Jason Silva isn’t a scientist, he’s a synthesizer. And he is a quoting machine. Kevin Kelly, Freeman Dyson, Ernest Becker, Erik Davis, Steven Johnson. These are Silva’s heroes, and he aims to infect us with his enthusiasm for their ideas. In his new “Creative Sessions” interviews, Silva goes straight to the source.
Instead of a quote from Erik Davis? Davis (author of TechGnosis) is there, sitting on his couch for an hour-long conversation—in which he gets plenty of time to frame his ideas, put meat on the bones, add context.
The latest installment features Steven Kotler, author of The Rise of Superman (about the brain chemistry of top performance), Abundance and Bold (coauthored with Peter Diamandis), and a forthcoming book, Tomorrowland (which explores how technology goes from science fiction to science fact).
Kotler discusses the emerging brain science of flow (or alternatively, being in the zone). Contrary to common sense, it isn’t about heightened brain activity, it’s about turning parts of the brain off. Briefly silencing the Woody Allen in our prefrontal cortex, as it turns out, is a universally liberating experience.
And increasingly we can hack this state.
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