Philosopher in Meditation, Rembrandt (1632)
“What I’m really concerned about is reaching one person. And that person may be myself for all I know.”
-Jorge Luis Borges
“If you asked me now who I am, the only answer I could give with any certainty would be my name. For the rest: my loves, my hates, down even to my deepest desires, I can no longer say whether these emotions are my own, or stolen from those I once so desperately wished to be.”
-Evelyn Waugh
Volume 1
Chapter 6: The Inward Hike
I went on a hike today while on LSD. I hadn’t planned to log this session. It was meant to be a simple outing with my father—a chance to enjoy some time in nature, something I’d never done before. My goal was just to experience it, not to analyze it. A departure from my usual approach to psychedelics. But as usual, the thoughts came unbidden, so here I am, writing. The peak has passed, though the effects still linger. The trip felt like something to check off a list. I have a great relationship with my father, and he understands the upsides and downsides of psychedelics, which made him a good choice for this kind of experience. His presence ensured everything stayed grounded and smooth.
What surprised me most was my lack of heightened appreciation for nature. The scenery was stunning, but I admired it no more than I would have sober. Granted, my dose was relatively low. I didn’t experience the vivid visuals many rave about, though I had anticipated a deeper sense of connection or awe. It left me questioning how others manage to hike while heavily intoxicated. Based on my experience, reaching the level of visuals often described would require a dose above 200 mcg—a level at which I can’t imagine tackling an uphill hike. The logistics of such endeavors puzzle me: how far do people hike, and how difficult are these trails? For me, just staying upright would likely be a challenge by itself.
When the drug began to take effect, I found myself in one of the most breathtaking places on Earth, yet all I wanted was to sit in the shade, think, and write. Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations kept surfacing in my mind, particularly one of my favorite quotes: “Nowhere can man find a quieter or more untroubled retreat than in his own soul.” Marcus Aurelius, the Roman Emperor and Stoic philosopher, wrote Meditations as a personal guide to self-improvement and reflection, emphasizing reason, virtue, and self-restraint. That quote perfectly captured my mood. Despite being surrounded by extraordinary natural beauty, I couldn’t stop retreating inward, absorbed in my own thoughts.
People often love nature for its unspoiled purity, free from human interference—a realm untouched by our hands. But this trip made me reflect on how thinking itself is as natural as anything else. If rivers and mountains are nature, then so too are our minds and their endless streams of contemplation. Aristotle called man a political animal by nature, but I’d argue we are first and foremost philosophical. To perceive reality is to analyze and question it; reason is inseparable from our experience. What could be more human—or more natural—than that? What would be a greater state of artificiality: A world of people incapable of thought, or philosophers surrounded by concrete and steel? There is no nature more authentic than the mind in its ceaseless pursuit of understanding.
With the advancement of science, society gradually adopted a Newtonian worldview. As scientific understanding grew, religion’s grip weakened, leaving the world increasingly nihilistic. The Enlightenment, a cultural and intellectual movement of the 17th and 18th centuries, was sparked by thinkers like Descartes, whose philosophy championed reason, skepticism, and the pursuit of knowledge. It encouraged individuals to question traditional authority and seek truth through rationality, laying the foundation for modern science and reshaping society’s worldview. Over centuries, this intellectual transformation infiltrated culture, dismantling the metaphysical framework upon which religion—and individuals—once stood. By the 19th century, Darwin arrived like a storm fueling a wildfire, obliterating long-held beliefs. His theory of evolution reshaped our understanding of reality in ways no field of chemistry, biology, or physics ever could. From there, it was only a matter of time before the truth became inescapable. Reality began to appear as nothing more than atoms, haphazardly arranged into intricate but ultimately meaningless patterns. Nihilism was the natural outcome.
But I’d argue this was always destined to happen. While traditional religion undoubtedly provides meaning to many lives, it serves as little more than a bandage over humanity’s innate nihilism. The existence of God, even if true, does not present an actual solution, but rather a fleeting comfort. Imagine, for argument’s sake, that there is a creator—a deity who crafted you with care and intention, who imbued your existence with a specific purpose. Does that truly end humanity’s existential questioning? Why should we feel compelled to obey this creator? Why does God care about any of it? What are God’s values, and why those in particular? What is the essence of this deity, and why does it exist at all? These questions compound endlessly, exposing the idea of God as a partial answer at best—a superficial covering that hides deeper secrets. For those genuinely committed to exploring the mind and reality, such answers are insufficient. No matter how daunting the journey, we venture into the darkest caves in search of truth. We know we’ll never achieve complete understanding, yet we accept our limitations and persist in our quest for light. Our existential fire, ignited long before the Enlightenment, was of our own making. It was a necessity born from self-awareness. Extinguishing that fire would condemn us to eternal blindness—a perpetual darkness where no answers could ever be sought. This fire may burn, but it illuminates.
The interconnectedness of philosophical thought throughout history is remarkable. From Plato to Kant and beyond, each philosopher builds upon the ideas of their predecessors, creating a vast intellectual lineage. As Whitehead famously noted, “all Western philosophy is but a series of footnotes to Plato.” Although of course, Plato was deeply influenced by early thought as well. This interconnectedness forms an extensive, ever-growing tree of knowledge, with each branch representing a different philosophical tradition or mode of thought, all connected to a shared trunk of foundational ideas. While only a few great minds may form that trunk, we are fortunate to have the opportunity to study the entire tree, exploring whichever branch piques our interest. We live in a time where nearly everyone has access to this wealth of wisdom. We possess what was once the privilege of kings or gods: the accumulated thoughts of humanity, distilled into their finest form. It’s a gift of incalculable value. How people go through life without engaging with even a fraction of it baffles me—not out of elitism, but sheer wonder. Imagine being offered the most exquisite diamond, polished by the greatest minds to ever exist, and simply walking away. It’s an astonishing choice, and one I struggle to comprehend.
I found myself thinking about alien life and the persistent effort to communicate with hypothetical extraterrestrial beings. While the prospect of receiving a response seems remote, the endeavor strikes me as incredibly risky. Strangely, it’s often those in the most rigid scientific fields who champion these attempts. I recall a video where Bill Nye dismissed philosophy as meaningless and without practical value—a statement that exemplifies profound ignorance. Neil deGrasse Tyson has made similarly dismissive remarks, claiming philosophy doesn’t “contribute productively to our understanding of the natural world.” He even tweeted about how we rarely learn in school “how data become facts, how facts become knowledge, and how knowledge becomes wisdom”—a transformation rooted deeply in philosophy, ironically. And then there’s Stephen Hawking, who declared, “philosophy is dead.” I mention their views on philosophy to highlight a common blind spot: an inability to engage with the humanities or the subtleties of subjective experience. Their focus on cold, hard facts blinds them to the complexities of human understanding, particularly when it comes to ethics, culture, or our place in the cosmos. The scientific method excels at stripping subjectivity to reveal objective truths, yet it falters when applied to human existence, where we ourselves are the subject of inquiry.
This reductionist mindset often leads to oversimplified assumptions about society and culture—that they are obvious or follow a linear progression. History and philosophy paint a far messier picture. A recurring thought I have when studying history is how different the world might be if key figures hadn’t existed or had pursued different paths. The butterfly effect, the idea that small changes can have vast, unpredictable consequences over time—like a butterfly flapping its wings eventually causing a hurricane—comes to mind. Even minor shifts in individual contributions could have radically altered where we are today. We assume the world around us is inevitable, yet it’s the result of fragile, intricate processes. We began as apes, driven by basic instincts like food and reproduction. The journey to our current state involved countless improbable steps. Why, then, assume that interacting with alien life would lead to a favorable outcome? I’m not saying the outcome would be inherently negative—I simply don’t know, and neither does anyone else. The unknown is far too vast.
Consider our anxiety over AI and its potential dangers, despite our ability to somewhat control its creation. Now imagine dealing with an intelligence wholly unrelated to us. If we could artificially raise the intelligence of animals like fish or tigers, who could predict their societal behaviors or moral frameworks? Such scenarios underscore the potential risks of engaging with beings whose nature we cannot comprehend. It’s not worth gambling carelessly. The most immediate problem is morality. I acknowledge the possibility of an objective morality—a descriptive framework, at least, rooted in human nature. However, such a framework is exclusive to humans. It collapses when extended to beings whose physiology, perception, and cognition differ entirely from ours. For example, if humans lacked pain receptors, our moral values would look drastically different.
Even within humanity, morality varies dramatically. Consider the isolated tribe in the Indian Ocean that has lived without outside contact for thousands of years, attacking outsiders on sight. And these are human beings, just like us. The point here isn’t that the isolated tribe’s behavior is inherently immoral, but rather to highlight the unpredictable and potentially dangerous consequences of encountering a culture with vastly different values and norms. Layer onto that the murderous ideologies and philosophies humans have developed over history, and it becomes clear that the emergence of alien ideologies or religions is not only possible but plausible. Optimistically assuming that extraterrestrial civilizations would align with our values—or even possess the concept of friendliness—seems dangerously naive. Nature is brutal, indifferent, and often hostile. An unfriendly encounter is, statistically speaking, more probable than a friendly one. We often see ourselves as exceptional, good, and rational. But the history tells a different tale—our story is woven with threads of violence and self-interest. To believe that other beings would share our rhythm, simply because we are blind to the puppet strings that guide our own dance, is a grave mistake. The melody they move to will likely be their own. Perhaps one that is impossible for us to hear.
When analyzing religious texts, the discussion often seems to fall into a binary trap. Take Jesus Christ, for example: either he was exactly what he claimed, validating the metaphysical story, or he was a delusional madman. A seemingly middle-ground position—one often secular—argues that the story isn’t factually true but holds moral or cultural value. However, much of the story’s significance lies precisely in its metaphysical claims, making it hard to fully escape the binary choice. A more nuanced approach might be to merge these views rather than choose between them. It’s not simply that Jesus was either correct or deluded; it’s both. One gives rise to the other. Plato once said, “the greatest of blessings come to us through madness, when it is sent as a gift of the gods.” This idea resonates with the notion of the Messiah as someone embodying a personality type that exists in all of us—not as part of our conscious ego, but as an external guide. In this sense, the Messiah could be seen as someone wholly consumed by this archetype, giving a divine claim its reasonable context. Yet simultaneously, this path of total surrender would resemble a mental illness, as it involves dismantling the ego and letting a deeper, collective self take control.
A friend of mine recently explored the concept of tulpas, a practice rooted in Tibetan Buddhist traditions that involves creating an autonomous personality within one’s consciousness—an agent distinct from the ego. In modern contexts, tulpas are often framed as psychological phenomena, with proponents claiming these entities possess consciousness and self-awareness separate from their creator’s own thoughts. As far-fetched as it may sound, this concept aligns with psychological principles suggesting that consciousness is far more fragmented than we typically acknowledge. Many report successfully creating tulpas, and while I remain skeptical, it’s not entirely implausible. The line between what we consider mental health and mental illness is often thinner than we realize.
This brings to mind shamanic traditions, where in many indigenous cultures, shamans—a type of healer or spiritual leader—act as intermediaries between the human and spirit worlds. These traditions often involve rituals, altered states of consciousness, and a profound connection with nature to promote healing and guidance. Shamans often begin their journey as children exhibiting behaviors we might classify as mental illness—hearing voices, seeing visions, or experiencing alternate states of consciousness. Instead of suppressing these experiences, elder shamans guide the child, teaching them to interpret and control what are seen as gifts from the gods. Through this process, the child often transitions from a state of personal and social dysfunction to becoming a healer for their community. This approach contrasts starkly with modern Western society, where similar individuals might be heavily medicated and struggle to function normally. Such practices suggest that we may naturally house several agents within our psyche, organized hierarchically, with the ego as the dominant entity.
Jung’s doctoral dissertation explored some of these ideas. He studied a medium who claimed to communicate with spirits, positing that she wasn’t speaking to actual spirits but rather to splinter personalities within her psyche. She wasn’t lying about her experiences; her interpretation of these subconscious agents as external spirits was, to her, genuine. This phenomenon highlights the potential complexity of our internal world and how readily it can be misunderstood. This kind of thinking made me more sympathetic to religion, though my interpretation of it pleases neither atheists nor theists. Such phenomena are real—not in the literal sense theists may claim, but not fake as many skeptics would dismiss them. They are subjectively real, with tangible neurological patterns in the brain, and they can hold agency comparable to the ego. Writing them off as silly superstitions, delusions, or evidence of a supernatural creator oversimplifies their nature. Instead, we must analyze them rigorously and acknowledge them for what they truly are: profound elements of human psychology and culture deserving deeper understanding.
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