|
Steven Wolfram claims that the “ruliad,” the space of all possible computational states in nature, is reality—a structure so complete it contains every possible way of processing information. Our universe emerges from how observers with particular computational bounds sample this infinite structure. In this profound essay, Proulx argues that the ruliad is best understood under an idealist framework wherein each observer’s perspective isn’t merely a partial representation of underlying states, but a rendering of reality itself; just as a frame in a computer game is a rendering generated on-the-fly, not a partial representation of underlying states.
|
In this conversation, cognitive scientist John Vervaeke joins Hans Busstra to examine the historical roots of the modern meaning crisis through the lens of psychotechnologies: culturally developed mental tools and practices that transform how human beings think, perceive and make sense of reality. Vervaeke describes how psychotechnologies such as shamanism, Socratic dialogue and the Christian notion of agape profoundly shaped Western thought.
|
In less than 2000 words, Brian Fang shows that ‘substance’ does not define existence; structure does. What a thing is cannot be separated from the structure that remains stable as everything else changes, particularly at the quantum level. If we look closely at what things actually are, we cannot help but realize that they are far removed from our classical intuition of mere blocks of “stuff.” Instead, to understand an object is to understand its specific pattern of invariance.
|
Prof. Cocks recounts the life and ideas of Mary Baker Eddy, a forgotten but founding figure of the New Thought movement in the 20th century, in particular her gnostic-leaning idealist metaphysics. As he explains, Eddy’s idealism attempts to tackle the problem of evil—which arises under the light of Christian Theology—and claims practical applications in health care and well being.
|
The metaphysics of the psychedelic experience: Anil Seth, Christof Koch, and Bernardo Kastrup debate
The OPEN Foundation and the Essentia Foundation together hosted a panel debate on metaphysics at the latest Interdisciplinary Conference on Psychedelic Research (ICPR26), Europe’s leading scientific conference dedicated to psychedelic science, therapy, ethics, and policy. During this discussion, Anil Seth, Bernardo Kastrup and Christof Koch discuss the latest insights from psychedelic research, as well as their different viewpoints on the epistemic value of psychedelic experiences and what metaphysics these experiences point to.
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.
|
Prof. Cocks recounts the life and ideas of Mary Baker Eddy, a forgotten but founding figure of the New Thought movement in the 20th century, in particular her gnostic-leaning idealist metaphysics. As he explains, Eddy’s idealism attempts to tackle the problem of evil—which arises under the light of Christian Theology—and claims practical applications in health care and well being.
|
Stephen Lester invites us to contemplate the relationship between the seemingly individual self and the world—including other seemingly individual selves—merely as different perspectives within a continuous ecosystem. Ecology has taught us to see the world as an interconnected whole. In much the same way, embodied awareness can teach us that we aren’t separate from the world, but instead that the objects we observe are merely other perspectives within the same consciousness we are.
|
Dr. Koch argues that, because AI computers have a feed-forward structure very reminiscent of the human cerebellum—which is empirically known not to be involved in human consciousness—we have no reason to expect AI computers to have a conscious inner life of their own. He further substantiates his argument with the clear, quantified prediction of Integrated Information Theory (IIT) that systems with low integrated information, such as silicon computers implementing Large Language Models, do not feel like anything from the inside.
|
Moreira invites us into a long meditation on the meaning of digital spaces, and the possibility of finding another in the endless cacophony of simulacra. When you reach across the screen—he says—you do not know if the figure you address is real or fabricated, friend or phantom. The temptation is to strike first, to treat them as less than a person. But if there is even the chance of an Other on the far side, the only way to preserve meaning is to extend recognition before certainty. In the digital void, kindness is the only bridge that can survive simulation.
Would you like to submit an essay?
|
The metaphysics of the psychedelic experience: Anil Seth, Christof Koch, and Bernardo Kastrup debate
The OPEN Foundation and the Essentia Foundation together hosted a panel debate on metaphysics at the latest Interdisciplinary Conference on Psychedelic Research (ICPR26), Europe’s leading scientific conference dedicated to psychedelic science, therapy, ethics, and policy. During this discussion, Anil Seth, Bernardo Kastrup and Christof Koch discuss the latest insights from psychedelic research, as well as their different viewpoints on the epistemic value of psychedelic experiences and what metaphysics these experiences point to.
Seeing
Videos
|
Professor of Biology Denis Noble, best known for creating the first mathematical model of a beating cardiac cell, proposes a profound shift in how we understand life. In this conversation with Hans Busstra, he challenges the long-standing central dogma of Neo-Darwinism: the notion of one-way causation from DNA to cell to organism, with genes positioned as the ultimate governors of biology. Instead, Noble proposes a theory of ‘biological relativity’: no single level—genes, cells, organs, or the whole organism—has privileged causal authority.
|
Nora Bateson is a filmmaker, author and director of the Bateson Institute. In this conversation, Hans Busstra talks to Nora about her work and that of her father Gregory Bateson, who was one of the founding fathers of cybernetics. Bateson’s notion of ‘double bind,’ for instance, helps to see how solutions we design on one level of a system (say, the use of pesticides to solve food shortage) directly form an existential threat on a different level (destruction of soil microbiome).
Expanding on her father’s work, Nora Bateson introduced the concept of ‘warm data’: information about the interrelationships within a complex system, which are contextual, relational, and multi-perspectival. And she argues that to avoid double binds we need to work with warm data, which is about meaning, instead of trusting solutions that come out of the syntactic reasoning of AIs.
|
Dr. Kelvin McQueen, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Chapman University, examines the leading quantum-consciousness theories and the unresolved questions that still hinder them all: what exactly is collapse, and what counts as a measurement? Building on his work with David Chalmers, McQueen argues that the neuroscience of Integrated Information Theory (IIT), with it’s definition of consciousness as intrinsic causal integration (quantified by Φ), offers a novel way forward.
From the archives
|
Swami Sarvapriyananda is one of the world’s leading teachers of Advaita Vedanta, the non-dual philosophical tradition rooted in Hinduism, which places rational inquiry and self-investigation at its core. As head of the Vedanta Society of New York, he is renowned for his clear and rigorous presentations of Advaita Vedanta, and for showing how its insights resonate with modern developments in analytic philosophy, neuroscience, and physics. In this conversation with Hans Busstra, Swami Sarvapriyananda explores the metaphysics of Advaita Vedanta, the meaning of the great saying “That Thou Art” (Tat Tvam Asi), how Advaita differs from other schools of Hinduism and Buddhism, and why it offers a unique perspective on the problem of suffering.
|
A clinical neuropsychologist tells us how her own ego-dissolution experience led her to a new perspective on science, the ‘soul,’ and life itself. Psychology and spirituality are not opposing paths, she realized, but complementary languages describing the same reality: consciousness.
|
River Kanies argues that the paradoxical nature of psychological archetypes isn’t contingent, but reflect the very structure of experience: one where irresolvable tension is the impetus to action and the substance of meaning. The belief that an archetypal paradox can be resolved—that the tension between order and chaos, control and freedom, self and other can be finally settled in favor of one pole—is a failure to understand the nature of consciousness, he argues. It mistakes a structural feature for a solvable problem.
Let us build the future of our culture together
Essentia Foundation is a registered non-profit committed to making its content as accessible as possible. Therefore, we depend on non-financial contributions from people like you to continue to do our work.
