universals. While this raises clear ontological questions—suggesting that the contents of mystical experience may, in some sense, be real—the deeper lesson may be epistemic: alongside knowledge gained through scientific experimentation, there may also exist a form of direct acquaintance with truth; a ‘hyper-real’ mode of knowing that can leave the experiencer puzzled for years, or even a lifetime, and can inspire groundbreaking new science.
Do we really live in a fundamentally physical universe? Are we essentially material beings? Essentia Foundation is a new force in the cultural dialogue about the nature of reality. Find out more about us.
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In this remarkably observant essay, Brian Fang shows that the mathematics of the ubiquitous Fourier transform—which ties the words of events and frequencies together—provides a formal grammar for understanding how temporality is a facet of eternity, and vice-versa. As such, perhaps what we call “the world” is not fundamentally made of matter unfolding in time, but of patterns that admit atemporal readings. This does not prove idealism, but makes it less strange. If being can be fully captured in structural terms, then perhaps the ultimate constituents of reality are not particles in motion, but intelligible patterns that merely appear temporal when viewed from within.
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In this thought experiment mixed with science fiction and serious futurism, eminent neuroscientist Dr. Christof Koch sketches a not-so-distant future in which we will be tempted by the promise of eternal life in an AI cloud. With the fluidity of a novelist, he brings to life this felt temptation, in all its force, just to smash it towards the end. This essay is a critical warning to us all, an attempt to have us confront the problem before we are actually faced with it, so we can protect ourselves with the light of reason.
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While Prof. Torday agrees with Federico Faggin that quantum mechanics is salient to consciousness, he maintains that the role of the cell membrane—which separates an organism from its environment—is key to the selective assimilation or mirroring of the quantum properties of the cosmos into the differentiated consciousness of the organism. This essay is short, dense, and may be difficult to unpack. But it handsomely rewards the effort of the patient and determined reader. The many literature citations in the essay also provide rich ground for further exploration.
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Moreira argues that Camus, insightful as he was, missed something crucial: in defending his dignity against an absurd world, he remained blind to an emotional truth. What can ultimately sustain us is not the courageous revolt of intellect, but the humility and vulnerability of doubt and uncertainty. For care for the other does not begin in defiance or condescension, but in allowing the other to be insufficient just as we ourselves are.
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In this conversation, neuroscientist Dr. Christof Koch, philosopher Dr. Bernardo Kastrup, and Hans Busstra explore what it means to take mystical experience seriously without abandoning scientific rigor. Both Koch and Kastrup emphasize that some psychedelic experiences exhibit a striking degree of specificity and convergence across individuals, pointing toward possible archetypal universals. While this raises clear ontological questions—suggesting that the contents of mystical experience may, in some sense, be real—the deeper lesson may be epistemic: alongside knowledge gained through scientific experimentation, there may also exist a form of direct acquaintance with truth; a ‘hyper-real’ mode of knowing that can leave the experiencer puzzled for years, or even a lifetime, and can inspire groundbreaking new science.
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What if phenomenal consciousness, signs, communication, and interpretation are fundamental aspects of all living systems, whether or not we can detect brains? This is the departure point of biosemiotics, an interdisciplinary field that combines biology, semiotics (the study of signs and meaning), and philosophy. Environmental philosopher Dr. Yogi Hendlin is Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Biosemiotics and, in this conversation, Hans Busstra talks to him about the widespread meaning-making in nature. All living beings, from bacteria to plants to mammals, have an ‘Umwelt,’ a dashboard representation of the world. In a sense, biosemiotics states that our mind is in the world: we are embodied beings, and with every inhalation 50.000 microbes enter our body, and they communicate to us by influencing our microbiome.
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Hans Busstra talks to Dr. Bernardo Kastrup about the groundbreaking work of Professor Michael Levin and Dr. Christof Koch. Levin’s research into bio-electric fields reveals that cellular networks use electrical signals not just for immediate physiological tasks, but to coordinate complex patterning and memory across tissues—suggesting a kind of distributed intelligence in living systems. Christof Koch, meanwhile, champions Integrated Information Theory (IIT), which proposes that consciousness is an intrinsic property of certain physical systems with high levels of causal interconnectivity. Both lines of inquiry challenge the traditional reductionist view that mind is merely an emergent byproduct of neural activity. Instead, they point to a more holistic, perhaps even fundamental, role for information and consciousness in nature. Though Levin and Koch make no explicit metaphysical claims in their work, their empirical findings and views are very much in line with analytic idealism.
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Dr. Edward Kelly, a professor of experimental psychology, talks about his many years of study of a variety of psi and anomalous phenomena. In this interview with Natalia Vorontsova, he candidly shares how phenomenological evidence has led him to re-examine his metaphysical views on the nature of reality. Are our minds confined to our brains? Do we survive our biological death? Is mind primary to matter? Why should we take anomalous phenomena seriously? These are some of the topics covered in this conversation.
From the archives
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In this superbly written essay, psychoanalyst Jamey Hecht engages in a virtual trialogue with philosophers John Searle and Thomas Nagel. He cogently argues, without any appeal to religious thinking and through a rigorous analysis of Searle’s and Nagel’s philosophical viewpoints, that naturalism is intrinsically inadequate to account for the totality of human experience, and that Dualism, too, must remain on the table as a reasonable hypothesis.
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In this conversation with Natalia Vorontsova, Francis Lucille explains that Advaita Vedanta is grounded in a single axiom: there is only one reality, which he equates with consciousness. The apparent multiplicity of selves, worlds, bodies, and minds is an appearance arising within this one consciousness. An important value of Advaita Vedanta, in the myriad of idealist spiritual traditions, is that it focuses not so much on achieving altered states of consciousness, but rather offers a method to recognize that consciousness is the single, universal reality.
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This short and powerful essay argues that the widespread dismissal of the Hard Problem of Consciousness is an unintended consequence of science education itself. Our pedagogy first encourages us to project the language of intention onto mindless processes, cheapening the concept; then, it swiftly debunks that intention as a mere metaphor. After years of this training, we reflexively apply the same logic to ourselves, trivializing the one form of interiority that is undeniably real, argues Brian Fang.
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