Show Notes
Todays’ guest is Bernardo Kastrup. Bernardo is the executive director of the Essentia Foundation and a promoter of a philosophy called metaphysical idealism, the notion that reality is essentially mental. He has a Ph.D. in philosophy and another in computer engineering. As a scientist he worked for the European Organization for Nuclear Research at CERN and the Philips Research Laboratories. He’s also been active in the high-tech industry for almost 30 years. His ideas have been featured on the Scientific American, the magazine of The Institute of Art and Ideas, the Big Think, and many other places.
We had a wide-ranging conversation that began with his experiences as a computer engineer working on physics problems. We explored his Idealist philosophy and its impact on Artificial Intelligence, understanding consciousness and psychedelic experience. As we spoke, it became clear that idealism is a worldview that has world-shaking implications.
Bernardo’s website and the Essentia Foundation
https://www.bernardokastrup.com
https://www.essentiafoundation.org
Some key books
Kastrup, B. (2024). Analytic Idealism in a Nutshell: A straightforward summary of the 21st century’s only plausible metaphysics. Iff Books.
Kastrup, B. (2014). Why Materialism Is Baloney: How True Skeptics Know There Is No Death and Fathom Answers to life, the Universe, and Everything. Iff Books.
Kastrup, B. (2012). Meaning in Absurdity: What Bizarre Phenomena Can Tell Us About the Nature of Reality. Iff Books.
Additional Resources
AI & Consciousness:
David Chalmer’s Hard Problem of Consciousness.
Bernardo’s full lecture on AI.
Quantum Theory
Article introducing non-locality or ‘spooky action at a distance.’
Micro-psychokinesis experiments:
https://psi-encyclopedia.spr.ac.uk/articles/psychokinesis-research
Bernardo on Psychedelics….
https://www.bernardokastrup.com/2014/08/magic-mushrooms-and-brain-activity.html
https://www.bernardokastrup.com/2018/10/the-fix-is-worse-than-problem-reply-to.html
https://www.bernardokastrup.com/2016/04/the-lsd-study-youre-being-subtly.html
And NDEs….
https://philarchive.org/rec/KASRIF
And High Strangeness:
https://www.bernardokastrup.com/2024/01/uaps-and-non-human-intelligence-what-is.html
Reality is Mind | Bernardo Kastrup