Recently I was invited to sit down with Justin Otto, host of Dharma Junkie. Esoterically minded with a respectable lean towards Buddhism, he is open about his former drug addiction, giving him great perspective about successful recovery, rebuilding personal life in a constructive way, and brutal (yet insightful and necessary) self-honesty.
We begin talking about my book, Dive Manual, and develop a conversation that looks heavily into the polarity of the human experience: fact and ideal, spirit and science, true and false, even conscious and unconscious. Including looks into conspiracy theory as a mindstate (good and bad), simulation theory, university institution bias, the rise and fall of Jordan Peterson, drug addiction, physical and psychological detoxing, and the importance of faith in one form or another.
Ultimately we explore how "facts" are so often "moving targets", but this doesn't mean that empirical facts should be discredited overall. If anything, it reminds us all that we should be skeptical and critical with our research, and it helps to explain the important cyclic affair of fact informing ideal and vice versa within the human experience.
Justin as well took the time to read Dive Manual before the interview, reviewing it as one of the most interesting books he's read as of late, and potentially one of the most esoteric books he's ever read! Almost made me blush! He also gave the very fair critique that the book might be over the heads of some newcomers---something I tried to avoid but knew would be the case to some degree.
Hopefully you enjoy the chat as much as we did!
Comments