Season Six

69 - Airships Menace U.S.

Menacing objects shot down over North America have been linked to a secret Chinese balloon-based surveillance program. But, not all of the four interlopers downed by the Pentagon in the past eight days fit the description of balloons. What is going on over America’s skies? Could the Pentagon be suffering from a case of ‘war nerves’? Is China plotting to strike the U.S.A? Or are we being revisited by the mysterious airship captains of 1896-97?

68 - America Under News Blackout

Dane builds the case that interesting and important news that makes the U.S. government and foreign allies look not-so-great is deliberately ignored by print media, TV and cable news inside the U.S. Meanwhile, the terrible coverage of legacy media is fueling an explosion of high quality independent journalism. Could a golden age of American media be happening right under our noses?

67 - Interrogating Psychonautica

How can you learn anything about external reality from an experience that takes place entirely inside your own head? Initially skeptical of psychonauts, Dane reviewed DMT user reports and found five characteristic properties that seem to be self-authenticating. DMT users say their experiences contain elements that are hyper-real, not like being intoxicated, wonderous, trigger synchronicities, and demonstrate interpersonal stability. Dane compares the inference from mystical DMT vision to the reality of the supernatural to the writings of the great French philosopher Renee Descartes. In doing so, he builds the case that we can make sense of why many people who use DMT change their spiritual and metaphysical beliefs in response to the events that take place under its influence. Whatever you may think of all this, there’s no escaping from the larger cultural ramifications of a molecule that makes people take the supernatural seriously.