Does Your Brain Make You Conscious? Or Is It Just Listening?
Welcome to the Psychedelic Blog. I write about the Impact of Psychedelics on Grieving, Relationships, Culture & Death. This week, I explore the question at the heart of every Psychedelic journey: Does your brain generate consciousness—or is it simply tuning into something much bigger?
“The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled.” — Plutarch
Theories explain. Psychedelics reveal.
Consciousness isn’t just a container for information—it’s a phenomenon we ignite through experience. And nothing strikes the match quite like Psychedelics. These substances don’t just mess with thoughts; they reorder perception, dissolve boundaries, and flip the script on what we think the mind is.
But what exactly is consciousness? And how do these strange compounds reveal so much about its nature?
Consciousness Under the Influence: What Psychedelics Reveal About the Mind
The Hard Problem meets the Neon Microscope.
Consciousness is the one thing we all know intimately—and the one thing science still can’t explain. You can scan every neuron, map the entire brain, and record electrical storms across the cortex… but none of it tells you why anything feels like anything. This is the so-called “hard problem” of consciousness.
Enter Psychedelics—compounds that routinely cause people to report leaving the body, merging with the universe, dissolving into pure light, or communicating with non-human intelligences. So what’s happening here?
Are these just hallucinations? Or do they point to something real that our current models can’t explain?
Let’s examine the four leading theories of consciousness—and see how they hold up through the lens of a Psychedelic journey.
Theory 1: Integrated Information Theory (IIT)
Consciousness = Integrated Information (Φ)
IIT claims that consciousness arises from how much information a system integrates into a unified whole. This integration is measured by a value called Phi (Φ)—the higher the Φ, the more conscious the system.
This isn’t about data volume. It’s about structure. A camera records more pixels than your eye, but it doesn’t feel like anything to be a camera. Why? Because it doesn’t integrate that information into a unified experience.
Psychedelic Tie-In
Many high-dose journeys report a loss of ego and merging with “the whole.” This might reflect a temporary redistribution—or amplification—of Φ. The brain stops segregating input, and the boundaries between systems (and self) dissolve.
Critique
Hard to measure. Harder to falsify. And it implies your thermostat might be slightly conscious. Still, for those interested in how tripping might “reboot” the brain, IIT gives us a promising (if esoteric) framework.
Theory 2: Global Workspace Theory (GWT)
Consciousness = Broadcasting
GWT imagines your mind like a theater. Countless unconscious processes are happening backstage—heartbeat regulation, muscle tension, stray thoughts—but only one scene makes it into the spotlight of awareness.
According to GWT, consciousness is what happens when one of those inputs wins the brain’s internal competition and gets broadcast across the neural network.
Psychedelic Tie-In
Psychedelics obliterate this filter. The backstage stampedes the stage. You get everything at once: emotions, memories, synesthetic soundscapes, inner monologues, childhood flashbacks. This could explain the chaos, the insights, the downloads.
Critique
GWT is great at explaining what becomes conscious—but not why it feels like anything. The mystery of subjective experience (aka qualia) remains unsolved.
Theory 3: Orch-OR (Orchestrated Objective Reduction)
Consciousness = Quantum Collapse
This is the most controversial theory—and the most mystical. Physicist Roger Penrose and anesthesiologist Stuart Hameroff propose that consciousness arises from quantum vibrations in tiny structures called microtubules inside your neurons.
When these quantum states collapse (an objective process, not a random one), a unit of consciousness is born.
Psychedelic Tie-In
Many people on DMT or 5-MeO-DMT report becoming vibration, or merging into an infinite frequency field (can confirm). If consciousness isn’t produced by the brain but received through it—like a radio tuning into a signal—Orch-OR might be more than just woo-woo.
Critique
Most neuroscientists consider it speculative at best, pseudoscientific at worst. But if your trip convinced you that “everything is energy,” this theory may already be living rent-free in your mind.
Theory 4: Panpsychism
Consciousness = Fundamental
Panpsychism flips the script. Instead of asking how matter creates mind, it asks: what if mind was there all along? It proposes that all matter has some form of rudimentary experience. Not “rocks have thoughts”—but “even electrons aren’t entirely dead inside.”
It’s metaphysics with a modern twist.
Psychedelic Tie-In
This is practically the default setting of a deep trip. The tree is alive. The earth breathes. You are the universe. Many Psychonauts return with the conviction that everything is conscious, and always was.
Critique
Hard to test. Easy to dismiss. But also, eerily aligned with the lived reports of thousands of Psychedelic explorers over decades.
But let’s pause.
“The map is not the territory.” — Alfred Korzybski
These theories give us structure, not truth. They help describe the architecture of experience, but they can’t substitute for the experience itself. And if Psychedelics reveal anything, it’s that consciousness isn't a puzzle to solve—it’s a mystery to inhabit.
The Brain May Be Built for Transcendence
Recent neuroscience suggests that transcendence isn’t a fluke of brain chemistry—it may be a core feature of human neurobiology. Functional MRI studies show that states of awe, meditation, and Psychedelics engage (or quiet) key neural networks like the Default Mode Network (DMN), which is closely linked to ego function. Meanwhile, the executive control networks work together to support focused attention, emotional release, and the felt sense of meaning beyond the self.
As researchers continue mapping these states, a striking pattern is emerging: the brain appears to be wired not just for survival or problem-solving, but for moments that transcend the self. A 2024 study from USC found that adolescents who practiced “transcendent thinking” (reflecting on purpose, interconnectedness, and values beyond the individual) showed enhanced coordination across key brain networks—and that this neural integration predicted greater well-being in adulthood. In light of findings like this, some researchers now argue that the brain is evolutionarily equipped—perhaps even designed—to experience self-transcendence.
In this view, mystical states aren’t fringe—they’re fundamental.
But What If the Brain Isn’t the Source?
Of course, not everyone agrees that transcendence is something the brain generates. Many argue that the brain may function more like a receiver or filter—tuning consciousness rather than producing it. Mystical experiences, near-death events, and high-dose Psychedelic journeys involve reports of leaving the body, merging with a larger field of awareness, or encountering an intelligence beyond the self. These aren’t minor experiences—they’re radical alterations of reality perception that defy neurological reductionism.
The idea that human consciousness is the only source of transcendence is anthropocentric. Plants communicate using biochemical signals. Bats use sonar. Dolphins use echolocation to construct 3D maps of their world. Our perceptual channels are narrow. Who’s to say transcendence doesn’t exist all around us—outside the range of our senses, but not outside reality?
And let’s be honest: many of those who claim the brain “creates” transcendence have never communed with potent Psychedelics or crossed a threshold experience. It’s easy to intellectualize the mystery from a lab bench. It’s another thing entirely to dissolve into it.
The Latest Science: What a Landmark Study Just Revealed
In April 2025, a seven-year, adversarial collaboration was published—testing IIT & GWT head-to-head in the largest consciousness experiment of its kind.
256 participants. Multimodal brain scans. High-contrast visual stimuli. The goal? To see where, and when, conscious perception arises in the brain.
The results surprised everyone.
The study found that sensory areas in the back of the brain, especially visual regions, play a far greater role in conscious perception than previously thought. Meanwhile, the prefrontal cortex—the usual poster child for higher cognition—may not be as central to raw consciousness as once assumed.
In short: consciousness might be less about thinking and more about perceiving.
Implications
For IIT: The findings didn’t show strong sustained integration in the back of the brain, casting doubt on how Φ maps to real-time consciousness.
For GWT: The expected frontal “broadcasting” activity didn’t consistently appear either, weakening the idea that consciousness is a spotlight controlled by executive functions.
Both theories took a hit. And yet… both gained nuance.
As neuroscientist Anil Seth put it:
“The theories are just too different in their assumptions and explanatory goals... but much has been learned about where and when in the brain information about visual experience can be decoded.”
This study doesn’t solve the hard problem—but it shifts the spotlight. From cognition to perception. From abstract reasoning to embodied awareness.
Which, for those familiar with Psychedelics, feels… familiar.
So… Which Theory Best Explains a DMT Trip?
The truth? None of them fully do. And maybe that’s the point.
DMT trips defy reduction. They suggest that consciousness isn’t a puzzle to solve, but a mystery to inhabit. One that blurs the boundary between subject and object, self and other, perception & participation.
The Problem of Privacy
Neuroscientist David Eagleman recently revisited Thomas Nagel’s famous question: What is it like to be a bat? His conclusion: You’ll never know.
Even empathy is projection, not transmission. You simulate someone else’s inner state based on your own wiring. The truth? First-person experience is fundamentally inaccessible from the outside.
Why This Matters
No matter how many brain scans we develop, we still won’t know what it feels like to be you—let alone a tree, a dolphin, or a DMT entity. This is the great limit of neuroscience. The best we can do is approximate.
Which is where Psychedelics come in.
Psychedelics as Empathy Technology
If VR & literature are tools to stretch empathy, Psychedelics are the nuclear option.
They don’t just expand perspective—they temporarily dissolve it. They let you feel like the other. The tree. The river. The deceased. Your past or future self.
And while you may never be the bat… you might, for a moment, understand its wingbeat.
Final Reflection
Maybe we’ll never fully explain consciousness. But maybe that’s not failure—it’s invitation.
As Eagleman suggests, the act of reaching toward another’s interior world, or a deeper truth, might be the most profoundly human thing we do.
Even if you never become the bat, or the mushroom, or the multiverse… you can try. And maybe that’s where the real consciousness lives.
Your Turn
Which theory resonates most with your own Psychedelic experiences?
Reply to this post or leave a comment. I read them all.
And if this expanded your awareness just a little… feel free to share it with someone who’s still trying to figure out what the hell is going on inside their head.
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From my experience on many heroic doses I believe that we are antennas for the “dark matter” non local consciousness of the universe. Each of us tuned delicately to our own frequency. Psychedelics simply make available the channels on the radio dial that would otherwise make “normal” daily life impossible if they were always turned on.
All the different chemicals that we use to perturb our state of being have their unique “hue” they place on the experience. I also believe what T. McKenna said about a well of souls that occupy the realms that are opened, the older the usage the deeper the well. Hence Ketamine and its feeling of a void and mushrooms with its connections to eons gone by.
Whether we are meant to ever know or not seems silly after doing countless journeys to the other realms available. “Buy the ticket, take the ride”. HST
This was super interesting Andrew. I am as confused about consciousness as I am about everything else, but I love to think about it. In my psychedelic experiences, panpsychism definitely resonates with me. I absolutely love to see my trees breathing. I am going to read the articles mentioned by "salience". Wonderful job!