In Pluribus, Enlightenment Mostly Sucks

The fascinating dharma of Apple TV's most-streamed show

Note: I had planned to write about Pluribus before this past weekend’s cascade of news. Then, after writing about the news for the Forward, I needed a break from it, so I decided to write about Pluribus again. Perhaps you, too, will enjoy the break.

1.

I stumbled into the Pluribus phenomenon. I had no idea the show was rapidly becoming the most streamed in Apple TV’s history (which it now is, beating out Severance). I just read about it and thought it sounded interesting… and became instantly hooked. Like apparently a lot of other people.

Pluribus is a non-science-fiction series built atop a science-fiction premise. In the first episode, we learn that the RNA sequence of an alien virus has been decoded, the virus has been synthesized, and nearly the whole world has been infected. The result: all human minds are telepathically joined together (e pluribus unum). Individuality ends, everyone knows everything anyone knows, and, among other things, all conflict ceases.

Except for a few people, who, for some reason, are immune — including our hero, the pulp novelist Carol Sturka (played perfectly by Rhea Seehorn), a misanthropic, alcoholic lesbian who is cynical, hilarious, self-destructive, and, for many of us in the queer community, deeply familiar.

To the disappointment of SF fans, Pluribus is really all about Carol. I won’t spoil any plot points, but suffice to say the show spends very little time on Sci Fi stuff — Is it a hostile alien intelligence? What are the secrets of the universe? — and a lot of time on Carol’s grief, misanthropy, and antipathy toward the insufferable happiness that the infected, omniscient human(s) now display. In some ways, it’s a very intimate show.

Online, some commentators have proposed that the series is a parable for AI, or perhaps technology in general. The showrunner, Vince Gilligan (Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul), has been friendly to this interpretation. The conversations with the infected humans are a bit like talking with an AI chatbot: ask any question, and you instantly get an answer from the hivemind, but there’s no real conversation, because your partner is basically a robot. Often, the infected humans sound like call center employees, reciting rote formulae with a cheery disposition and no sincerity whatsoever. Despite all the humans around, it’s as if no one is really left alive.

Fan art by confettier ( https://x.com/confettier/ )

2.

Me being me, I was most fascinated by the juicy religious, dharmic, and philosophical questions implicated by the Pluribus universe. Of which there are several.

First, I kept wanting Carol to ask “them” about their now-shared peak experiences. Because of the universal telepathy, one person’s enlightenment is now everyone’s, which is why, I supposed, everyone has a half-smile on their face at all times. If even one person on this planet has experienced ego dissolution, devekut, unio mystica, samadhi, fana, nibbana, or being possessed by the Holy Spirit, now everyone has the memory of it. What is that like?

And, for that matter, what about experiences of the demonic? Does the good (or God) really outweigh the evil in the world? Are the existentialists wrong? What is the ultimate truth?

I kept wanting Carol to ask these things, even though she obviously never would. Enlightenment is not her jam.

Second, the lived experience of all these unified humans is itself ego dissolution. In their experience, there is, as many mystics, idealists, and psychonauts have insisted, only a single, unified and apparently non-material consciousness. All of humanity is undergoing a high-dose LSD experience all the time, but without any fear or resistance. It’s a mystic’s paradise, but it looks awful. There’s no way to ever be alone again, no secrets to hold, no silence or solitude. No wonder Goddess manifests as the world of separation; unio mystica is insufferably boring.

Or is it? Several times, Carol is asked why she wouldn’t want to dissolve her lonely, separate self into the vast Consciousness now uniting humanity. Her answer is a little vague; she never takes seriously the possibility that the bliss of the neuralinked humans is actual happiness — she is a humanist. She wants things go back to how they were, when she was miserable but also alive, human, in relationship, imperfect. And for the most part, the show stays close to her and sympathizes with her. The linked humans (again, almost all of humanity itself) are creepy and devoid of individuality. We’re not meant to envy them, though at times I did.

Gradually — this next paragraph contains minor spoilers but not major ones — Carol gradually learns that the enlightenment of the world’s collective humanity can also be exploited. The humans are incapable of lying, so Carol can trick them into spilling some secrets. They are also incapable of harming any living being, which Carol also uses to her advantage. And they are compelled to eradicate suffering, so they give into almost any request that Carol or other non-infected make.

Does any of this sound familiar? These are some of the core tenets of Buddhism: the ethical precepts, the commitment to end suffering for all beings, the non-reality of the separate self. In Pluribus, everybody is Buddhist.

Not the non-infected, however. The show eventually depicts a spectrum of philosophical responses to this new reality, from hedonistic indulgence at one end to religious purism at the other, and Carol herself somewhere in between. At one end is a character who enjoys all manner of earthly and carnal delights; why not? He asks. At the other is a pious Catholic who refuses anything the infected people have to offer; he is virtuous to an extreme, endangering his own life rather than compromising in any way.

In between is Carol. She is a thoroughly contemporary, apparently atheist queer person who curses, drinks, and makes demands of the humans. But, like the Catholic figure, she is a quasi-religious humanist who regards them as abhorrent, even an abomination. She may not believe in an explicitly Christian notion of the soul, but implicitly, that is her worldview. One unified consciousness may be the heaven of some spiritual seekers, but she is living in hell.

3.

I love these tensions in the show, because I live them in real life.

On one side, I am a ‘mystic,’ though that sounds ridiculous to write. Some of the most profound and generative experiences of my life have been peak experiences in which the default mode network / separate self / mochin d’katnut is taken offline and replaced by something ineffably profound and awe-inspiring. On the other side, I am an enthusiast, epicurean, virtuous-hedonistic Enneagram 7 who has lived a rich sensual, worldly, and emotional life, from suburban dadhood to pagan radical faeriehood, and who also has had several this-worldly careers.

It’s hard to imagine my life without both of these aspects, the world-transcending and the world-embracing. And even long before Both/And the newsletter, my most enduring book, Everything is God, attempted a theological synthesis of essence and manifestation, even including a chart of binaries to be transcended and included. (This wasn’t my innovation of course; it’s core to Tantric Buddhist practice, some forms of Vedanta, and some early Hasidic practices, among others.)

So I get it.

The humans of Pluribus have attained enlightenment, but it feels, to Carol and to me, like a loss. There will be no more artists, at least not in the sense we’ve had them before. All genius is shared now. No more love, since there cannot be love without the individuality of the beloved. Humanity may discover new things, and perhaps even delight in the discoveries, but only collectively, as one. It is inhuman.

And yet, these are all complaints made from the perspective of the small self, and it’s impossible to conceive of enlightened consciousness from this perspective. By definition, wouldn’t the sacrifices be worth it? Wouldn’t the benefits outweigh the costs? Or at least, wouldn’t the well of memories gleaned from the experiences of seven billion humans offer even more emotional depth and delight than one person could ever cultivate on their own?

And, conversely, aren’t the “costs” of our alienation from one another all too evident today? All you have to do is switch tabs on your browser or scroll down your inbox for evidence of that.

So far, at least, Pluribus seems clearly on the side of Carol’s humanism. Even without the theology of her Catholic counterpart, she has a fierce humanity that reminds me of Captain Kirk’s in the original Star Trek. We’re people, dammit!

As of this writing, there are two episodes left in Pluribus’s first season. Perhaps some of these questions will be resolved, or new ones will be asked. Perhaps, though I doubt it, there will be a Hasidic/Mahayana both/and synthesis of unitive consciousness and the play of manifestation; this is the whole secret of lila, the Cosmic Dance of the Divine, which is also what my husband and I named our daughter.

Here’s hoping. In the meantime, I can’t wait til the next episode drops.

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Earlier this week, a friend, colleague, and mentor of mine, Steve Schwartzberg, passed away after a long battle with cancer — he miraculously lived far longer than anyone had expected, and he invited us all on his journey to mortality. He had a great death. Don Shewey wrote a beautiful memorial to him here. If you’d like to learn what a life well-lived can look like, in all its complexity, I invite you to read it.

We also, of course, lost Rob Reiner this week, in altogether more tragic circumstances. I had the good fortune to schmooze with him last year for Rolling Stone; he had lent his name to an important documentary about Christian Nationalism. Like literally everyone except Donald Trump has said, he was a real mensch. The interview is here.

Speaking of what Trump said, if you haven’t read his disgusting post made after Reiner’s death, I suggest you do so here, in the context of Jay Kuo ‘s review of its impact. Like the Epstein Files, this thing is dividing MAGA once again, as more and more people realize the kind of scumbag Donald Trump truly is. If you have a MAGA relative, send them Trump’s post and ask them to defend it.

Incidentally, the Trump post is good news. If you don’t follow the news closely, you may not be fully aware, but Trump’s support is crumbling, his approval rating stands at 31%, and many of his supporters are deserting him.

See you next week.