Aldous Huxley's workThe Doors of Perception introduced the phrase 'Mind at Large' to the lexicon of psychedelic experience in 1954.I argue that its original presentation requires re-evaluation.I present evidence that Huxley manipulates the construction of the discourse he uses to present this phrase as a philosophically legitimate term.His choice of a pivotal quotation implies support from the...
In a landmark paper from 2019, Robin Carhart-Harris and Karl Friston lay out their theory for what happens to the human brain under the influence of psychedelics: their so-called REBUS (RElaxed Bra...
Ayahuasca has a variety of traditional uses, yet there is a growing global interest in its potential therapeutic benefits for mental health conditions. Novel approaches to psychotherapy are emerging to address the needs of ayahuasca users to prepare as well as to guide them in 'integrating' their powerful psychedelic experiences, yet there is little discussion on the ethical frameworks that may...
In this introduction to the thematic issue Critical Psychedelic Studies we argue that many and diverse critical analyses of psychedelic cultures and practices are needed to counter the current hype around the biomedicalization of psychedelic substances. The social sciences and humanities offer insights and methods to resist appropriation and to establish community based ethical practices. The...
The longstanding juncture between science and religion in psychedelic research is mediated most notably by the Mystical Experience Questionnaire (MEQ). The MEQ is a psychometric survey for assessing mystical experiences, and it relies on the work of philosopher Walter Stace for its typology and philosophy of mysticism. Yet there is an under-investigated influence from Vedantic Hinduism that...
Indigenous psychedelic uses have long been imbricated with colonialism and its afterlives. Amidst tensions from accelerating investor interest in psychedelics and calls to decolonize research and practices, we argue that the study of psychedelics is troubled by dualisms used in both colonial and decolonial thought: subject and object, self and other, culture and nature, synthetic and natural,...
In his recent book Theology and Psychology, Fraser Watts explores an area of interdisciplinary dialogue that has become active on many fronts. He traces the main areas of engagement while limiting his purview mostly to psychological explorations of the formation of the human spirit and of religious experience, and theology directed to parallel concepts. Psychology is largely pursued within its...
A predominant feature of the nuclear age is that a major paradigm shift is now under way. A new holistic paradigm is slowly but steadily emerging, which stresses convergence in place of conflict, cooperation in place of competition. For the last four centuries the predominant mode of Western thought which has dominated the world was based essentially upon dualistic philosophies, on what may be...