Ethical Issues of Non-Subjective Psychedelics. Invited presentation by Helena Aicher. Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, University of Zürich. (April, 2022).
The Psychedelic Hype Bubble. Centre for Psychedelic Research, Department of Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics, University of Zürich. (April, 2022).
Psychedelics: A shortcut to enlightenment? Public Debate. With Dr. Michael Ferguson, Harvard Medical School. Debate hosted at the University of Oxford. (February, 2022).
Ethical Issues Regarding Non-Subjective Psychedelics as Standard of Care. Invited presentation by Julian Savulescu. Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics, University of Oxford. (February, 2022).
Preparing for the Bursting of the Psychedelic Hype Bubble. Centre for Psychedelic Research, Department of Psychiatry, Imperial College London. (February, 2022).
The Varieties of Spiritual Experience and Practice: Implications for Well-Being. Invited by Tyler VanderWeele. Institute for Quantitative Social Science, Harvard University. (December, 2021).
Are the Subjective Effects of Psychedelics Necessary for their Enduring Therapeutic Effects? Public Debate. With David Olson, Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine at University of California Los Angeles. Debate hosted by Alius, The Netherlands. (March, 2021).
Presentation to Medical Residents: Psychedelics in Psychiatry. Department of Psychiatry, University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. (April, 2021).
Grand Rounds: Psychedelics in Psychiatry. Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Minnesota (Virtual due to Covid-19). University of Minnesota School of Medicine (December, 2020).
A Meta-Analysis of Religion/Spirituality and Life Satisfaction: A Multi-Dimensional Approach. Society for Personality and Social Psychology (February, 2020)
The Measurement and Experimental Manipulation of Self-Transcendent Experience. Johns Hopkins Medicine, Invited by Roland Griffiths, Baltimore (January, 2020)
William James’s Conversion to Self-Report Survey Methods in Psychological Research. American Philosophical Association, Eastern Division Annual Meeting. (January, 2020)
The Psychology of Philosophy Survey. Yale University, Invited by Molly Crockett, New Haven (August, 2019)
Transcendent Experience: Perspective from Psychology and Neuroscience. International Positive Psychology Association. Melbourne Australia (July, 2019)
Organizational Mattering. International Positive Psychology Association. Melbourne Australia (July, 2019)
A New Measure of Emotional Well-Being. Society for Philosophy and Psychology, Ann Arbor Michigan (July, 2018)
Self-Transcendent Experiences: Developing Multi-Factorial State and Trait Measures. Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Atlanta (March, 2018)
Neuromodulating self-transcendence: A noninvasive brain stimulation study. Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Atlanta (March, 2018)
The Awe Experience Scale: A Multi-Factoral Measure for a Complex Emotion. Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Texas (January, 2017)
Self-transcendent experience: A potent source of meaning. Invited presentation by Willibald Ruch. International Positive Psychology Association Conference. Angers, France. June 29, 2016
Transcendent Experience: Psychological, neurological, and clinical implications. Invited presentation by Jon Spiegel. University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. Pittsburgh, PA. May 9, 2016
The Practices Project: Classification and analysis of meaning enhancing methods in world religious traditions. Invited presentation by Kaiping Peng. Tsinghua University, China. April 16, 2016
The varieties of spiritual experiences: Scientific advances. Invited presentation by James Pawelski. Liberal and Professional Studies. University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, October 17, 2015.
Illuminating the Numinous: Empirical Methods of Investigation
Joint Conference of the International Association for Analytical Psychology,
Yale University, New Haven, CT (July, 2015)
Practices: A Cross-Cultural Classification
International Positive Psychology Association,
Beijing, China (June, 2015)
Secular Self-Transcendence: Psychological and Neurological Perspectives
Lehigh Valley Humanists
Lehigh Valley, PA (May, 2015)
The Science of Happiness
The Philadelphia Science Festival
Philadelphia, PA (April, 2015)
The Psychological Sense of Meaning and Purpose in Life
Tsinghua University Department of Psychology
Tsinghua University, Beijing, China (June, 2014)
Secular Self-Transcendence: And Musings on Inclusive Humanism
American Humanist Association Conference
Philadelphia, PA (June, 2014)
The Meaning and Purpose in Life Project
Harvard Kennedy School
Boston, MA (April, 2014)
The Psychology and Neuroscience of Religious Experience
University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA (April, 2014)
The Science of Love
Philadelphia Science Festival
Philadelphia, PA (April, 2014)
The Varieties of Self-Transcendent Experience and Callings
University of California Berkeley
Berkeley, CA (February, 2014)
Humanism and Secular Ethics
Yale University
Berkeley, CA (February, 2014)
The Varieties of Self-Transcendent Experience and Callings
Canterbury Cathedral
Canterbury, England (September, 2013)
Introduction to Positive Psychology
Tribhuvan University
Kathmandu, Nepal (February, 2013)
Well-being and Positive Psychology
Our Lady of Lourdes Medical Center
Camden, New Jersey (June, 2012)
Health and Well-being
Brooklyn College
Brooklyn, New York (March, 2011)
Please visit The Varieties Corpus
Please visit The Center for Psychedelic and Consciousness Research

David,
I’m captivated by your work. I had (several) mystical experiences, two in particular in the summer, 2021, that were transformative. I find your statistic that 30-35% of people have some type of mystical/transcendent experience heart-warming. I’ve questioned my sanity more than once because of these experiences. As a person in recovery, I suspect that prevalence statistic would be much higher within the recovery communities. I first became aware of William James’ seminal book, The Varieties of Religious Experience, several decades ago, and I love the deep-dive you’ve taken into his work. I’d be open to sharing the experiences I’ve had, but I suspect you get this request a lot.
Thank you! Your work is very meaningful to me.
Kathe
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I am a psychologist from Medellín – Colombia and I would like to tell you, Professor, that reading some of your research pappers has been a great experience for me, especially, I found very interesting the Overview Effect. I just want to thank you.
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