In ‘The Matter with Things’, Iain McGilchrist tackles the big questions: Who are we? What is the world? How can we understand consciousness, matter, space and time? What happens if we neglect the sacred and divine?

He argues that we have become enslaved to an account of things dominated by a partial view dominated by the brain’s left hemisphere, one that blinds us to an aweinspiring reality that is all around us, had we but eyes to see it. He suggests that in order to understand ourselves and the world we need science and intuition, reason and imagination, not just one or two. When we do, we tap into an understanding that is both profound and beautiful, in line with the deepest traditions of human wisdom.

Dr. Iain McGilchrist is a psychiatrist, philosopher and literary scholar. He is a Quondam Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, a Fellow of the Royal College of Psychiatrists and of the Royal Society of Arts, as well as a former Clinical Director of the Bethlem Royal & Maudsley Hospital, London. With a gift for synthesising neuroscience, culture and philosophy, his thought has provided essential frames for making sense of the times we live in and proved particularly influential on Rebel Wisdom over the years.

Video Overview:

0:00 Introduction
4:27 New book 'The Matter with Things'
15:17 Previous book, 'The Master and His Emissary'
30:45 What is true?
39:09 What is mind?
47:36 The sense of the sacred
52:38 Opposites
59:55 Is polarisation bad or necessary?
1:07:55 Is the world getting better or worse?
1:12:23 The God question
1:17:48 The sacred and the quantum
1:20:13 Lessons to take from the new book
1:29:35 Closing