Episode 48: Walking the Tightrope with Erik Davis - a podcast by Phil Ford and J. F. Martel

Journalist and historian of religion Erik Davis joins Phil and JF to talk about his latest magnum opus, High Weirdness: Drugs, Esoterica, and Visionary Experience in the Seventies. In this masterwork of weird scholarship, Davis explores the simultaneously luminous and obscure worlds of three giants of Seventies counterculture: Terence McKenna, Robert Anton Wilson, and Philip K. Dick. Their psychonautical legacy serve as fuel for a deep-delving conversation on Davis' own ontological leanings, yearnings, and hesitations. We touch on his philosophical development since the release of Techgnosis in 1998, the meaning of "weird naturalism," the primacy of the aesthetic, the uses and abuses of anthropotechnics, the challenges of tightrope-walking across bottomless chasms, and lots more.
REFERENCESErik Davis, High Weirdness: Drugs, Esoterica, and Visionary Expreience in the Seventies (http://strangeattractor.co.uk/shoppe/high-weirdness/)
Erik Davis, Techgnosis: Myth, Magic, and Mysticism in the Age of Information (https://www.amazon.com/TechGnosis-Myth-Magic-Mysticism-Information/dp/1583949305)Philip K. Dick (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_K._Dick), American science fiction writer
Robert Anton Wilson (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Anton_Wilson), American writerTerence McKenna (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terence_McKenna), Half-elf bard
Graham Harman, American philosopher (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham_Harman)Timothy Morton, British philosopher (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timothy_Morton)
Jeffrey J. Kripal, The Serpent’s Gift: Gnostic Reflections on the Study of Religion (https://www.press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/S/bo4126089.html)William James (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_James), American philosopher and psychologist
Hee-jin Kim, Eihei Dogen: Mystical Realist (https://www.amazon.com/Eihei-Dogen-Mystical-Hee-Jin-Kim/dp/0861713761)Dogen, "Instructions for the Cook" (http://www.thezensite.com/ZenTeachings/Dogen_Teachings/Instructions_for_the_cook.html)
Steve Reich, "Music as a Gradual Process" (http://www.bussigel.com/systemsforplay/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Reich_Gradual-Process.pdf)Peter Sloterdijk, [You Must Change Your Life](https://books.google.ca/books/about/YouMustChangeYourLife.html?id=aDcBAAAQBAJ&rediresc=y)
Albert Hofman’s famous bicycle ride (https://allthatsinteresting.com/bicycle-day-albert-hofmann)Erowid LSD vault (https://erowid.org/chemicals/lsd/lsd.shtml)
George Lackoff and Mark Johnson, Metaphors We Live By (https://www.amazon.ca/Metaphors-We-Live-George-Lakoff/dp/0226468011)Alexander Bard and Jan Söderqvist, [Syntheism: Creating God in the Internet Age](https://www.amazon.com/Syntheism-Creating-God-Internet-Age/dp/9175471833/ref=sr11?qid=1559663582&refinements=p27%3AAlexander+Bard&s=books&sr=1-1&text=Alexander+Bard)_
Special Guest: Erik Davis.

Further episodes of Weird Studies

Further podcasts by Phil Ford and J. F. Martel

Website of Phil Ford and J. F. Martel