[2.14] Freedom from Ego

Those who seem to be "enlightened," seem to have a different model of the world and their place in it. Embedded in their way of being in the world, they sense that they have no ego, that they have no hard boundary with the world around them, and that their consciousness is part of a greater consciousness. Most of us don't have that model. The claim is that we are asleep, and they have woken up. But how can we decide whose model is right?BibliographyTaylor, J. B. (2008). My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist's Personal Journey. Viking (earlier edition 2006). Taylor, J. B. TED talk, "My stroke of insight" (2008). Nielsen, J. A., Zielinski, B. A., Ferguson, M. A., Lainhart, J. E., & Anderson, J. S. (2013). PLOS ONE 8(8): e71275. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0071275. Simner, J., et al. (2006). "Synaesthesia: The prevalence of atypical cross-modal experiences." Perception 35(8): 1024–1033. Lafer-Sousa, R., Hermann, K. L., & Conway, B. R. (2015). "Striking individual differences in color perception uncovered by 'the dress' photograph." Current Biology 25(13): R545–R546. Seth, A. (2021). Being You. Dutton. TED talk "Your brain hallucinates your conscious reality." Deane, G., Miller, M., & Wilkinson, S. (2020). "Losing ourselves: Active inference, depersonalization, and meditation." Frontiers in Psychology 11: 539726. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2020.539726. Dennett (1991) Consciousness Explained Thich Nhat Hanh, flower teaching: Plum Village talks (UCSB, Sept 6, 1997; "The Flower Contains Everything," UBC, 2011)Watts (1966) The Book, Pantheon. Garfield (2022) Losing Ourselves, Princeton UP.Harris, S. (2022, June 28). "#286 The Paradox of Psychedelics." Making Sense podcast. Yaden, D. B., et al. (2017). "The noetic quality: A multimethod exploratory study." Psychology of Consciousness: Theory, Research, and Practice, pp. 54–62. Griffiths, R. R., et al. (2006). Psychopharmacology 187: 268–283 [R].Lindahl, J. R., Fisher, N. E., Cooper, D. J., Rosen, R. K., & Britton, W. B. (2017). Yaden et al. (2017), Psychology of Consciousness, pp. 54–62. Griffiths et al. (2006, 2008).Harris, Sam. Making Sense #286, June 28, 2022. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It has long been said that the ego is the source of your pain and suffering, and that it is an illusion. In this episode we work through that the Perennial Philosophy / One Wisdom has to say about the nature of ego, the nature of the illusion, and the spark that leads to waking up from it. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

400 years ago, Galileo and Descartes split the known world into things "out there" and things "in here" -- our experience of things: color, the sound of the cello, a thought, a conviction, an image. In the second half of the 20th century, the scientific community of the west began the momentous attempt to bring those two worlds together. They have not quite succeeded, but they have discovered that we are not remotely who we think we are.Bibliography Thomas Nagel, "What Is It Like to Be a Bat?", The Philosophical Review 83:4 (1974)David Chalmers, "Facing Up to the Problem of Consciousness," Journal of Consciousness Studies 2:3 (1995)David Chalmers, The Conscious Mind (Oxford, 1996)Joseph Levine, "Materialism and Qualia: The Explanatory Gap," Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 64 (1983)Ned Block, "On a Confusion About a Function of Consciousness," Behavioral and Brain Sciences 18 (1995)Philip Goff, Galileo's Error (Pantheon, 2019)René Descartes, Meditations on First Philosophy (1641); The Passions of the Soul (1649)Daniel Dennett, Consciousness Explained (Little, Brown, 1991)Daniel Dennett, "The Self as a Center of Narrative Gravity" (1992)Daniel Dennett, "Are We Explaining Consciousness Yet?", Cognition 79 (2001)Keith Frankish, "Illusionism as a Theory of Consciousness," JCS 23:11–12 (2016)David Chalmers, "The Meta-Problem of Consciousness," JCS 25:9–10 (2018)Robert Wright, Why Buddhism Is True (Simon & Schuster, 2017)Alan Watts, The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are (1966)Alan Watts, Nature, Man and Woman (1958); The Wisdom of Insecurity (1951)Sam Harris, Waking Up (Simon & Schuster, 2014)Colin McGinn, "Can We Solve the Mind-Body Problem?", Mind 98:391 (1989)Colin McGinn, The Mysterious Flame (Basic, 1999)Bertrand Russell, The Analysis of Matter (1927)Arthur Eddington, The Nature of the Physical World (1928)Galen Strawson, "Realistic Monism: Why Physicalism Entails Panpsychism," JCS 13:10–11 (2006)Philip Goff, Consciousness and Fundamental Reality (Oxford, 2017)William James, The Principles of Psychology, vol. 1 (1890) Thomas Nagel, Mind and Cosmos (Oxford, 2012)Erwin Schrödinger, What Is Life? / Mind and Matter (Cambridge, 1944/1958)Francisco Varela, Evan Thompson & Eleanor Rosch, The Embodied Mind (MIT, 1991)Evan Thompson, Waking, Dreaming, Being (Columbia, 2015)C.G. Jung, The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious (CW 9i, 1959) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We see throughout myth and fable that the hero does not just wake up and decide to leave everything behind. They are thrust into things. Gandalf shows up with a bunch of dwarves to wrest Bilbo from his dinner. Now may or may not be the time for your Hero’s Journey to start. But you may already hear the call to adventure. Whenever your time comes, I hope this episode helps you recognize it’s happening, and participate fully in it.Bibliography:Joseph Campbell, The Hero With a Thousand FacesJoseph Campbell with Bill Moyers, The Power of MythStephen Larsen and Robin Larsen, A Fire in the Mind: The Life of Joseph CampbellCJ Jung, Collected Works (translated by RFC Hull)Robert A Johnson Inner Work: Using Dreams and Active Imagination for Personal GrowthRobert A Johnson, Owning Your Own Shadow: Understanding the Dark Side of the PsycheMarie-Louise von Franz, Projection and Re-Collection in Jungian Psychology: Reflections of the SoulEdward Edinger, Ego and ArchetypeJames Hollis, The Middle Passage: From Misery to Meaning in MidlifeJames Hollis, Finding Meaning in the Second Half of LifeMurray Stein, In Midlife: A Jungian PerspectiveConnie Zweig, Meeting the Shadow: The Hidden Power of the Dark Side of Human NatureIain McGhilchrist, The Master and His Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western WorldThe Matrix Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Modern cinema is chock full of Hero's Journeys. Today I cover 3 of my favorites, each more interesting and sophisticated than the last. We will actually see three variants on the Hero's Journey, with different details that we can relate to. This episode is not evidence that the Hero's Journey is bubbling up without the conscious attention of the screenwriters or directors, but instead my hope is that you will be able to engage with story and myth in a new, more powerful way.Movies include:The Star Wars Trilogy (Episodes IV, V, VI)Mad Max: Fury RoadEurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

When you realize something is very wrong, that life is not all it was cracked up to be, that the meaning has been drained from the world, then you have heard the call to adventure. If you answer it, you begin the Hero's Journey. Joseph Campbell shows us how the Hero's Journey has been told in myth and legend across all cultures and times, as a roadmap to our very enlightenment. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In Silicon Eden, the loss of the immortality project means a collapse of meaning and a gaping hole where a value system used to be. Right now, the only good news is that you will be far from the first to go through this problem.SourcesEliot, T.S. The Waste Land. 1922.Eliot, Valerie, ed. The Waste Land: A Facsimile and Transcript of the Original Drafts. 1971.ietzsche, Friedrich. The Gay Science. 1882Kierkegaard, Søren The Sickness Unto Death. 1849.Camus, Albert. The Myth of Sisyphus. 1942.Jung, Carl. "The Stages of Life," in The Structure and Dynamics of the Psyche (Collected Works, Vol. 8).Jaques, Elliott. "Death and the Mid-life Crisis." International Journal of Psychoanalysis 46 (1965): 502–514.Hollis, James. The Middle Passage: From Misery to Meaning in Midlife. Inner City Books, 1993.Becker, Ernest. The Denial of Death. 1973.Campbell, Joseph. The Hero with a Thousand Faces Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Everything you want is right at your fingertips. There is no struggle, nothing to accomplish. Can humans figure out how to just enjoy life as the pets of a superintelligence? SourcesPlato. Republic, Book VII Sukhumāla SuttaRussell, Bertrand. "In Praise of Idleness." 1932. Keynes, John Maynard. "Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren." 1930. Susskind, Daniel. A World Without Work. Metropolitan Books, 2020. Robinson, Terry E., and Kent C. Berridge. "The neural basis of drug craving: an incentive-sensitization theory of addiction." Brain Research Reviews 18(3), 1993, 247–291. Robinson, Terry E., and Kent C. Berridge. "The Incentive-Sensitization Theory of Addiction 30 Years On." Annual Review of Psychology 76, 2025, 29–58.Berridge, Kent C., and Terry E. Robinson. "Liking, wanting, and the incentive-sensitization theory of addiction." American Psychologist 71, 2016, 670–679. "A reward and incentive-sensitization perspective on compulsive use of social networking sites — Wanting but not liking predicts checking frequency and problematic use behavior." Addictive Behaviors 116, 2021, article 106808Bostrom, Nicholas. "Deep Utopia: Life and Meaning in a Solved World." Ideapress Publishing, 2024. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Many people believe that in a the robo-communist future of superintelligent AI, humans will flourish: artists, scholars -- perhaps Burning Man 24/7. Human nature suggests a very different picture.Nietzsche, Friedrich. Thus Spoke ZarathustraBecker, Ernest. The Denial of Death.Bostrom, Nick. Deep Utopia: Life and Meaning in a Solved World. Ideapress, 2024Kosmyna, Nataliya, et al. "Your Brain on ChatGPT: Accumulation of Cognitive Debt when Using an AI Assistant for Essay Writing Task." arXiv:2506.08872, 2025. MIT Media Lab.Stanković, Miloš, et al. "Comment on: Your Brain on ChatGPT." arXiv:2601.00856, 2026. Lee, Hao-Ping (Hank), Advait Sarkar, Lev Tankelevitch, Ian Drosos, Sean Rintel, Richard Banks, and Nicholas Wilson. "The Impact of Generative AI on Critical Thinking." Proceedings of CHI 2025, Yokohama.Aguiar, Mark, Erik Hurst, and Loukas Karabarbounis. "Time Use during the Great Recession." American Economic Review 103(5), 2013, 1664–1696. Sleep and TV absorb the largest share of foregone work hours.Aguiar, Mark, and Erik Hurst. "Measuring Trends in Leisure: The Allocation of Time over Five Decades." Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2007. Leisure up roughly 4–8 hrs/week, 1965–2003. Cowen, Tyler. "Human Life in a Post-AGI World." Talk at Google DeepMind, July 8, 2026. tylercowen.com. - Note Cowen disagrees significantly with me!National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), 2024 results. 12th-grade reading lowest ever reported, 10 points below 1992; 4th and 8th grade at early-1990s levels. Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC), 2023 cycle, released Dec 2024 (NCES). Bone et al. "Reading for pleasure" trends from the American Time Use Survey, 2003–2023. iScience, August 2025.Aguiar, Mark, Mark Bils, Kerwin Kofi Charles, and Erik Hurst. "Leisure Luxuries and the Labor Supply of Young Men." Journal of Political Economy 129(2), 2021, 337–382.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode we walk through some potential solutions to the fermi paradox, and then apply the now-likely reality that our own Von Neumann probes are probably only a few million years away from seeing most of the galaxy. What is out there waiting for them? What does our pending success mean for the likelihood of different fermi paradox hypotheses? Eric Jones, Los Alamos memo reconstructing Fermi's 1950 lunch remark (1985)Frank Drake, the Drake Equation (1961)Michael Hart, "An Explanation for the Absence of Extraterrestrials on Earth" (1975)Ian Crawford, Scientific American (July 2000)Frank Tipler, "Extraterrestrial Intelligent Beings Do Not Exist" (1980)Robin Hanson, "The Great Filter — Are We Almost Past It?" (1996)Vernor Vinge, "The Coming Technological Singularity" (1993)Robin Hanson, Daniel Martin, Calvin McCarter, Jonathan Paulson, "If Loud Aliens Explain Human Earliness, Quiet Aliens Are Also Rare" (2021)Peter Behroozi & Molly Peeples, MNRAS (2015) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.