Third Eye Drops #27 - One Truth, Many Stories with Shane Mauss

Featured art - Topher SipesComedian, knowledge-seeker, and psychonaut, Shane Mauss returns!LISTEN | ITUNES YOUTUBE ARCHIVE STITCHERThese mind melds are brought to you by YOU! Find out how to support us and receive rewards in the process at our Patreon page.

I don’t even know how or why I came upon this fact, but if you google "philosophy is,” the two first suggestions are “dead” and “bullshit.” Unfortunately I couldn’t resist the carrot, so I followed through with the "philosophy is dead" search.

The primary culprit for Google's suggestion seems to be a speech Stephen Hawking gave to Google’s Zeitgeist conference in 2011, in which he claimed that “ philosophy is dead” and that "scientists have become the bearers of the torch of discovery in our quest for knowledge.”

To hear my riff on Hawking's proclamation that philosophy is dead, click play.

Musings in this mind meld include -

• Stephen Hawking says "philosophy is dead." is it?
• Why too much data and not enough philosophy can be deceptive and dangerous
• Thoughts from Sam Harris on why we can't talk about consciousness in only measurable, observable terms
• Finding your creative niche 
• Why Shane is transitioning to a psychedelics-based comedy set
• Dealing with criticism and the administrative aspects of being creative 
• Communicating with critics, trolls and homeless people 
• The memetic spread of information and ideas 
• Is television a tremendous waste of time, or a valuable learning tool?
• Consciousness is a story we tell ourselves 
• Shane’s ongoing wrestling match with his metaphysical views 
• Are psychedelic substances fooling your brain into thinking you’re dying, causing it to run simulations that comfort you?
• How cultural conditioning and beliefs seem to shape people’s experiences in altered states of consciousness.

(UPDATE) Welcome to the Matrix! Physicist Tom Campbell on Quantum Weirdness, Simulation Theory and Consciousness

 LISTEN ON ITUNES YOUTUBE ARCHIVE STITCHER

 Welcome to the era of virtual quantum weirdness, my friends. Lucky for us, we have Tom Campbell, physicist with NASA, Army Intelligence and out-of-body experiences on his resume to walk us through it.

The idea that we may be living in some sort of simulated universe makes a lot of people supremely uncomfortable. Unfortunately for them, the logic behind the simulation argument is pretty sound (take it from the guy with the Nobel Prize around his neck,, not me). 

But, what of the natural philosophical follow-up questions that come along with being told you're living in an ultra-advanced virtual realm (i.e, Who made the simulation? What am I then? Does that mean my consciousness is simulated?)? Obviously, scientists can't answer these queries, but if we don't dive into them, we're left with nothing but a tremendously achey case of existential blue balls. No fun.

Lucky for you (and them), we've got Tom Campbell on the show. Tom is a man with both the requisite hard (I'm holding back a double entendre right now) scientific and subjective consciousness-based expertise necessary to have this conversation properly.More on Tom:Tom Campbell began researching states of consciousness with Bob Monroe (Journeys Out Of The Body, Far Journeys, and The Ultimate Journey) at Monroe Laboratories in the early 1970s. There, he and a few others were instrumental in getting Monroe’s laboratory for the study of consciousness up and running. Campbell has been experimenting with, and exploring the subjective and objective mind ever since. For the past thirty years, Campbell has been focused on scientifically exploring the properties, boundaries, and abilities of consciousness.During that same time period, he excelled as a scientist. He worked on large-system simulation, technology development and integration, and complex system vulnerability and risk analysis. Presently, and for the past 20 years, he has been at the heart of developing US missile defense systems.Tom has compiled his experiences and expertise in his three-part book series, My Big TOE (Theory of Everything). He also has many, many hours of free talks on You Tube.

Third Eye Drops #5 - Dennis McKenna and Bruce Damer

LISTEN ON ITUNES YOUTUBE ARCHIVE STITCHER

Greetings godlings! I am ecstatic that you’ve decided to once again plug your consciousness into the conversational coven that is the Third Eye Drops show!

There are a few unicorns running around who've figured out a way to re-appropriate the dusty old construct of academia to their own terms. Both Dennis McKenna and Bruce Damer were brilliant enough, brave enough and tenacious enough to do it. If you’re familiar with them you already know, if not, you’ll hear exactly what I’m referring to in this chat. 

Dennis McKenna is an ethnopharmacologist, researcher lecturer and author. He has spent decades doing deep academic and personal research on consciousness and psychedelics. Dennis is also the author of Brotherhood of the Screaming Abyss, a memoire chronicling his adventures with his brother, the late Terence McKenna.

In addition to being part of the same circle as Dennis and Terence McKenna, Dr. Bruce Damer, is a researcher at UC Santa Cruz focusing on origin of life theory. Bruce has also worked on projects for NASA in which he developed asteroid-capturing spacecraft.

Third Eye Drops #4 - Erik Davis and Michael Garfield

LISTEN ON ITUNES YOUTUBE ARCHIVE STITCHER

Welcome back friends and thank you for once again plugging your consciousness into our nest for catma-filled novelty nuggets!

Erik Davis is an author, scholar and lecturer. His tremendous book, Techgnosis Myth Magic and Mysticism In the Age of Information draws novel, fascinating correlations between technology and mysticism.  

Michael Garfield is an all-around silver tongue-tipped spear of information. He also writes for websites like Big Think, creates art and music and is just generally bordering on star child territory.

This conversation is all about evading the awe-sucking tentacles of society's deeply-entrenched dogma dealers. It's not easy, but to do it, we need to expand, reconsider and diversify the types of knowledge we’re willing to explore. We've got to be active wonder-seekers. We have establish our subjective inner-worlds as frontiers worth exploring, developing and celebrating.

We've also got to be careful not to take our catma (I'm in love with this word) quest too far, for if we do, we're sure to end up deep in the realm of woo, a place where few are taken seriously. 

For more-

Erik's site

Michael's site

 

Third Eye Drops #3 - Daniele Bolelli - Professor, Savage, Author, Philosopher, Boob Poet

 Seeking a show about angry goats, psychedelic gnosis and Theodore Roosevelt? Then congratulations my friend, you've found your grail!LISTEN ON ITUNES ARCHIVE STITCHER YOUTUBETo everyone else rereading that seemingly nonsensical combination of topics: no, the forceps of destiny didn't get drunk on the job and start plopping subject matter into reality at random with zero care, I promise. This conversation is actually (fairly) coherent.To whom do we owe that coherence? Professor, Author and Podcaster extraordinaire, Daniele Bolelli!

Daniele hosts two tremendous podcasts, The Drunken Taoist (a conversation-based show, not dissimilar to this one) and History on Fire .

Daniele is also the author of stellar works like Create Your own Religion and his latest, Not Afraid,  "a meditation on facing fear, heartbreak, and mortality. The story of a man who in rapid succession has his wife die in his arms, loses his house and his job, and is left to care for his 19-month old daughter." 

For more - Daniele's Site

Musings in this chat:

• Trying not to be a volatile, reactionary dick
• Overcoming and coping with fatigue and stress
• Anger, how to deal with it and not deal with it
• Fear, how to deal with and not deal with it
• Is there ever a time where violent confrontation is justified? (plus, a personal story on that)
• Different examples of how people deal with loss 
• Authentic creativity versus cries for attention
• Substance induced revelations versus natural ones
• A future nobel prize winning poem about boobs
• Wim Hof is a real-life superhuman bad ass
• Theodore Roosevelt was crazy
• Living a wild life as coping mechanism for trauma 
• Psychedelic gnosis and horror stories

Third Eye Drops #1 + #2 - Android Jones on Art, Purpose, Technology and Personal Transformation

If you want to know what The Third Eye Drops show is all about, look no further than Android Jones.

LISTEN ON ITUNES YOUTUBE ARCHIVE

Android’s otherworldly collection of psychedelic masterworks are a feast for the eyes, sure, but they're more than just a spectacle for your spectacles. Each piece is a rabbit hole unto itself. You can (and I have) sit there and dissect his pieces pixel by pixel, it's epic stuff.

Even so, Android refers to his art as mere “residue" of a deep ecstatic revelry he comes into contact with when he takes up the pen. As he says in our conversation, "my art is how meditate and my art has always been the way I access the spirit of creation."

As you’ll hear throughout this chat, Android’s aim is more than art. It’s a revolution in thought, action and purpose. It’s a collective awakening to the cultural conditioning that coerces us into thought prisons and mediocrity. Pretty lofty ambitions for one man, but then again, maybe that’s fitting because it feels like the spirit that’s flowing through Android and his work is bigger than him to begin with.

In a roundabout way, I’ve also more or less described what’s driving me to embark upon this Third Eye Drops thingamajig, so there you go!

• Topics of musing in this conversation (in no particular order) include:
• How Android got his nickname
• Major catalysts for change both personal and creative in life
• The need for rites of passage and initiatory experiences
• Burning Man
• Artistic Challenges
• How important it is to never discourage a creative
• The role of technology, virtual reality and augmented reality in art, philosophy and consciousness
• The importance of not measuring your success by the success of others. (There will always be a girl with big boobs who gets twenty times the love you do on social media).
• Casting out the serpent of doubt
• The power/insidiousness of social media  
• How to be responsible for your own success and happiness
• Meditation
• Psychedelics
• Overcoming fear and self-doubt
• When you sharpen a skill enough, you start using it to bring the transcendent into the world and inspire others with it.

Third Eye Drops #0 - NOW ADMINISTERING THIRD EYE DROPS

ITUNES ARCHIVEThe very idea of an "episode zero" causes a revolving Pizza Pizzaz-like cycle of anxiety and conflict in my ego. I get that anxious indigestion in the old bowls because I know this is the place where I'm supposed to hook you in and make you excited about this show and tell you about all the great things and people we’re going to cover here and all of that self-promotional jazz. How do you not make that awkward and contrived?Genuine enthusiasm, that's how!

Luckily I've got that in spades because we've captured what I'd classify as some pretty spectacular, life-affirming and entertaining mind melds with some of my favorite minds.

Speaking of which, at present, I’ve got just shy of ten conversations in the bank (or at least planned) with intensely excellent humans like Android Jones, Daniele Bolelli, Dennis McKenna, Erik Davis, Michael Garfield, Zoltan Istvan, Shane Mauss and more. As tempted as I am to start ranting about the nitty-gritty particulars of some of the rabbit holes I dove down with them, this thing is supposed to be short and punchy, so I gotta move on.

What I'm trying to say is, if you are a human being with the requisite hearing ability who's interested in a conversational coven filled deep dives down the old rabbit hole featuring wonderful and successful artists, authors, thinkers philosophers, scientists and talented and creative humans of all stripes, this might be a fun place for you to hang out.