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Psychology

Bicycle Day Reflections, Quantum Mechanics, and the Value in Studying Philosophy to Understand Psychedelic Experiences

April 19, 2024
Featuring: Lenny Gibson, Ph.D.

In this episode, Joe and Kyle interview Lenny Gibson, Ph.D.: philosopher, Grof-certified Holotropic Breathwork® facilitator, 20-year professor of transpersonal psychology at Burlington College, and the reason Joe and Kyle met many years ago.

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In this episode, Joe and Kyle interview Lenny Gibson, Ph.D.: philosopher, Grof-certified Holotropic Breathwork® facilitator, 20-year professor of transpersonal psychology at Burlington College, and the reason Joe and Kyle met many years ago.

He talks about his early LSD experiences and how his interest in the philosophy of Plato and Alfred North Whitehead provided a framework and language for understanding a new mystical world where time and space were abstractions. He believes that while culture sees the benefits of psychedelics in economic terms, the biggest takeaway from non-ordinary states is learning that value is the essence of everything. And as this is being released on Bicycle Day, he discusses Albert Hofmann’s discovery and whether or not it’s fair to say that Hofmann intentionally had the experience he did on that fateful day.

He also discusses:

  • The end of Cartesian thinking and the need for a new understanding of reality that incorporates the insights of quantum mechanics
  • How philosophy has been taught as an intellectual endeavor, and how we need to embrace the practical and conceptual side of life
  • John Dewey and quantitative thinking, William James and pragmatism, and was Aristotle a Platonist?
  • The novelty of the creation of LSD, and how it gave us a path to a mystical experience that wasn’t culturally bound

and more!

Links

Dreamshadow.com

Breathwork.com

PT316 – Lenny Gibson, Ph.D. – Vital Psychedelic Conversations

Channelmcgilchrist.com

Science and the Modern World, by Alfred North Whitehead

PT499 – Mesoamerican Psychedelics, Decolonization, and the Concept of an Ontological Turn, featuring: Osiris González Romero

LSD: My Problem Child – Reflections on Sacred Drugs, Mysticism and Science, by Albert Hofmann Ph.D.

The Doors of Perception and Heaven and Hell, by Aldous Huxley

The Metaphysics, by Aristotle

Wikipedia.org: Stephen Pepper

Shadow Culture: Psychology and Spirituality in America, by Eugene Taylor

Book links are affiliate links, meaning that Psychedelics Today will receive a percentage of the sale.

Lenny Gibson

In this Episode

Lenny Gibson, Ph.D.

Lenny Gibson, Ph.D., graduated from Williams College and earned a doctorate in philosophy from Claremont Graduate School and a doctorate in psychology from The University of Texas at Austin. Lenny has 60 years of experience working with non–ordinary states of consciousness. He has taught at The University of Tulsa and Lesley College, and served his clinical psychology internship at the Boston, MA V.A. Hospital. He also taught transpersonal psychology for 20 years at Burlington College. Lenny serves on the board of the Community Health Centers of the Rutland Region in Vermont. A survivor of throat cancer, he facilitated at the head and neck cancer support group at Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center for several years. He is a past president of the Association of Holotropic Breathwork International.

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