Shows
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeReclaiming the Acid QueenWe all know Timothy Leary, the high priest of ‘60s psychedelia, but his partner, Rosemary Woodruff Leary, has largely been forgotten. She also had a remarkable life, even breaking Leary out of prison with the help of the Weather Underground. Now, biographer Susannah Cahalan tells her story — from the heady Sixties to a life on the run for decades.Original Air Date: November 08, 2025Interviews In This Hour: Guests: Susannah CahalanNever want to miss an episode? Subscribe to the podcast.Want to hear more from us, including extended interviews and f...
2025-11-0847 min
To The Best Of Our KnowledgeFarewell from TTBOOKYou listened on car trips and overnight flights, in tents and canoes, kitchens and living rooms. You shared our love of ideas, our search for wonder, our curiosity and our belief in the future. Now, after 35 years, it’s time for us to say goodbye. In this hour, Anne talks with TTBOOK’s producers about some of their favorite interviews and why public radio is such a powerful medium.Music in this hour was provided by the Aurora Principle, AurbanniAudio, Kai Engel, and Tom Blain.Original Air Date: September 27, 2025Interviews In This Hour: A...
2025-09-2752 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeThomas Metzinger on why we need a “culture of consciousness”Thomas Metzinger is a renowned German philosopher. He has a longtime fascination with psychedelics, stemming from his own experience and also from his work as an analytic philosopher. He says altered states of consciousness give us profound insights into the nature of the mind. And he believes modern society has an ethical imperative to foster a “culture of consciousness.”Original Air Date: August 02, 2025Interviews In This Hour: Guests: Thomas MetzingerNever want to miss an episode? Subscribe to the podcast.Want to hear more from us, including extended inter...
2025-08-0240 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeMarcelo and Kari Gleiser on tripping with your partnerMost psychedelic stories are highly personal, but there’s a different dynamic when two people share the experience — especially a married couple. Steve talks with theoretical physicist Marcelo Gleiser and clinical psychologist Kari Gleiser about their transformative experiences.Original Air Date: May 9, 2025Guests: Marcelo Gleiser, Kari GleiserNever want to miss an episode? Subscribe to the podcast.Want to hear more from us, including extended interviews and favorites from the archive? Subscribe to our newsletter.For more from Luminous: ttbook.org/luminous
2025-05-101h 00
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeMarcelo and Kari Gleiser on tripping with your partnerMost psychedelic stories are highly personal, but there’s a different dynamic when two people share the experience — especially a married couple. Steve talks with theoretical physicist Marcelo Gleiser and clinical psychologist Kari Gleiser about their transformative experiences.Original Air Date: April 28, 2025Guests: Marcelo Gleiser, Kari GleiserNever want to miss an episode? Subscribe to the podcast.Want to hear more from us, including extended interviews and favorites from the archive? Subscribe to our newsletter.For more from Luminous: ttbook.org/luminous
2025-05-091h 00
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeChris Timmerman on how DMT can deconstruct the mindChris Timmerman is a neuroscientist with a deep interest in phenomenology—what’s actually happening in our minds during psychedelic experiences. He leads the DMT Research Group at Imperial College, where he’s found that a single psychedelic experience can transform a person’s belief system, often turning materialists into panpsychists. In this wide-ranging conversation, Steve talks with Chris about everything from fractals and ayahuasca ceremonies to whether scientists who study psychedelics should talk openly about their own experiences.Original Air Date: March 01, 2025Guests: Chris TimmermanMore from Luminous: ttbook.org/luminous
2025-03-0154 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeSpring Washam, the Buddhist ShamanBuddhist meditation and psychedelic journeys have a lot of shared DNA—both take you deep inside your mind and can change your life. But many Buddhists say psychedelics violate the prohibition against intoxicants. Do they? Spring Washam straddles this divide as both a Buddhist teacher and founder of an ayahuasca church. Her own story is fascinating—how she’s merged these two practices.Original Air Date: January 25, 2025Guests: Spring WashamMore from Luminous: ttbook.org/luminous
2025-01-2549 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeDo psychedelics reveal a deeper dimension of reality?There’s a huge question swirling around the really big psychedelic experiences. Are these mind-blowing trips just hallucinations – the brain shot full of chemicals, playing tricks on you - or do they crack open some transpersonal dimension of consciousness? Most scholars who study psychedelics won’t go anywhere near this question, and yet it’s central to how you interpret these experiences. If you’re in psychedelic-assisted therapy, you want to know if this glimpse of the divine was real or just some figment of your imagination. Philosopher Peter Sjöstedt-Hughes believes we need a metaphysics of psychedelics to explain the...
2024-11-3043 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeKatherine MacLean on Mushrooms and the Limits of Consensus RealityPsychedelic people are practicing at the very edge of anyone else’s comfort zone,” says psychologist Katherine MacLean, author of the psychedelic memoir “Midnight Water.” MacLean was a pioneering psychedelic researcher at Johns Hopkins, who then left her job to pursue her own unconventional psychedelic journey. She talks with Steve Paulson about her work as a psychedelic guide, her personal history with psychoactive substances, and why she reveres the Mexican healer Maria Sabina.Original Air Date: August 30, 2024Guests: Katherine MacLeanFor more from Luminous: ttbook.org/luminous
2024-08-3149 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeErik Davis on LSD, the psychedelic underground and visionary experienceErik Davis’ “Blotter” is really three books in one: It’s about the way LSD tabs were embedded in blotter paper so they wouldn’t be detected by the authorities; it’s also a deep dive into the psychedelic underground; and finally, it’s an art book — gorgeously illustrated, with lots of very trippy blotter art. Steve talks with Erik about the wildness of psychedelic experiences and whether they reveal a deeper dimension of consciousness.Original Air Date: July 20, 2024Guests: Erik DavisFor more from Luminous: ttbook.org/luminous
2024-07-2044 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeDid the ancient Greeks use drugs to find God?Brian Muraresku makes the controversial argument that the famous Eleusinian Mysteries were fueled by a psychedelic wine. And he speculates that this secret ceremony, with its mind-altering drugs, became the Eucharist — the foundational event of early Christianity.Original Air Date: May 04, 2024Guests: Brian MurareskuMore from Luminous: ttbook.org/luminous
2024-05-0449 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeIs it the drug or is it the trip?For all the talk about how psychedelics might transform psychiatric care, there's still a fascinating question at the heart of psychedelic science. Is it the mind-blowing experience that fundamentally changes a person’s outlook on life? Or is it the powerful molecules that rewire the brain?
Check out more from the series at ttbook.org/luminous.
Original Air Date: December 16, 2023
Interviews In This Hour:
Does psychedelic therapy need the trip? — Will psychedelics replace antidepressants? — Spiritual warriors in the psychedelic underground
Guests:
David Olson, Charles Raison, Rachel Harris
Never wan...
2023-12-1652 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeCan you have too much transcendence?Some people dabble in psychedelics, others are more serious psychonauts. And then there’s Chris Bache. Over the course of 20 years, he had 73 high-dose LSD experiences — doses so high that the human body couldn’t tolerate anything more. For Bache, who was a religion professor, these were journeys into deeper dimensions of reality. These were grueling experiences — at times terrifying and other times ecstatic. He believes he transcended every aspect of personal identity and ultimately encountered the Divine – what he calls “the infinite creative intelligence of the universe.” And he ended up in a really interesting place, wondering if it’s possible t...
2023-11-1837 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeCan psychedelics be decolonized?It’s easy to get caught up in the hype about how psychedelics might revolutionize the treatment of mental illness. But there are also lots of ethical concerns. And probably none are so troubling as the charges of exploitation and cultural appropriation. The fact is, the knowledge about many psychedelics — like magic mushrooms and ayahuasca — comes from the sacred ceremonies of Indigenous cultures. But over the past century, Western scientists and pharmaceutical companies have been going into these cultures, collecting plants and synthesizing their chemical compounds.Even if science is all about building on the knowledge of earlie...
2023-10-2152 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeWhat happens to an octopus on MDMA?Psychedelics have a unique capacity to open up the mind so that everything feels fresh and full of possibilities. Especially as you get older, it can be easy to get stuck in a rut — but under a psychedelic, the brain can become more plastic. This time period, though, is limited - it might last just a few days, or a few weeks. So it’s really important to understand this “critical period” when our minds are so open — and also so vulnerable.
These “critical periods” are what Gul Dolen has been studying for years. She’s a neuroscientist a...
2023-08-1250 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeMelissa Etheridge on AyahuascaJust a few years ago, it was pretty unusual to hear big-time celebrities talk about their own psychedelic experiences. But that stigma is starting to fade thanks to people like the rock star and music icon Melissa Etheridge.
For her, this psychedelic renaissance has gotten very personal. Three years ago, her son Beckett died at the age of 21 from an opioid drug overdose. When Etheridge heard that clinical trials with psilocybin were showing real promise for treating addiction, she became an outspoken advocate for psychedelic therapy. And she started her own nonprofit organization, the Etheridge Foundation, to su...
2023-07-0816 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeBuilding The Psychedelic RevolutionIn the last decade, an unlikely place has emerged as a hub for the latest psychedelic renaissance — Madison, Wisconsin. And the Usona Institute is a major part of that.
Usona is currently building a 93,000-square foot structure devoted to psychedelics. There’s nothing else like it. The man behind it all is the psychedelic CEO Bill Linton. He prefers to stay out of the spotlight, but he recently sat down for a rare interview with Steve Paulson.
In this episode of "Luminous," we go inside Usona’s chemistry lab and go deep with Bill Linton about h...
2023-05-1736 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeWhat Can Psychedelics Teach Us About Dying?In the first episode of "Luminous," our series about the philosophy and the future of psychedelics, how can psilocybin ease our fears about dying? And how can psychedelics change the way we approach the end of life?
Original Air Date: April 08, 2023
Interviews In This Hour:
How a pioneering psychedelic researcher 'leaned in' to his terminal cancer diagnosis — Dying without fear: How psychedelics can ease the anxiety of terminal illness — The terror and the ecstasy of psychedelics
Guests:
Roland Griffiths, Lou Lukas, Anthony Bossis
Check out the full series at t...
2023-04-0851 min
Luminous: A Podcast about Psychedelics from To The Best Of Our KnowledgeComing April 8: Luminous, a podcast about psychedelicsAre you ready for the psychedelic revolution? In the next few years, the FDA is likely to approve these mind-bending drugs for treating depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. Some states have already decriminalized psilocybin, the active ingredient in "magic" mushrooms. But for all the headlines, many questions are swirling around this psychedelic renaissance. How do we make these drugs effective, safe and accessible to the people who need the most help? And how can they be used ethically, when much of the knowledge about plant medicines comes from Indigenous cultures?
Psychedelics also raise profound questions about the n...
2023-04-0504 min
TTBOOK Presents: KinshipBiologist Merlin Sheldrake on the mind-bending world of mushroomsThe fungal world is mind-bending. Mushrooms may look like plants, but taxonomically, fungi are more closely related to animals. They go inside their food to eat it and “play games with individuality,” says biologist Merlin Sheldrake, author of “Entangled Life.” One underground fungal network in Oregon spreads over four square miles, but genetically, it’s a single organism. As Sheldrake says, “they are everywhere at once and nowhere in particular.” He talks with Steve Paulson about his lifelong fascination with fungi, his experiments with ancient recipes for fermented alcohol, and the maverick Stoned Ape Theory, which claims that magic mushrooms spar...
2022-04-0939 minTTBOOK Presents: KinshipAnthropologist Enrique Salmon on 'kincentricity'Anthropologist Enrique Salmon formulated the concept of “kincentricity,” a worldview that sees everything around us — plants, animals, rocks, wind — as our direct relative. As Salmon says, “the rain is us, and we are the rain.” In his native Raramuri culture, culture and language are embedded in the mountain landscape of Chihauhau, Mexico. Salmon teaches a class called “American Indian Science,” in which he asks his students to incorporate their personal experiences into their observations about the world. He tells Steve Paulson that any theory of reality must account for lived experience, which pushes against the scientific paradigm that seeks an “objective” u...
2022-03-2638 min
The Podcast HourListening to the city: To The Best of Our KnowledgeTTBOOK (as it's known to its friends) started life as a radio show back in 1990 on Wisconsin Public Radio. 28 years later and it's still on the radio on nearly 200 different US stations, and of course now you can podcast it too! Husband and wife team Anne Strainchamps and Steve Paulson do most of the interviewing, with Anne taking the lead role as host. And the format's perhaps best described as 'variations on a theme'. Each episode takes a big idea and explores it with a range of different interviews. Recent topics have included the search for meaningful work, automation, and...
2018-12-0100 min
To The Best Of Our KnowledgeThe Mass Murderers Among Us (TTBOOK Extra)The shooting rampage in Orlando has led to a lot of speculation about Omar Mateen’s politics and state of mind. There's still so much we don't know, but maybe we can learn from another mass murder. Consider the case of Anders Breivik, the gunman who killed 77 people, mostly teenagers, in 2011. It was one of the biggest mass murders in modern history and a national trauma for Norway. Breivik was a white supremacist, so his politics were different from Mateen's. But the two mass muderers were both alienated, self-radicalized loners. And as we struggle to find out what we can...
2016-06-1633 min