Fevered Egos

How Civilization Taught Us to Worship the Human Ego

Fevered Egos: How Civilization Taught Us to Worship the Human Ego

Why do we keep electing tyrants, worshiping narcissists, and celebrating antiheroes—while pretending to hate them? Why do our systems reward cruelty, performance, and domination, even as they leave us anxious, divided, and lost?

Because our civilization is built on a trance: the hallucination of the ego.

Drawing on neuroscience, psychology, history, and culture, Fevered Egos exposes how the left hemisphere of the brain’s cerebral cortex—our mapmaker and narrator—hijacked human perception, crowned itself reality, and built empires in its own image. From agriculture to religion, from kings to algorithms, the ego has been enthroned for millennia.

But the trance can be broken.

This book doesn’t just diagnose the disease of ego-based civilization. It shows the exits: how rebalancing perception, rebuilding compassion, and redesigning our systems can dissolve the hallucination and return us to what is real.

Blending sharp critique with clear science—and bookended by the prophetic comedy of Bill Hicks—Fevered Egos is a guide for anyone ready to see through the illusion, reclaim presence, and stop mistaking the map for the territory.

It’s just a ride. And we can change it anytime we want.