Richard Doyle earned his Ph.D. in Rhetoric at UC Berkeley. He was the Mellon Post Doctoral Fellow in History and Social Science of the Life Sciences at MIT in 1993. Professor of Rhetoric, Doyle holds appointments in English, Science Technology & Society and the College of Information Science and Technology at Penn State University and was Visiting Associate Professor at UC Berkeley, Department of Rhetoric in 2003.

Doyle teaches courses in the history and rhetoric of emerging technosciences - sustainability, space colonization, biotechnology, nanotechnology, psychedelic science, information technologies, biometrics - and the cultural and literary contexts from which they sprout. Professor Doyle has published two books: On Beyond Living: Rhetorical Transformations of the Life Sciences(Stanford, 1997) and Wetwares:Experiments in PostVital Living( Minnesota, 2003) - in a putative trilogy about emerging transhuman knowledges. These knowledges and practices, linked to molecular biology, artificial life, nanotechnology, psychedelic and information technologies render the experiential distinctions between living systems and machines frequently dubious and often indiscernible. This excited and confused rhetorical membrane between humans and an informational universe nonetheless broadcasts a clear message: humans, in co-evolution with the technical matrices transforming the planet, find themselves in an evolutionary ecology that is as urgent as it is experimental.

Continuing his collaborative work on the “transhuman imperative”, Doyle ( aka mobius) has now completed the trilogy with a scholarly book about archaic and contemporary psychedelic media technologies and the evolution of mind: Darwin's Pharmacy: Sex, Plants and the Evolution of The Noösphere, has been published by the  University of Washington Press. Other current projects include a book, Admixtures: Dialogues After Genomics with Anthropologist Mark Shriver.  With Shriver Doyle founded th The Penn State Center for Altered Consciousness, investigating the genetics and phenomenology of legally altered consciousness with the help of a flotation tank.

Doyle directed the Penn State Composition Program from 2004-2006, and serves as Expert, Wetwares and Human/Machine interaction for international organizations and a volunteer to the Penn State Center for Sustainability More about mobius' work and teaching can be found by browsing his web site.

Some Texts

Configurations - A Special Issue on Psychedelic Science

A Somewhat Recent Text - __Divining Ayahuasca__Discourse, 27.1 (Winter 2005), pp. 6–33. Download, read, respond....

Williams S. Burroughs, Life Scientist, in celebration of the 50th Anniversary of the Publication of Naked Lunch ( A draft - Revised version now published in Naked Lunch@ 50: Anniversary Essays

Just Say Yes to the Noosphere - MAPS Special Issue on technology and psychedelics

Blog by mobius - Makin' links and sequences in a wiki way in a most kairotic way

Some Podcasts,Talks & Interviews

The Poetry of Plants and the Ecodelic Programming of Consciousness - an interview with Erik Davis and Majah D'Aoust on Expanding Mind

The Intertwingularity is Here - an interview with R.U. Sirius

Part One of an Interview on Motherboard with Jason Silva of Current TV and the Hybrid Realities Institute

Language, Ancient Internets, and LSD -  Part Two of an Interview with Jason Silva

Rhetorics of Consciousness - An Interview with Yukiko Bowman and Julianne Gola of  C-Lab, Columbia University

Phytopsyche

A talk on Plant Intelligence for the American Anthropological Association, delivered by Dorion Sagan

Healing with Plant Intelligence: A Report from Ayahuasca 

A Talk for the Society of Anthropology of Consciousness, March 2010

Scaling the Noosphere

A TedX Talk@PSU

Darwin's Pharmacy- Part Two of an interview with Joanna Harcourt Smith Reality Sandwich and Future Primitive.

The Ecstasy of Language - An interview with Joanna Harcourt Smith of Reality Sandwich and Future Primitive

Expanding Mind  - "Schrodinger's metaphysics, plant intelligence, and bicycling into the noosphere" With Erik Davis and Majah D'Aoust

Feet to the Noosphere, or "The Noosphere Is!"  March 22, 2009

Radio Free Noosphere - bootstrapping collective consciousness through micromedia, featured on Feet to the Fire, Alternative Talk Radio for the Times.    

\"Two Hours of Nothin'\" As is His Want, mobius talks about Nothing for Two Hours, featured on Feet to the Fire, Alternative Talk Radio for the Times.

\"Radio Free Consciousness\" mobius talk radio on consciousness & psychedelics

Just Say Yes to The Noösphere - a talk at Stanford University Law School

Psychedelics R Information Technologies A talk at Rice University Computer and Information Technology Institute

Ayahuasca Montage: Why Psychonauts Should (and Do) Interrupt Themselves Continually - A talk given to the Society for Literature, Science and Art, Amsterdam, Netherlands, June 2006.

A Transmission From the Vast Active Living Intelligent System From Da Grasshopper Lies Heavy, A spoken Wyrd Opera

Biometrics and the Human/Plant Interface - A talk given at the 'Beyond Biopolitics' symposium at the Center for the Study of Women and Society, CUNY Graduate Center of New York, March 2006.

Omphalosophia - Towards a Copenhagen Interpretation of Living Systems in Museums, With Special Reference to John Lilly, presented in telepresence to Copenhagen

LSDNA - 2001 talk on, yes, LSD and DNA, at Penn Writer's House, Courtesy of the Slought Foundation

Composing the Sacred Podcasts

"Let the Seeking Become Strong"  - Week 1 of a course, Composing the Sacred

In The Cloud - Week 2

Perennially Pink: From the Cloud of Unknowing to the Dark Side of the Moon - Week 3

Declaration of a Quest: Who Knows?!

Mobius available as hapticlattice on Skype and IM. IM and Skype office hour Wednesdays 3:30-4:40 pm Eastern.

OtherDoyleWikis

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