Expanding Mind

A conversation with Burt Shonberg biographer Spencer Kansa about LA bohemia, psychedelic art, Marjorie Cameron, gumshoe biography, and his new book Out There: The Transcendent Life and Art of Burt Schonberg. http://burtshonberg.com/

A conversation with Sylvia Thyssen, senior editor at the Erowid Center, about experience reports, drug geekery, Shulgin's notebooks, and Erowid's current Pineapple fund-matching drive. 

A conversation with futurist, inventor, and educator Mark Pesce about Faustian bargains, Facebook mind control, surveillance capitalism, and his bracing recent article “The Last Days of Reality.”  https://www.markpesce.com/

A conversation with historian of religion April DeConick about altered states, religious conspiracy theory, and her new book The Gnostic New Age. 

A chat with occult writer and drug geek Julian Vayne about Baphomet, the (sur)reality of spirits, evolution, ritualizing entheogens, and his new book Getting Higher: The Manual of Psychedelic Ceremony. https://theblogofbaphomet.com/

A lively discussion with "meditation MacGyver" Jeff Warren about polyspirituality, Buddhist hedonism, the X-factor of awareness, and how he contributed to Dan Harris's new book Meditation for Fidgety Skeptics (Spiegel & Grau). http://jeffwarren.org/

A fascinating conversation with computer scientist and freak-geek extraordinaire Dr. Bruce Damer about innovation pools, realm-bending, Terence McKenna, and a powerful new scientific vision about the origins of life.

Psychologist and consciousness researcher Susan Blackmore talks about astral cords, brain regions, Zen koans, and her recent book Seeing Myself: The New Science of Out-of-Body Experiences (Robinson). https://www.susanblackmore.co.uk/

A wide-ranging conversation with historian of religion Dustin Atlas about certainty, skepticism, antisemitism, gnosis, and the politics of knowledge. Read Dustin’s blog thoughts on this and other matters at https://blogblawgblog.wordpress.com/.

Guitarist and artist David Arnson talks about his long-running psychedelic surf band Insect Surfers, along with comments on rare dolphins, reverb units, pictures in your mind, and his eye-boggling new coloring book Insect Surfers & Alien Allies. http://www.insectsurfers.com/