Show Notes
Season 3 Episode 3 ‘A Life of Philip K Dick’
Today I have a dialogue with returning guest Anthony Peake. Anthony is a writer who deals with borderline areas of human consciousness. His first book, ‘Is There Life After Death?’, was published by Arcturus books in 2006. It detailed Anthony’s ‘Cheating the ferryman’ hypothesis, which argues that we experience our lives over and over again, like the movie Groundhog Day. This book has now sold over 60,000 copies world-wide and has been translated into various foreign language editions.
In 2013, Anthony Peake published a book on the Science Fiction writer Philip K. Dick, also known as PKD. Anthony sees many intriguing parallels between Philip K Dick’s ideas and his own. So in today’s feature-length dialogue, we take a deep dive into the life and literary career of PKD. We discuss the weird experiences that inspired much of that fiction. And we attempt to draw out the significance of PKD’s work for our understanding of consciousness, reality and time.
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Resources
His Book on Philip K. Dick:
Peake, A. (2013). A Life of Philip K. Dick: The Man Who Remembered the Future. Arcturus Editions.
PKD is also mentioned in:
Peake, A. (2010). Daemon: A Guide to Your Extraordinary Secret Self. Arcturus.
Anthony’s J.B. Priestley talk on YouTube from July 2025.
Philip K Dick: Works Mentioned
The Exegesis:
Dick, P.K. (2012). The Exegesis of Philip K Dick. Gollancz.
Sibyl illustration:
Novels Mentioned:
Dick, P.K. (1956). The World Jones Made. Ace Books.
Dick, P.K. (1959). Time Out of Joint. J. B. Lippincott Company.
Dick, P.K. (1962). The Man in the High Castle. Putnam.
Dick, P.K. (1967). Counter Clock World. Berkley Books.
Dick, P.K. (1968). Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Doubleday.
Dick, P.K. (1969). Ubik. Doubleday.
Dick,P.K. (1977). A Scanner Darkly. Doubleday.
Dick, P.K. (1981). Valis. Bantam Books.
A full list of PKD’s writing is available on Fantastic Fiction.
Other Resources
1974 Rolling Stone article and interview with PKD.
Andrew M. Butler’s guide to PKD. Contains descriptions of major themes in his work:
Butler, A.M. (2000). Philip K Dick. Pocket Essentials.
Philip K Dick’s Religious or Mystical Experience, 2:3:74, was depicted in a comic by Robert Crumb in Weirdo #17. This is a good overview of the experience. However, it is the ‘authorised’ or ‘official’ version promoted by PKD. In the podcast we discuss some problems with PKD’s telling of 2:3:74.
Hypnogogia & migraine:
Mavromatis, A. (1981). Hypnagogia : the unique state of consciousness between wakefulness and sleep. Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Alice in Wonderland syndrome on Wikipedia.
Bicameral Mind:
Jaynes, J. (2000). The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind. Mariner Books.
Cosmic Consciousness:
Bucke, M. (1905). Cosmic Consciousness: A Study in the Evolution of the Human Mind. Innes & Sons.
Sapir-Whorf hypothesis (language shapes reality).
Other authors mentioned:
Ray Bradbury on Fantastic Fiction.
Works of SF author Philip Jose Farmer on Fantastic Fiction. (Especially Riverworld series).
Ursula Le Guin on Fantastic Fiction.
Jorge Luis Borges on Fantastic Fiction.
Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot on YouTube.
Betty & Barney Hill’s 1961 abduction experience:
Fuller, J. (1966). The Interrupted Journey: Two Lost Hours”Aboard a Flying Saucer”. Dial Press.
Movies:
We discuss director Christopher Nolan’s 2014 movie Interstellar.
And Vanilla Sky from 2001 (dir: Cameron Crowe).
And the Truman Show (1998, dir: Peter Weir).
Waking Life, (dir: Richard Linklater, 2001).
Arrival (dir: Denis Villeneuve, 2016).
Documentaries & Adaptations
There are many good documentaries on PKD. Here are a couple of good ones.
Philip K. Dick - A Day In The Afterlife. 1994 BBC2 Documentary.
The Worlds of Philip K Dick. 2018 documentary featuring Anthony Peake.
Wikipedia list of adaptations of works by Philip K. Dick (Movies & TV adaptations).
Title Music: ‘Stranger things’ by Music Unlimited on Pixabey.
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