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This work proves to be a mind-bending experience. In particular, it extensively chronicles various compounds consumed by this US-raised professor of history and philosophy of science has taken. Among them are psychedelic fungi, LSD, cannabis; anxiety medications to ease tension; mood stabilizers, Prozac, escitalopram and older generation drugs; caffeine (“I have drunk coffee daily for over three decades”); and, at least for him, the perpetually underwhelming spirits.

The Truly Trippy Dimension

The really trippy thing, nevertheless, lies not primarily in the philosopher’s accounts of his substance journeys, rather that they come from a tough-minded logical thinker, well-versed in analytic philosophical texts as visionary psychedelic-fueled consciousness studies. Moreover, they are offered intending to eroding the perceptions of his fellow thinkers and the public proposing that psychedelics break down individual identity and make us part of cosmic consciousness, which leads to us free in the manner Baruch Spinoza’s Dutch philosopher the ethicist conceived it (summarized in the book through “an agreeable surrender in the way one’s own body functions within the inevitable order of things”).

Dissolving the Cartesian Framework

The transforming comparison fits well, since the foundational moment of early modern rationalist tradition came when the 17th-century philosopher René Descartes melted a piece of wax. The material might transform its form, scent, length, breadth, and yet, he claimed, we assert with certainty that it is the same piece. The observer can be wrong about all sensory inputs related to the wax but not, the philosopher maintained, whether cognition exists: here lies the core of his well-known “I think, I exist” – by means of which Descartes shaped humanity into logical, science-respecting individuals we became from then on.

Smith-Ruiu, provocatively, reverses the narrative on Descartes’ thought experiment: imagine if, in place of transforming the object, Descartes had “expanded his consciousness” using LSD, or through hallucinogens beginning to appear to the West from overseas together with new crops and tobacco, such as sacred cactus or DMT brews? Imagine if rather than foregrounded rationality but rather praised the visionary powers that he argues, are released via entheogens? Western civilization might have ended up seeing the world completely differently, and human beings instead as “limitless wells of light and wisdom”.

Beyond Traditional Epistemology

There’s more in Smith-Ruiu’s consciousness expansion, as suggested, than imagined in conventional colleagues’ theories. His approach appears related to current contemporary, mind-blowing schools of thought including the new realism of perspectives, and the holistic views of philosophies and non-human-centric views. Immanuel Kant claimed the divine remains unknowable, inferable perhaps but not directly perceived. One cannot within empirical reality, experience transcendence. In this work, entheogens could assist transcend that barrier. For that thought merely it is astonishing – and cheered – that academia embraces this.

Clarity Reflections

It’s worth mentioning here that this is not one of those drug-fueled memoirs written as the person is under the influence. The philosopher differs from the chaotic writer. It is called On Drugs yet it wasn’t composed while high (except, probably, including the prescription meds he mentions above and occasional coffee boost). “During composition, clear-headed, focused, and entirely engaged in the work.”

An Astonishing Revelation

The book ends with a fascinating plot twist (key revelation). In 2023, the author participated in religious ceremony after decades in 40 years in the parish next door to his residence. His claim in this section proposes that the psychedelic experience resembles that of ritual worship: ordinary time is interpreted as a distortion, and during mass it is possible to experience, as he did during trips, an intimation of timelessness. Another parallel concerns how a person relinquishes egoic control in ritual just as with a psychedelic trip. Smith-Ruiu expresses: “Psychedelics, similar to faith, comparably to creativity are among other things a release of the will to go it alone.” He demonstrates reflexivity to acknowledge how ironic this may seem: that psychedelics are now his gateway drug to spirituality.

Common Transcendence

And you don’t even need to consume entheogens from some geezer in a Dutch head shop (as described) to expand consciousness. He cites the beginning of Proust’s novel by Marcel Proust, where the protagonist creatively fantasizes identifying as {some of the things