Michael Pollan On The Mystery Of Consciousness
About this episode
Michael Pollan discusses his new book on consciousness and various related topics with Andrew Sullivan.
This is a free preview of a paid episode. To hear more, visit andrewsullivan.substack.com Michael is quite simply one of the best nonfiction writers out the planet: a real role model. He’s been a contributing writer to the New York Times Magazine since 1987, and he’s the bestselling author of many books, including How to Change Your Mind — which I reviewed in 2018 — and its sequel, This Is Your Mind on Plants , which we discussed on the Dishcast in 2021. This week we covered his new book, A World Appears : A Journey Into Consciousness . For two clips of our convo — on the magic of spontaneous thoughts, and the consciousness of kids — head to our YouTube page . Other topics: toasters and other things that don’t have consciousness; Thomas Nagel’s bat; panpsychism; Francis Crick trying to solve consciousness; the global neuronal workspace theory; how brains are not like computers; AI and consciousness; Proust; James Joyce; Wordsworth and the Romantics; William James and stream of consciousness; Lucy Ellmann’s Ducks, Newburyport ; words on the tip of your tongue; phenomenology; letting your mind wander; Addison’s Walk at Oxford; how smartphones distract from thinking; Trump taking up…
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