Mind Meld 27 | One Truth, Many Stories with Shane Mauss

Featured art – Topher Sipes

Comedian, knowledge-seeker, and psychonaut, Shane Mauss returns!

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I don’t even know how or why I came upon this fact, but if you google “philosophy is,” the two first suggestions are “dead” and “bullshit.” Unfortunately I couldn’t resist the carrot, so I followed through with the “philosophy is dead” search.

The primary culprit for Google’s suggestion seems to be a speech Stephen Hawking gave to Google’s Zeitgeist conference in 2011, in which he claimed that “ philosophy is dead” and that “scientists have become the bearers of the torch of discovery in our quest for knowledge.”

To hear my riff on Hawking’s proclamation that philosophy is dead, click play.

Musings in this mind meld include –

• Stephen Hawking says “philosophy is dead.” is it?
• Why too much data and not enough philosophy can be deceptive and dangerous
• Thoughts from Sam Harris on why we can’t talk about consciousness in only measurable, observable terms
• Finding your creative niche 
• Why Shane is transitioning to a psychedelics-based comedy set
• Dealing with criticism and the administrative aspects of being creative 
• Communicating with critics, trolls and homeless people 
• The memetic spread of information and ideas 
• Is television a tremendous waste of time, or a valuable learning tool?
• Consciousness is a story we tell ourselves 
• Shane’s ongoing wrestling match with his metaphysical views 
• Are psychedelic substances fooling your brain into thinking you’re dying, causing it to run simulations that comfort you?
• How cultural conditioning and beliefs seem to shape people’s experiences in altered states of consciousness.