Predictive Processing, Psychedelic Spirituality, and Neurophenomenology
Oxford University Press eBooks July 22, 2026 DOI: 10.1093/oxfordhb/9780192844064.013.41 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Topics | Philosophy of mind |
| Key points | Argues that predictive processing theory can bridge neurobiology and phenomenology to explain how psychedelics alter first-person experience, potentially leading to meaningful spiritual experiences. Proposes phenomenological reflection as a method for first-person descriptions within this framework. |
Abstract
Abstract Psychedelic substances such as psilocybin, LSD, ayahuasca, DMT, or mescaline, when employed with knowledge and skill, can sometimes lead to profoundly meaningful and transformative subjective experiences. This chapter discusses how the predictive processing theory can further our understanding of these deeply meaningful spiritual psychedelic experience. It makes a more specific proposal that the predictive processing theory of psychedelics can contribute to the neurophenomenology research program. The chapter proposes that phenomenological reflection on the psychedelic experience can be used as a method by subjects for providing first-person descriptions of how the different phenomenological structures of their experience are altered during, and after, their acute psychedelic experience. What predictive processing adds is a further mathematical way of knowing consciousness that can serve as a neutral vocabulary for creating generative passages between neurobiology and phenomenology that allows neuroscientists to make sense of how psychedelics perturb the structures of first-person experience in ways that can lead to profoundly meaningful spiritual experiences.
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| How do the brain's time and space mediate consciousness and its different dimensions? Temporo-spatial theory of consciousness (TTC). | 2017 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| The phenomenology of deep brain stimulation-induced changes in OCD: an enactive affordance-based model. | 2013 | Theoretical or philosophical paper | |
| Looking for the Self: Phenomenology, Neurophysiology and Philosophical Significance of Drug-induced Ego Dissolution | 2017 | Theoretical or philosophical paper |