The Norwegian philosopher Peter Wessel Zapffe is little known to most Anglophone readers. He was greatly inspired by Arthur Schopenhauer and has been called one of the “bleakest thinkers of all times and places”. Zapffe was also an avid mountaineer and a friend of fellow Norwegian philosopher – and originator of deep ecology – Arne Næss.…
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Antinatalism is the view that procreation is morally wrong. Its most well-known current defender is David Benatar, a professor of philosophy at the University of Capetown, who explicated this moral position on procreation in his 2006 book Better Never to Have Been: The Harm of Coming Into Existence. However, antinatalism long predates Benatar’s work. Antinatalism has…
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Nicaragua wasn’t a country I planned to visit during a round-the-world trip I did in 2015/16. I was intending to spend some time volunteering on an organic farm in Costa Rica, but this no longer seemed appealing as the date to start farming drew closer, so I changed my plan and embarked on a fairly…
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A commonly reported feature of the DMT experience is that of impossibility. In the DMT space, one can be left astonished to witness objects, events, and beings that one regards as undeniably impossible. But does impossibility mean exactly in terms of the DMT experience? And are users correct in their apprehension (if that’s possible) of…
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Raqib Shaw is an Indian-born artist, based in London. He is known for his intricately detailed paintings depicting imaginary paradises. Shaw’s fantastical paintings are, in part, influenced by the disputed territory of Kashmir in northern India, which Shaw has described as “paradise on earth”. The artist was born in Kashmir and grew up in the…
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