I had a very similar experience to you in moving away from my militant atheism. In high school, I really admired Christopher Hitchens for his eloquent dismissals of religion, but as an adult I have a whole lot more respect for Sam Harris and the way his doubt of the religion doesn’t totally negate the value he sees in psychedelic exploration. Funnily enough, I recently got curious to see what Hitchens thoughts on psychedelics were. I assumed that surely someone so outspoken must have at least tried them, or at least spoken publicly about them, but from what little I could find, it didn’t seem as though he had. He was oddly outspoken about the value of alcohol though, strangely.

I wish I’d realized when I was younger that religion being dangerous doesn’t mean that there’s no such thing as a world unseen. Great piece, George. I really enjoyed reading your thoughts here.