
The Ezra Klein Show · New York Times Opinion
Michael Pollan’s Journey to the Borderlands of Consciousness
March 31, 2026·1 hr 28 min·7 clips
A developmental psychologist told Michael Pollan that children are in a state of consciousness similar to LSD — they're tripping all the time.
As heard by us
A sharp, body-minded meditation on consciousness that keeps circling back to the limits of thought.
This conversation treats consciousness as a hard problem, not a decorative one. Michael Pollan moves through the theories and experiments with steady control, while Ezra Klein keeps pushing toward the place where an idea becomes lived experience.
Why you'd press play
You want a calm, serious guide to why consciousness gets stranger the closer you look.
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