Culture critic Mark Dery talks about Surrealism, the gay voice, penny dreadfuls, and the occult and Taoist influences examined in his fascinating new biography of Edward Gorey, Born to Be Posthumous: The Eccentric Life and Mysterious Genius of Edward Gorey (Little Brown).

Martial artist and psilocybin explorer Kilindi Iyi talks about African martial arts, high dose psilocybin work, African-American psychedelia, Dr. Strange, and the metaphysics of darkness.

Canadian cultural observer Peter Limberg talks about Stoicism, philosophical sandboxes, the Intellectual Explorers Club, making uncertainty sexy, and navigating the conflicts between today's memetic tribes.  

Nurse practitioner and psychedelic therapist Julie Megler talks about integration circles, hierarchy vs. community, ketamine therapy, somatic work, and the philosophy behind her new East Bay clinic Sage Integrative Health.

Poet, journalist, and professor Nicholas Powers talks about festival politics, race and psychedelia, dreads, tokenism, and his book The Ground Below Zero: 9/11 to Burning Man, New Orleans to Darfur, Haiti to Occupy Wall Street (UpSet Press).

Bay Area conceptual artist Lindsay Tunkl talks about confronting death, therapy as art, pre-apocalypse counseling, humor, and her book When You Die You Will Not Be Scared to Die (Parallax Press).  

Occultist and Aleister Crowley biographer Richard Kaczynski talks about Jack Parsons, the "method of science,” the Agape Lodge, the women of Thelema, and the pluses and minuses of the Strange Angel TV series.   

The Gurdjieffean teacher and DuVersity director Anthony Blake talks about dialogue, synergy, mind between brains, the trouble with teachers, and the gymnasium of beliefs in higher intelligence.   

In part two of our conversation, author and blogger Eric Wargo talks about dreams, self-fulfilling prophecies, unconscious trauma, the banality of true spirituality, and his book Time Loops: Precognition, Retrocausation, and the Unconscious.   

In part one of our conversation, author, blogger, and dreamer Eric Wargo talks about uncertainty, determinism, Zen, the evidence for “feeling the future," and his brilliant and head-spinning book Time Loops: Precognition, Retrocausation, and the Unconscious.   

A conversation with eco-literary scholar Derek Woods about science fiction, terrariums, geo-engineering, eco-modernism, and the wild science of designing technologies that exceed our control.

Host Erik Davis reflects on Burning Man in light of his first return to the event in nearly a decade. Topics include: the Burning Opera, Instagram, poetic terrorism, remembering dead people, chaos, and the unfolding paradigm of the city.

A conversation with devotees Usha Harding and Swami Bhajanananda about the unique Kali temple they help run in Laguna Beach, and about the recovery of magic, the perfume of practice, Western pujaris, religious diversity, and the challenge of commercial yoga.   

A conversation with activist and writer David Nickles about the DMT Nexus, psychedelic militancy, extraction tek, the Statement on Open Science for Psychedelic Medicines, MAPS, and the trouble with for-profit psilocybin companies. 

A conversation with South African ethnobotanist Dale Millard about sangoma healers, animist science, beta carbolines, ayahuasca, and the broad-spectrum healing properties of harmine. 

A conversation with writer, editor, and performer Mitch Mignano—aka Raven—about existential humor, the Cacophony Society and the origins of Burning Man, pranking your fears, nihilism, and the sacred clowns of the Sun Dance ceremony.  

A conversation with philosopher and religious studies professor Dustin Atlas about ancient skepticism, Madhyamaka Buddhism, the taste of honey, Montaigne, Robert Anton Wilson, and the path of doubt.  

A talk with gnostic scholar Matthew Dillon about religious mourning, the Nag Hammadi library, sex magick Jesus, the gnostic Eden, David Icke’s lizards, and the power of the archons as an allegory of contemporary technological and political power. 

A talk with journalist Adam Fisher about virtual reality, fumbling the future, the cyberculture underground, human augmentation, libertarianism, and his rich oral history Valley Of Genius: The Uncensored History of Silicon Valley, as Told by the Hackers, Founders, and Freaks Who Made It Boom (Twelve). 

A conversation with bestselling author Michael Pollan about psychedelic awe, trip reports, the mental health crisis, underground therapists and the highly positive reception of his book How to Change your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence (Penguin).

A talk with music scholar and ethnographer Owen Coggins about amplifier worship, sonic pilgrimage, “as if” listening, metal humor, and his new book Mysticism, Ritual and Religion in Drone Metal.

A wide-ranging conversation with writer and teacher Miranda Mellis about uncanny climates, thinking with fables, empathic fictions, “don’t know” politics, Buddhist meditation, and the entanglement with the nonhuman.

A discussion with anthropologist Joanna Steinhardt about her study of DIY mycology, psilocybe politics, PF Tek, and psychedelic naturalism.

A conversation with esoteric writer Gary Lachman about postmodernism, Positive Thinking, chaos magic, Putin's esoteric tricksters, and Gary's hot new book Dark Star Rising: Magick and Power in the Age of Trump (Tarcher).  

Guru’s Child   A conversation with artist and man-about-town Naropa Sabine about Shakti, self-formation, rural ashrams, and growing up with a Tantric guru for a dad.