Hello and welcome to the Essentia Readings podcast. My name is Nadia and I’ll be bringing you content from a wide range of contributors: scholars, journalists, philosophers, scientists, and academics. All to do with that ineffable thing we call consciousness. What is the underlying nature of reality? How do we explain our experience of the world and others? And what are the real implications of viewing existence from an idealist perspective, rather than the prevalent metaphysical model of materialism? These questions and more will be tackled in the episodes to come, and so whether you’re savvy or simply curious, I invite you to join us on this journey of discovery. The article I’ll be presenting today is actually the first one I read back when the Essentia Foundation website was launched. As soon as I saw the tag “Mythology”, I couldn’t click fast enough. As a longtime lover of mythology and fantasy fiction, I knew that was where I should begin, and so it seems only appropriate that we begin here too. Fellow geeks, this one’s for you.