Wisdom, Purpose, and the Search for Coherence with John Vervaeke | TGS 158

[@treefrog3349]

At the age of 26 I found myself upon a 30-foot sailboat in the South Pacific, a thousand miles from land, surrounded by nothing but ocean. It was a clear, cloudless night, the stars were ablaze like few have ever seen, and the seas were calm. At some point the Cosmos itself, in all of its' infinite glory, invaded my 30-foot world. In an instant I realized what a truly unique and special place the Earth is amidst that endless void. That was almost 50 years ago. I am getting "goose bumps" as a write about and recall that moment. The Earth is such a unique and magical place. It terrifies me to see what we are doing to it. In my lifetime I have heard people scoff at Carl Sagan's depiction of Earth as a "pale blue dot". I am here to tell you that it IS!

[@Kuleto]

Hey stranger but yet friend (I have very often seen and thumbs-upped your KZbin comments from multiple different KZbin channels). Let me tell you a little bit about one of my stories. I suppose now is as good and perfect a time as any it appears to me. I will probably need my PC to type to more easily type this out so I'll wait until I get on it.

[@daviddziuk-uz8ps]

For me it was a warm August evening on a farm in Minnesota in which I suddenly became everything and everything was me. A moment in which you know everything is total and all connected and what you do 2 it really does matter.

[@9340cody]

Thank you for sharing this profound sentiment. I agree that we humans occupy a very unique place among the cosmos, and it's a shame that most people seem to miss this point and focus on their own perceived self-importance while ignoring the fragility of this complex ecosystem. I find it hard to put into words how special this place is, yet how small we are in the Grand Scale. Blessings, from Nebraska, USA

[@johncarter1150]

If everyone who lives or ever lived had an experience similar to yours. It is possible reality would be different and possibly better! Thanks for sharing/reminding!

[@Kuleto]

Eyedea & Abilities- “Now” Lyrics were here to bring the people and the music and the movement all together now we see through repetitive etiquette and the highly unoriginal were here to bring the people and the music and the movement all together now they will lose check it out now, check it out now this is a necessary change from the grim simple and plain gonna exercise that brain to break the chain pain is a part of gain no need to explain we innovate to generate an intricately interwoven tapestry of musical and ethical epiphanies the interest is minimal im on an awsome mission with an angel that can take it all the way to where the sun is just like a runner loving running tryin’a turn it into a simple symphony simple sentiment adrenaline is coming back im in the innercity, where i gotta be a superstar id rather be a galaxy but how you see is so dependent on the medicine the rhetoric and how at any second you think you could sit on the brink of this world is all asleep and i have no apologies i breathe keep my sight on what we ride on let bygones be bygones the migraines dont sidetrack my final destination nothing rivals predetermination to exterminate the germination of a nation that accepts anything thats thrown in its fat face cause when theres nothing left theres no more point to the rat race we dont waste a minute of the day dont be offended what im saying trying to send it all way to another stage a creative alternator rated and greater the crazy maniac mellodies end up all up in your face wait success aint only based on self esteem it takes a sense to differentiate between whats yours and someone elses dreams i felt the screams climbing up my cold spine saying nows the time to put in all the energy to get rid of the enemy... i said it so!... were here to bring the people and the music and the movement all together now we see through repetitive etiquette and the highly unoriginal were here to bring the people and the music and the movement all together now they will lose Cuz music aint good if it got no style ----- sick of the same old thing free us and touch what we cant see twist that knife and watch him bleed lost inside its way too deep someone choke me help me breathe run from mistakes right in my face feels like im running in place

[@patrickmclaughlin8105]

An incredible conversation between two of the people who give me the most hope in these strange times. Thank you both!

[@harveytheparaglidingchaser7039]

That was great. " Being connected and wise is not optional" my motto for 2025

[@nathanielgraham622]

I've spent my life chasing the flow state by surfing, MTB, snowboarding, skateboarding etc. This discussion has been deeply informative. Wu Wei everyday in everyway!

[@mary-anncarleton7578]

Right on.....

[@anthonytroia1]

An entire podcast could be platformed on interviewing Vervaeke. I cant get enough of this stuff.

[@andywilliams7989]

@@anthonytroia1 rebel wisdom did a lot of that.

[@MattAngiono]

His own channel has more content than anyone can possibly watch already.... Okay, maybe that's a slight exaggeration, but I love it and I can't keep up with it all

[@martamalchevski6174]

Yo check out Awakening From the Meaning Crisis - 50 hours of this stuff. It’s BRILLIANT

[@sharonhearne5014]

I came alone out of a restaurant in Lake Tahoe standing awaiting the rest of my group still inside. Out of the dark appeared a single timber wolf which walked toward me and stopped about ten feet away. We stared at each other and there was an intelligent recognition. There seemed little time to react but the wolf did not appear threatening. I heard my party at the door and the wolf turned fading back into the dark. This too was a meaningful though temporary exchange.

[@NateKinch91]

Seeing Nate shift over the years has been really amazing. The moment where he expressed awe and reverence towards what we might well be capable of, yet held that in living tension with the utter despair he felt in relation to what we have done, where we are and where we are probabilistically headed. Really beautiful moment. Thank you both.

[@leightonwatkins9486]

a lot of people have had that shift ,,of course you dont see it when your in it

[@lepidoptera9337]

Most people aren't capable of anything. They are even failing at the most common-sensical tasks and their emotional life ain't that great, either. Would you like the domestic violence statistic with that?

[@leightonwatkins9486]

@@lepidoptera9337 glaring composition fallacy 😀 .."most" ...."anything" ...8 billion people on the planet have you met them all?

[@klausfaller19]

The fact of watching two of my ten, subscriptions finding together, leaves me very positive for the coming year. Simplification achieved by stepping back and taking a more holistic view. One can clearly see that the director of this podcast is practising his own medicine and recognizes that the mental crisis is underlining all the other pressing issues. It takes a loving composer to connect the points needed to start the healing of our mass psychosis. Thank you for devoting yourself to such a noble task. I wish you all a happy new year and a great step towards simplification. Stay sane all.

[@polymathpark]

I've been saying this for years, nuance and humility are the key to wisdom!

[@MattAngiono]

John Vevaeke is one of my favorite people along with Daniel Schmachtenberger.... So glad you've gotten to speak to them both! You must have them return as often as possible! While they aren't gurus, they are profound thinkers and help us connect with our true humanity in various ways.... This barely scratches the surface of their ideas

[@polymathpark]

They talk together with Iain McGhilchrist on a podcast last year actually.

[@MattAngiono]

@polymathpark yeah, I remember that! Had to watch it in sessions because there was so much gold lol

[@leightonwatkins9486]

daniel is evidence that we may have bred with aliens in the past ..lol...that intelligence and awareness is not the nomr is it

[@Seawithinyou]

I am So loving John’s deeply spiritually awakening mind of knowledge As I also so am learning this beautiful Flow of the Now and am becoming so much more at deeply enlightening Peace with our Living Earth Iain McGilchrist is another wonderful professor of psychology and philosophy to also watch on Nate’s previous podcasts 🕊🌏♥️

[@InvertedInsideout]

Verveke is one of a small handful of people I've watched as many hour of content from as you. Glad to see you connecting with him.

[@heatherwallace13]

My FAVORITE podcast EVER!!!

[@ladyintheskies]

Team 💚

[@willwchase]

@@ladyintheskieswhat does team green heart mean?

[@ladyintheskies]

​@@willwchase very short for "I'm on this team", in other words: "I agree with heatherwallace13". Green heart: "I love it". Does that help?

[@idatong976]

What a great start with one of my favourite intellectual persons. And I can''t wait to get more of it, such as the mystery around consciousness. Thank you very much.

[@colorfulbookmark]

Dr.Vervaeke and Dr.Hagens are affecting people to feel happiness^^ Thank you for presenting great conversation for people.

[@puppetperception7861]

I always love when John has the time for a discussion

[@iPaulyPaul]

This aligns closely with ideas I've been exploring about how we can reconnect with each other and the planet. It feels like we’re all circling around the same truth- the urgent need for a shift in how we live and care for one another. Thank you for bringing such profound clarity to these challenges. This is exactly the kind of dialogue we need right now.

[@magentapilot4576]

Important topic. Well done.

[@FermiDeck]

A great conversation! Thank you again for another amazing guest and dialogue.

[@anakissedboyle3067]

Between us we’re a genius, I will come back again to this and take to friends . There are keys here as we can all see, opening doors, thank you,

[@vexy1987]

Nate, if you're going down this road, defintely get William Irvine on the show to talk about Stoicism. So many practical applications for the troubled times/bend or break moment ahead. Thank you both for a wonderful and passionate conversation. You'll have to get John back for that follow-up conversation. Fans of TGS would do well to seek out the conversation between John, and past guests Iain McGilchrist and Daniel Schmachtenberger!

[@jessewest2109]

Vervake also has wonderful set of thoughts on stoicism and neo platnism

[@Kuleto]

@@vexy1987 Weird how people nowadays know next to nothing about Islam. The concept of staying patient during hard times and being thankful in times of ease is in the Qur'an and of living a purposeful life in all ways and doing and being good and upright. Is normative Islam is not like it's relegated to sufi's only.

[@vexy1987]

​@@jessewest2109 Thanks, I'll check them out. I just started his Awakening from course, 3 hours in, great so far!

[@johnbanach3875]

Great way to start the new year for TGS!

[@thomastepfer9861]

Thank you both very much ! I'll spread this for sure.

[@Leksi20]

Wow I expected this conversation to be great but now I think I want to listen to this every week

[@staudingerk]

Stunning conversation! Thank you!

[@ProgresistaGuayaquil]

Este podcast Nate es genial. Felicitaciones. Considero a Vervaeke uno de los mejores pensadores actuales que tratan un tema importantisimo para poder llegar a "The great Simplification" al final de la entrevista Vervaeke propone como seria el paso a una nueva sociedad, es interesante ya que menciona que es "realizable", pero que hay muchas fuerzas que lo impiden, considerando que en otros podcast que usted ha realizado se trata el problema del envejecimiento de la sociedad, creo que la propuesta de Vervaeke llegará no por ser buscada, pero si para replantear los fundamentos de occidente. Considero que seria genial que la propuesta de Vervaeke sea conversada con otro filosofo importante anivel mediatico: Byung-Chul Han. El propone tambien el problema de la crisis de sentido, pero en mi opinión NO plantea una solucion muy coherente yseria muy interesante lograr que Vervaeke se reuna con Byung-Chul Han y Jordan Peterson para tratar el tema del como lograr el paso a esta nueva realidad. Espero algun día verlos juntos. Saludos cordiales de un gran seguidor de tu podcast.

[@frictionhitch]

I have always asked myself what/who I will think about on my deathbed. A mass was recently found in my lung. I am ok. I went home and will continue living the way I do for as long as I can. I feel that in some ways I have found the answer to the question of Eternal Recurrence for me. "Nietzsche's Eternal Recurrence is that if you had to live your life over and over again exactly the same way would you feel joy or dread? Even with all the pain I would do it again for I now know who I am.

[@carlhorn9494]

If I could go back in time and also retain my current brain with its current contents, or go forward in time for another lifetime or two, I wouldn't hesitate.

[@carlhorn9494]

I neglected to add that if I were to be offered to go back in time and repeat my life WITHOUT retaining the current state of my brain, but having to live each breath again as I'd done previously in my first life, I'd refuse vehemently, or commit suicide. Now to repeat listening to this discussion until I fully understand it.

[@frictionhitch]

@carlhorn9494 to what end?

[@judithmcdonald9001]

@@frictionhitch Shall we bring in Sapolsky's no free will lectures??? LOL I honor you honoring your life.I walked through to death with my sponsor of 23 yrs. when she had lung cancer. I am buddhist and death is the most spectacular part of life whether or not there is another lifetime. staying present is my choice.

[@frictionhitch]

@judithmcdonald9001 you have free will. Determinism does not negate free will. Sapolsky is wrong. As a matter of fact you cannot have free will in a non-deterministic universe. What he speaks about is random will. A universe in which you could choose other than you would choose. It's complete nonsense and its most people sense of free will. Of course I make the decisions that I was going to make. That doesn't make me less of an actor. It makes me more. If I made decisions that I wouldn't make then what would be the point of me? Determinism and Free Will are perfectly congruent and indeterminism is incongruent with free will. Do not let these internet hippies confuse you by equating randomness to freedom. You are who you are and the universe made you who you are and it shows you the respect then it doesn't randomize your choices. If you were forced to make a choice other than you would through chaos then the universe would be robbing you of your free will. I am glad that we live in a deterministic universe because that is what allows me to have free will.

[@ideafood4U]

This was wonderful Nate. Solving the meaning crisis could be the key to solving the metacrisis. Fun to watch your work grow and evolve.

[@claraklimovsky9970]

Dear Nate, I’ve just finished watching/listening this episode for the second time (I’m sure there will be more views soon), and I’m astonished. Thank you so much for this conversation. I’m writing from the very global South, where all these topics seem so foreign to our daily reality. Again, thanks a lot, for this episode, and all the others, of course. 💜

[@leonstenutz6003]

@@claraklimovsky9970 In this neck of the "global south" -- which is vast -- the realities Nate & his guests address are very present, and all too real. Greetings from the Bolivian Andes / valleys & tropics.

[@BarbaraMackenzie]

Brilliant. Timely. And so confirming for those of us working with virtues or out there in the healing fields. 🌈🌎 This gives me hope. Thanks for sharing Lynda.

[@oliverjamito9902]

Thank you my HOST Meek Nate for having sincere conversations with our pop John= sincere answers will be given. Thank you for attending unto our own!

[@garyclifford5368]

Brilliant! Thank you Nate.

[@ErnestoEduardoDobarganes]

And I wasn't sure what I was going to listen to this morning.

[@oliverjamito9902]

Pop, thank you for still walking with the HELPER the Comforter dwelling within thee! I think of thee!

[@pookah9938]

May it be so:, all the scales and the ancestors of all the scales who have given beauty to the earth send energy to swell the tide of sane reverent treatment of all life.

[@david81663]

This is surreal, two of the most influential people in my life cross-pollinating ideas!! Can't wait for the next one❤

[@HellYesLetsDoItNow]

The flow of this conversation is a peak experience which is awe-inspiring and helping me transcend the insanity that has enslaved society

[@threefoldbold427]

excellent synopsis and revisit of John's perspectives, with update and application, always a pleasure to jostle with these concepts.

[@d.r.m.m.]

Thank you both, what a wonderful talk.

[@oliverjamito9902]

Yes, love you both!

[@carolsherman9817]

Thank you so much for this video. I LOVED it. I will watch more to learn more!!!

[@allonesame6467]

Holy Smoke! Thank you!

[@_jamesdphillips]

I’ve wondered when you’d have John on, very excited for this one!

[@evilryutaropro]

My job makes me feel a deep sense of meaninglessness but when I help my family and friends or simply spend time with them or take a stroll in the woods or read a book/absorb a story I feel some sense of meaning. I really feel like our society hates people embracing meaningful, fulfilling activities because it’s hard to monetize them(turn you into wage slave labor). As corny as it sounds it’s all about love friendship simple fun and being at peace with nature. Our ego is our own worst enemy

[@gld3gld3]

This was outstanding! I had been waiting for this colab and so glad it happened!

[@frictionhitch]

I think that if you want to become a proper steward for your land you need to sleep under her stars, go on walks with her, admire her beauty, and then court her properly. When your land becomes your lover you will surely love her and treat her right.

[@leonstenutz6003]

Beautiful!

[@CarolFoegen]

Nate another excellent conversation, well done. I'm a stoic been one since teen years because I went through Trauma and the only therapy was psychotherapy and getting at my "feelings" doesn't compute. Socrates, Plato, Marcus Arerius and Seneca to name a few. I still am but I found this culture has moved further and further away and I feel I climbing uphill more and more trying to follow after their coat tails. Oh I know many lived less than perfect lives and some lives as we face today. Yet ultimately I want to break free of the machine before it breaks! I often how many others feel this same way....

[@karenkoerner6015]

Nate, I trust you and your team had rejuvenating holidays. Thanks for starting the new year with this interview. Great stuff.

[@DanishAli-nz3ks]

Here danish from north of Pakistan keep on listening to your❤ videos.i love it believe me nate

[@carolspencer6915]

Good evening Nate and John Yip Yip and YIP. A Truly Happy 2025 to you both. Simply wish to thank Nate and John for many years of contributing in being my very own sanity sensemaking brain gym. Truly grateful, indeed. Story very short. 💜

[@trevgrooves]

I love you guys! This was a wonderful conversation. 🤘🏻

[@alfredmacleod8951]

Great meeting ! We lack wisdom in those days ! Social media as twitter or Facebook are not helping to spread wisdom !

[@jjuniper274]

In college, my flow was Tetris. I'd sit down to play a game or two, and afterwards, I could work for hours on writing assignments. The words and sentences almost literally flowed out of me. It made me sharper. I can't really explain it well. I hope someone understands. As a kid, I'd climb trees, then take off up a hill by myself and climb it faster. I used the scaling of the tree for practice of balance and movement and could climb a bluff in 10 minutes. It was a game. "Dad, I'm going to climb the hill and then when I get to the cliff tell me how long it took me." He had a watch. I didn't. :)

[@myriamlaureano6067]

Amazing conversation..you two are catalylic❤

[@brianrichards7006]

This was a fascinating video. I came to my atheistic conclusions over a period of the last 10 years (I'm 79 years old), and I thought I could just transition into "spiritualism"...LOL. I can't even define spiritualism! I am skeptical about just practicing meditation (although I did meditate for many years). I don't think there is any meaning in biological life except to pass on genetic material to the next generation. But cognitively, I feel fulfilled with meaning as a painter and sculptor. I'm at the point where the few years left to me are important, but in the end, meaningless. Does anyone else have these kind of thoughts?

[@ppetal1]

Absolutely. 11 years younger than you. Say it loud. If you got the energy. Resting is doing too, I recently discovered. I was in a wood, desperately trying to meditate, which bodily I was able to do, so perhaps I was meditating. Either way, lots of wildlife soon emerged. It was like Disney. I love woods.

[@judithmcdonald9001]

Yes, yes. I've studied buddhism for decades and at 77 it's all making sense. All that work on emptiness LOL!!! In the end of all the thoughts, dreams, words, ambitions, desires is emptiness. But it's not without substance -- it's compost for the new thoughts, dreams,etc. and I rejoice at those experiences I will never have. Practice planting tress under which you will never sit. I play music with a new enthusiasm to an audience of birds, spiders and microbes and enjoy the energy of hammers striking strings and the vibrations moving airwaves. this is the unique experience of we who outlive our tribe.

[@Peace2051]

So thought-provoking! (I'm sharing the link with friends.)

[@anakissedboyle3067]

So Happy you’ve met and spoken here ❤

[@oliverjamito9902]

Came with the Comforter dwelling within thee!

[@Phoeagdor]

Great conversation,Nate. John can go right up there and lose people. You both bounced off one another brilliantly, did a great dojo practice. Got alot enthused here, many thanks. There's a good section of the audience ready for mat.

[@HellYesLetsDoItNow]

''Optimal gripping'' reminds me of the analogy of many people who look at an elephant from different angles and yet all believe they know what the elephants 'means'' based only on what can see. Flow state is like having a kailedescopic perspective of the phenomena

[@PebloNemo]

01:02:00 as an artist I come to the realization that my duty towards the world is precisely this, to have wise value permeate the zeitgeist and show people a balanced future. In fact, every time you mention DnD I get a silly smile 😌 thinking about solarpunk rpg I'm designing

[@tedhoward2606]

At 56:30 John makes such a profound mistake that I almost gave up listening to him, but I am very glad I continued, because at 1:23:10 there is a real gem. [47:30] Meaning that came from religion to economic growth is waning as energy pulse of oil diminishes. This has some power, but [56:30] John goes down what seems to me to be an insane pathway. Of course people die, and we meet new people. Existence is both a being and a becoming. There is a history that has me be me now, and the me now is not the me that I was 30 years ago. I have some aspects that are similar, and some that are very different. The notion that the universe freezes and all we do is pile up mistakes is just pathologically stupid. The definition of life I find most useful is: of systems capable of searching the space of the possible for the survivable. Search in this sense has aspects of both freedom and creativity; in allowing us to search not just the known, but the unknown, and the unknown unknown (that which we don't know, and don't even suspect exists - the truly novel). When one has spent a few decades exploring beyond existing paradigm spaces, and one has transcended existing understanding repeatedly, then it becomes clear that one could spend the rest of eternity doing such things, if one was able to stay alive. Such an existence is nothing at all like the one John describes. He creates a straw man of life, then burns it. Yes real life needs depth, and breadth. Living a long time has no necessary relation with how deeply one lives. I can imagine living the rest of eternity and eternally finding new and interesting things to be, to explore, to do, to create. Perhaps I have explored that longer and deeper than most, because it became clear to me in 1974 (as I completed undergraduate biochemistry) that indefinite life extension had to be possible (difficult and possible), which then shifted my focus onto the sorts of cultures, systems and technologies that are required to give potentially very long lived individuals a reasonable probability of living a very long time with reasonable degrees of freedom and resources. That turned out to be orders of magnitude more complex than the biochemical aspects, and took me into depths of biological strategic systems that I hadn't imagined existed. And if there is one simple message from that which everyone needs to understand, it is that complex life if founded upon and sustained by cooperation (all levels, necessarily); and part of sustaining complexity is having effective systems to detect and mitigate cheating on that cooperation. Arguably most of our current economic and financial systems can be characterised as cheating cancers on humanity and biophysical reality more generally. That needs to change, very quickly, if we are to have long-term future. Yes, we can do more together than we can alone, and the reality of it seems to be far deeper and more complex than any of the historical narratives could possibly have conceived of, because the systems of biology and mathematics and the infinite realm of non-binary logics and paradigm and systems spaces simply did not exist. There are many well documented methods of scaling transcendence. I agree we need meaning, and that the existing economic system does that very poorly, and we must do must better, rapidly. I am no fan of going back to any sort of ritualistic way of being. I go far further than John, not nostalgia for a host of existential level reasons (that I will not go into detail here, but can if people are really prepared to deal with existential risk - I have been for 63 years, but most people experience crippling anxiety reactions if they dive into the risk realms I am familiar with without having realistic mechanisms for dealing with them - I have, but they took me decades to develop). I make the strong claim, that we need indefinite life extension if our species wishes to have a long term future. Many of the issues we have to deal with are so deep and complex that it takes decades to build a useful understanding. Mindfulness and movement are important, and so is science and non-binary logics, and they take a huge amount of time to begin to realistically explore and build useful levels of abstraction and simplification. [1:12:50] Nate accurately describes a major crisis of the damage we are doing to biophysical reality through our overly simplistic ideas that many call truth, be it economic, political, religious, scientific, logical or whatever. [1:16:30] John talking about intelligence and prediction and "cognitive light cones" and relevance. Both talk about combinatorial explosiveness. Our intelligence is about ignoring most of the complexity. [1:21:15] 2 attentional systems competing for salience network [1:23:10] John has a gem "Intelligence is that capacity of relevance realisation you use to solve you problems. Rationality is when you do recursive relevance realisation, to check in on the process of relevance realisation to make sure it is not one of your problems, and causing you self deception. Your intelligence is natural, rationality in that sense has to be cultivated. And this is the ancient sense of rationality. We've got a modern sense that rationality is logicality, that is largely a mistake. Rationality is, how systematically, across many domains, and how systemically, pervasively, through your cognition, can you reliably intervene on self deception without harming your intelligence. That's wisdom."

[@oliverjamito9902]

Pop John, just know ye are Love!

[@HellYesLetsDoItNow]

Carl Jung and James Hillman wrote about mystical experiences being directed by archetypal energy in the collective unconscious and not originating from individuals but being actualized by indviduals. Amazing conversation guys

[@laurapenazanatta5692]

I love these two🫀

[@JeromeMcCree]

Way to start the new year off. 👍👍

[@boredastronaut78]

A sense of awe combined with a sense of tragedy. "Poignancy. We could be so much more."

[@oliverjamito9902]

Likewise, thank you for thinking of me!

[@oliverjamito9902]

Will reveal the deepest concerning....beyond can contain!

[@treefrog3349]

It is poignantly "interesting" that John Vervaeke uses Communism and Naziism as examples of dystopian quasi-religious mythologies while totally ignoring the deleterious effects that American Exceptionalism has had on the entire world since the end of WWII. Even brilliant minds like Mr. Vervaeke can be ignorant of their own biases. Interesting, I say.

[@SteveBoyington-i1e]

It is not only the US that has a cultural belief that it's people are exceptional. That thought is popular in many cultures, and it gives excuses to do terrible things to others in all of them.

[@Slick-666]

How many countries pledge allegiance to a flag every morning in kindergarten?

[@willwchase]

Treefrog is right but sarcasm is tinted against Vervaeke’s. Curious. Jung in the 50s said observed that there was little difference between the two remaining superpowers USA and USSR.

[@Experimental-Unit]

I'm fully with you. Please let me know if you'd like to discuss this on a video

[@robertcox14]

"Men go crazy......." quote from Charles McKay, in 1841, in his book "Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds." "Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, one by one."

[@oliverjamito9902]

Will be made simple!

[@MattAngiono]

John has a LOT MORE than 50 hours of online education! That's just ONE COURSE, on awakening from the meaning crisis.... It's one of the best lecture series ever produced, IMHO... Go watch it! Now!

[@carolsherman9817]

At about 1:20 that explained to me why so many people vote against their interests. Thank you for that!

[@bsspkr]

Peterson and Huberman, Verveake and Hagens. I and myself. For me, 25 started nice.

[@graemetunbridge1738]

thanks

[@gunterappoldt3037]

“It's all been done before; I read it in a book. But when there's too much of nothing, nobody would look...“(Bob Dylan)

[@kymbriel]

It would be interesting to put you and John Vervaeke in a conversation with Marc Gafni and Aubrey Marcus about intimacy.

[@martingifford5415]

The search for meaning is just a distraction. If meaning is found, then is it reliable? If meaning is created, then is it real? In reality, meaning is already innate to being. We don't lack anything. We are not faulty. The real problem is that society distracts us away from being. Then just as we start questioning the distractions, along comes the the "deeper" distractions like religion and meaning.

[@oliverjamito9902]

My pop John, just know the Son recognize what ye do!

[@spring9603]

1:00:15 for me personally "in service of a greater good" is heaving a family and a child and carrying for your family. I consider this to be the most important thing in the life of a human being. LE: 1:03:08 agreed and more than enhancing meaning in life, it gives you the sense of being immortal, by passing on your genes, a part of you, you live beyond your biological life. It's the most tangible way to reach eternity.

[@jjuniper274]

Oh goodie!

[@SeegerInstitute]

Wonderful conversation, Nate. I’m just wondering when John talks about paying much more attention to biology than to physics if that can be done within the context of a book or classroom. How do we create places for and shared consciousness raising experience that utilize a deep intimate connection in service to nature from a posture of humility as a way of fomenting, a cultural revolution and finding a shared purpose in planetary restoration.

[@robertcox14]

Let's all shout out that Cain and Abel is a terrible example of what should be "normal" about "brotherly love" being these two gentlemen with such brilliant ideas to share.

[@shaytheo]

As a Christian pastor I am loving this conversation. I can see how modern evangelicalism provides flow but the dogma that lays over it create junk. For my traditional protestant form, the craving for flow isn't satisfied and I've been wondering how we can reclaim that without loosing our theology.

[@HellYesLetsDoItNow]

"I have to be careful, I'm getting really excited" - ME TOO John!!!

[@Skylark_Jones]

To have or to be, that is the question

[@anthonytroia1]

"We don't reason monologically, we reason dialogically."

[@real_pattern]

yes as long as more than one person exists that's trivially true, since no one speaks a language or thinks/experiences conceptually without others.

[@anthonytroia1]

​@@real_patterntry and go 30 seconds without thinking and report back.

[@real_pattern]

@@anthonytroia1 very Deep response. you really showed me that you're experienced with the incessant & impermanent flux of experience. wowza! now, tell me though, how specifically does this relate with the sesquipedalian & confused deepities endorsed by vervaeke or my point? eg., why would anyone use the word 'Dialogos' or 'dialogically' instead of dialogue or conversation?

[@anthonytroia1]

@real_pattern my comment was vague, I apologize. I was trying to point out that when we observed the mind we're met with a running monologue (default mode network). I.e. we use language even when no one else is in the room. Sorry if I came across as short.

[@oliverjamito9902]

Beyond can contain come here in front and remind! Lord can be contain!

[@Mashbass1]

Happy new year as well, Nate. I haven't watched the full episode yet, but a great book I am currenlty reading came to mind as I was watiching the first couple of minutes and it is 'To have or to be?' by Erich Fromm... Highly recommended. Edit: Now that I have been watching the first hour, he actually mentioned Fromm 😅😅

[@MS-od7je]

The shaman can see the flow of the group, the system, the universe without stepping in the river. He knows when, where and why you should or shouldn’t cross.

[@jessewest2109]

OH HAPPY DAY

[@smr5151]

There's seems to be confusion around some of the terms. Psychologically, trauma isn't the event rather maladaptive habitual responses. Dialogics is the externalisation of internal narrative, these are not easily possible by a person on their own, the other becomes a mirror to engage in a reflexive feedback loop. Simply being in the conversation with another doesn't make it dialogical. Effort is made to explore the meaning.

[@2R.de.P]

Very good break in 2025. Perfect 'Reciprocal bootstrapping' between these two. Nate was an Excellent leader of this conversation. This is basic knowledge for the future (not some stupid technology of the CO2 sequestration). Prometheus was mentioned herein. 'Prometheus' or 'Pramatyti' or in english 'Foresee-Forethought'. "Prometheus is one of the Titans and a god of fire. Prometheus is best known for defying the Olympian gods by taking fire from them and giving it to humanity in the form of technology, knowledge and, more generally, civilization. In the Western classical tradition, Prometheus became a figure who represented human striving (particularly the quest for scientific knowledge) and the risk of overreaching or unintended consequences. In particular, he was regarded in the Romantic era as embodying the lone genius whose efforts to improve human existence could also result in tragedy"(Wikipedia)

[@BobQuigley]

"wisdom is not optional"

[@anthonytroia1]

@@BobQuigley 🎯

[@andywilliams7989]

Having children really does take a lot of the bullshit out of life. As I head towards 50 and watch nearly all of my childless friends dwindle into meaningless, into drink, into more and more pointless consumerism, I thank and appreciate my children more and more each day. Even had a late one so as to expose the older ones to the process of child raising before they leave home. (That wasn't the only reason but it is one of the biggest net positives).

[@SolarpunkSeed]

That's not really the ideal takeaway here though imo, given that having a kid right now is the single worst thing we can do with regards to climate change. We'd do well to be creating community, creative anti-consumerism, health, and creating a sustainable planet as our "purpose".

[@andywilliams7989]

​@@SolarpunkSeedWhen you have done all of that noble stuff (done it, living it, teaching it) then the best vector for the software update that you have written and made incarnate, is to have children. A child growing up on a sustainable farm, learning all the stuff by exposure (like a baby in a rucksack hanging on a milk shed wall every morning while you milk the goats) makes all the complexity of the day to day stuff just get downloaded and saved into the next generation. I also teach the same stuff to techno fugitives looking to live sustainably..mostly their parents are guilty of having coddled them all the way to thirty, leaving them rudderless, intellectually paralysed, spiritually narcissistic and physically unchallenged. They are worried, stressed and in a state of total procrastination because they self debate about which way they tie their shoelaces and if one way or the other will better reduce their carbon footprint.😂 Seriously, having a child is the single worst thing anyone could do??? I can think of loads of stuff worse than that.. like having a child and coddling it until thirty yes...giving a child 6000$ of tech gadgets over a fifteen year period and not even teaching them to cook or wash up...Yep that's bad...having a child when you have already rewritten the software as best you can...that is called continuity and investment and especially meaning.. There is no point in 'saving the planet if it is to be filled with joyless sterile doomers..not a world I want to live in. And building community and having children goes hand in hand. Here, just based around the permaculture workshops and a whole variety of practical workshops for the kids (pottery, basket weaving, up cycling, music, dance, painting, theatre...) we have a sustained community of 300 people who all try their best to change the software, willing to help out and barter and organise stuff...i'd say that without the kids, we would never have done all that..

[@SolarpunkSeed]

@@andywilliams7989 That sounds wonderful. Yeah, if we can help ensure the next generation has a better world, and has the skills and inspiration to keep creating sustainably with great ideas, that's fantastic.

[@SolarpunkSeed]

@@andywilliams7989 Interesting that it worked out that way for you, but yeah, it's indeed entirely possible for people to dynamically engage with the world in these ways without having kids. As a world we also desperately need more rich holistic community and learning that isn't just in the family context. Stabilizing / lowering overall human population is also indeed helpful at this time, until we can figure out how to live more sustainably as a post-capitalist species, and with more big lifespan extension breakthroughs on the horizon.

[@andywilliams7989]

@SolarpunkSeed The overall population level is fine, it's the way we use resources that is the problem. Indeed

[@ClearMystic]

1:29:22 5-meo-dmt is the answer for waking up. This is the most potent medecine that brings a profound mystical experience, one that is in a league on its own, on the MEQ-30 mystical experience scale. Hope you and John can talk about it in a future episode.

[@christopherbagley2318]

"We don't need the French revolution, we need the axial revolution." Well said.

[@leightonwatkins9486]

happy ny nate ...when you doing the mmt vid man? ..all the best

[@TennesseeJed]

❤