The Pursuit of Self-Transcendence

Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt discusses the crossroads of religion, evolution and the ecstasy of self-transcendence in this captivating talk in which he explores why we seek to lose ourselves. He compares religious and spiritual assertions about the self and examining varieties of "religious experience" or altered consciousness.

Jonathan Haidt refers to humans as homo-duplex, and uses the metaphor of a large house that one knows very well but in which an unknown staircase can at times appear, which leads to this next level of consciousness.

Jonathan Haidt draws on examples from the work of William James, Charles Darwin and other great psychologists as he explores the routes by which humans pursue a level of self-transcendence, whether through psychedelic drugs, meditation, war, nature and more. Jonathan Haidt also examines the possible motivations of human beings to seek self-transcendence.