On Drugs
Psychedelics, Philosophy, and the Nature of Reality
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- $17.99
Publisher Description
“Like the best psychedelic experiences, On Drugs estranges the familiar, familiarizes the strange, and returns us to reality (whatever that is) with a broadened sense of the possible. Justin Smith-Ruiu is simply one of the most interesting thinkers alive, and he has found an ideal subject for his peculiar brand of brilliance.” —Christopher Beha, author of The Index of Self-Destructive Acts
In the late, post-lockdown days of the pandemic, grappling with personal loss and existential uncertainty, Justin Smith-Ruiu found himself standing in a California cannabis dispensary, pondering a question his tribe of fellow philosophers have often dismissed as too simple: How did I get here? That moment marked a transition for him—it was the start of a journey Smith-Ruiu would take to experience his own mind and the world around him in a new, clarifying way.
On Drugs blends autobiography, intellectual history, and philosophical inquiry to explore the transformative impact of psychedelics on human consciousness and thought. Drawing on his personal experiences as ‘an articulate guinea pig,’ Smith-Ruiu argues that psychedelics upend our assumptions about the nature of reality—and thus force a reckoning with the very foundations of Western philosophy.
Provocative, profound, and deeply personal, On Drugs points toward a radically new way of thinking about the world and our capacity to understand it.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Smith-Ruiu (The Internet Is Not What You Think It Is), a philosophy professor at the Université Paris Cité, provides a winding, ambitious rumination on what the use of psychedelics might reveal "about the relationship between mind and the world." Framing himself as "neither an advocate nor an activist" on behalf of the drugs, he draws from personal experience (partly as a rebuke to the "marginal" status of first-person perspectives in modern science) and philosophy to explore how psychedelics skew or clarify one's view of reality and what that might mean about reality itself. Some insights are profound, as when he delves into the factors impacting consciousness, noting that "there simply is no chemical-free apprehension of the world" (one's unique set of hormones and neurotransmitters significantly alter experiences of reality), or explores the simultaneous "ecstasy" and "terrifying dissolution of the self" that psychedelic trips can bring. While lengthier discussions of such topics as simulationism—the notion that the physical world is a model of virtual reality dictated by machines—can meander, they're made up for by the author's humility, curiosity, and embrace of complexityc. Open-minded readers will find much to chew on.
