This podcast explores the profound connection between humans and animals throughout history, discussing their role in human survival, rituals, imagination, and consciousness. It also delves into the power of words and animal symbolism, as well as the origins of language and its connection to animals. Lastly, it explores the impact of animals on imagination and consciousness, and highlights the potential consequences of species extinction on the human mind.

"I mean seriously, what's more out of touch with objective reality? The Lakota sense of Wakan-tanka, mother and father nature, mirrored in cultures and traditions around the globe. Or, say... Wal-Mart?"Who gets to claim objective reality? Scientists, leftists, rightists, capitalists, religious types, the spiritual-but-not-religious, atheists, modernists and ancients alike have all tried. Ultimately it may be that the only thing that can lay claim to objective reality is mystery itself. In this episode of the Emerald, I take a recent New York Times Magazine interview between David Marchese and Stephen Colbert to talk about objective reality, cultural notions of the real, and fictions that we all participate in. Caution: This episode dives (respectfully) right into the heart of the science-spirit divide. If you're up for it, come along for the ride.Support the show

Ancient myths of cosmic dismemberment are explored, connecting self-care to self-obliteration. Shamanic rituals and yoga practices confront the paradox of ego destruction in an identity-driven world. The podcast delves into the transformative power of initiation, critiques modern yoga's commercialization, and prompts reflection on seeking validation vs. genuine transformation.

In this mytho-poetic look at one of the defining modern political issues, Josh explores ideas of freedom, empathy, and responsibility and how they are viewed in various cultures, cosmologies, and mythologies around the globe. In the west, freedom tends to be seen solely in terms of the material freedom to follow our wants and impulses free of external interference. In yogic traditions, freedom is seen as moving beyond these same impulses towards a deeper vision of peace. Ultimately, questions around weaponry and armament in Indian mythologies and in the Arthurian legends revolve around worthiness and responsibility, a responsibility that extends not only to the larger community but ultimately to nature itself. Nowhere is this more evident that in the story of the holy grail itself, which explores this balance of freedom and restraint as a path that ultimately leads us towards empathy for our fellow humans and alignment to the natural world. Support the show

What can we learn from those who can read the ocean like we can read words on a page? How can we transform how we view culture when modern western culture likes to position itself as the top of the cultural pyramid? What does a vision of sacred geography have to offer us? What are its implications for planet and person? A discussion with anthropologist and ethnobotanist Wade Davis.If you don’t know the work of Wade Davis, you should. Davis is a Canadian anthropologist, ethnobotanist, author, and photographer whose work has focused on worldwide indigenous cultures, especially in North and South America and particularly involving the traditional uses and beliefs associated with psychoactive plants. Davis came to prominence with his 1985 best-selling book The Serpent and the Rainbow about the zombies of Haiti. Davis is Professor of Anthropology and the BC Leadership Chair in Cultures and Ecosystems at Risk at the University of British Columbia.He’s also an Explorer-in-Residence at the National Geographic Society (probably the coolest job title on the planet) and his work has taken him all across the world. Today on The Emerald, Why Ancient Wisdom Matters in the Modern World: A Conversation with Wade Davis.Support the show

Have you ever looked at your dog and wondered what it feels like to have whiskers? Those bristling antennae, so bright and alive... Or have you put your hand on one of those globes at a science museum and felt the energy surge through the very ends of your hair? Today on the podcast, we’re going to talk about hair. Tumbling, cascading, curling, radiating — hair holds a very special and very energized place in the imaginative mind. Across the world, visions of the divine involve wild-haired goddesses, bristling white beards, and even silver-haired baboons. Turns out that hair and energy and even consciousness are very closely linked in the human mind and in some traditions, even the cosmos itself is a little bit hairy. These aren't just Rapunzel stories, this is something wilder and more unkempt — hair that sprouts out of the back of trance practitioners, hair in the shamanic experience of animal transformation, and hair as a qabbalistic mystery. Support the show

Today on The Emerald. How did paleolithic and neolithic peoples see the world? What if, as an increasing number of anthropologists now think, they had access to a trance state — a vision-space — that is all but missing from the modern mind? A state that we don’t miss or see as vitally important because it’s like a relative we never knew we had. Gone out of mind and memory. Join Josh for this look at the human relationship with trance and imagination and how these essential states of consciousness have shaped the human mind and history. Explore lucid visions of theriomorphic beings from Siberia, Indian philosophies of the role imagination plays in the shaping of the cosmos, and Tantric practices that were designed to harness imagination as a living force that was ultimately considered more real that mundane reality itself.Support the show

Today on the Emerald, we dive a little further into the topic of wonder. Not wonder as just a fleeting feeling, but rather wonder as a state of consciousness deliberately architected through creative ritual. Wonder that is pursued systematically, stoked, as our interviewee says, in order to break open our day to day experience and get us to something deeper. In this way, wonder becomes a form of resistance to the current state of the world.Join us as Josh interviews professor and author Tulasi Srinivas about her book The Cow in The Elevator: An Anthropology of Wonder. Tulasi Srinavas is Professor of Anthropology, Religion and Transnational Studies at Emerson College. She is currently a Luce ACLS fellow in Religion and international Affairs, and a World Economic Forum expert in the study of religion. Support the show

Exploring the mythic implications of the Notre Dame fire, the podcast discusses the importance of buildings in human consciousness and myth. It explores the connection between architecture and sacred geometry, and reveals the little-known history of Notre Dame's worship of the goddess Isis. The podcast also questions the role of architecture in power dynamics and contrasts it with the meditative practice of San Mandala. Finally, it reflects on the rebuilding of Notre Dame and envisions a sustainable and inclusive future for the iconic cathedral.