The internet crossover everyone was waiting for

As Francis Schaefer Saïd, "All truth is God's truth". There is a great deal of wisdom in JV's perspective . I am moved by the mutual respect and affection shown by these two men. All our conversations with those we have substantial differences with should be like this!

I really enjoyed this conversationJohn Vervaeke. Of all the intellectuals in this circle I find John to be the most human, spirited, caring, inclusive, and humble of the group. He’s closer to a Holy man in that sense. It is too bad he was hurt by his Christian up bringing to where he is cut off from God. My mom is the same way. I find it heart breaking but I love her dearly and I try my best to be as good of a reflection of God as I understand him so she may yet change her mind. Ultimately it is her choice. God’s gift of free will and I respect that.

LETS GO! The meeting of the century! ;)

So grateful you both shared this conversation. (Just a supportive comment from another Christian in the Reformed tradition paying attention to Vervaeke's work and related developments.)

The series Vervaeke has done is of truly epic proportions - he should be a senior professor.

I keep reading Vervaeke is statements. One thing I know he is is a great teacher and very gracious with his time. I truly appreciate him putting himself out here like this and find it quite courageous regardless if I agree with him. Thank you both for the great dialogue.

oh I had no idea this existed. The best thing about youtube is all my favourite people keep talking to each other.

Obviously you find John Vervaeke hugely valuable. Why you do is still a little opaque to me after watching this. Maybe as a "regular" guy I need more definitions of terms or an accessible low resolution summary. At this point I see a quest for meaning short of being loved by an intentional Creator something like a house built on sand. The house on sand may be fortified by thoughtfully nuanced and thoroughgoing goodwill. Does the urbane goodwill which John obviously has, distract from an inadequate foundation? I'm probably missing the point.

I don't watch all of the 1-on-1 discussions but this one won't be skipped. Thanks to PV and JV for doing what you do.

What I have come to appreciate from both Vervaeke and Vanderklay is that they first and foremost maintain their primary grounding positions and then allow themselves to play with the mystery that each brings to the dialogue which somehow speaks to both their inner consents. My own journey in the meaning crises started 30 years ago from being a casual religious guy believing and fearing in an objective God to becoming a staunch atheists using objectivity and rationality to reject an objective God to now somewhere in the between a space which leaves me free floating but with sense of craving for more, more, always more a hunger for eternity ,and thirst for infinity, an appetite for God - which is never satisfied. My consciousness seeks to be itself and to be all other conciousnessess without ceasing to be itself:it seeks to be God. My spirit says "I wish to be! And my body answers: "I wish not to be!"

Holy moses!! June and July have gotten too busy when it takes me two days to get to a discussion I've been waiting on for months! Thanks for doing it fellas.

Finally! Great conversation. I appreciate both of you.

I haven't listened to Vervaeke yet, but with as much as you've referred to him and his shared interest in meaning, I'm really looking forward to listening to this convo!!!

This was the clearest I've ever heard from Vervaeke and I watch all of his videos. Things just started to connect. Good job on bringing that out Paul! It's also helping that I am reading Charles Taylor's "A Secular Age".

Liked within the first 5 seconds because this is one I've been waiting to hear forever - and hopefully it's not the last! Actually, since I havent seen it yet, maybe I should wait to see if its good... but, heck, given the cast, this episode is guaranteed gold!

This is how you have respectful and enriching conversations with someone who has divergent viewpoints from you. Thanks Paul & John for modeling such a positive example!

I'm beyond thrilled to know you will both be continuing your cutting edge discussions on wisdom, spirituality, psychology, theology, cognitive science, Christianity, and the whole meaning crisis. I'm an avid reader and you both mention books, philosophers, and metaphysical schools of thought which mean so much to me. You are also touching on things which I struggle with understanding about my own proclivities and belief systems.

What a wonderful windy, wintery morning I have had listening to this and writing down all my notes to ponder over. Thank you for the reference to more authors, books, google explorations that eventuate as a result, so not just the 90 minutes but maybe days of studying to come. What a life long learning encounter for me.

So excited about this interview! I will have questions I know after I listening to it.

Thank you both for this very interesting and thought-provoking conversation. I'll be straight to the meaning crisis series next.

What a fun and insightful conversation

I love John's idea of an ecology of practices. This could be very fruitful indeed.

Whoa! Finally, the long-awaited Vervaeke talk!

Watching again today! One of my faves❤️

Paul and John thanks for the excellent demonstration of how people from two very different backgrounds, with sufficient conflicting views in some aspects, can have a real discussion. This is precisely what we need in this time of propaganda and polarization. For in the end we all, as humans have the same issues. And while there certainly are reasons for those differences, there are many more for agreement. I look forward to more explorations in meaning.

Thanks John and Paul.

I get back from vacation to find this video... the perfect welcome home!

Grateful to be part of this culture that is I believe is helping many of us & a part of a like minded movement live a lil better, perhaps.

I loved this! I'm working on a response now because there was just too much good stuff.

Thanks Paul 👍

So glad to see two men be this honest and forthright about their lives.

It's good to see the two sides conversing. I think they need each other.

Yes, finally! 😄

I can't wait to watch this. I've loved John's series and your commentary on it. This is a thrill. Want to take this opportunity to note, I would *love* to hear John's thought on mimetic theory and how fundamental he believes imitation to be in our capacity to share attention, realize relevance, make meaning, etc. You've discussed Girard a bit on the channel, and his student Eric Gans's mimetic theory for the origin of language seems to have profound implications for the conversation that's unfolding. I'm setting off on my own reading to maybe synthesize across some of these domains, but I wonder whether John is familiar with Gans? An excerpt from the introduction to "The Origin of Language" offers a hint of the potential connection to the more pragmatic, phenomenological, and process-oriented approaches of the people engaging in this conversation. "It might help to consider Gans’s originary thinking to be a revision of the (often forgotten) constitutive assumptions across fields such as sociology, aesthetics, anthropology, religion, and so on. Why is there such a thing as the 'social,' or the 'aesthetic,' or the “literary,” or the 'human,' the 'ritual,' 'faith,' etc.? Gans’s hypothesis actually offers answers to all these questions. In reading this book, a good place to begin would be to give the question, 'why are there sentences, rather than signals?,' the weight that has been given to Heidegger’s famous question, 'why is there something rather than nothing?' -in fact to see this question as a more 'rational' version of Heidegger’s. And, therefore, as providing a more powerful and, I stress, still undiscovered, way into all the deconstructive questions raised in Heidegger’s wake-questions which, along with many others in the human sciences, seem to be in desperate need of rethinking."

Thank you Dr John Vervaeke for your work and efforts. I appreciate your passion for helping people sort through finding meaning for their own lives where they are at. I believe this is exactly what Jesus did, using parables. I especially like your points on relevances and placing values on our choices, applicable to everything but much neglected. Hopefully Paul won’t troll me this time 🙃

oh boy... its finally here

Yes I would love to hear about Martin Luther. That class you gave on it John was eye opening. I am just amazed of how much information you have on each of these people. What kind of research do you do? How many hours? Fantastic talk can't wait to hear more!

Wow what a delight

Really awesome stuff

"You're my pastor and your channel is my church" That can never be, or That can never be enough?

When are you going to do a commentary on his lectures? Honestly, I get more from your digests than the actual lectures themselves. But yes! please do more conversations with him

1.23.30 I prefer to read, but I listen if I am too tired or on the go, which is often. I expect it is the same with most folks.

I've been waiting on this for months. Now I just need to pop some corn.

58:45, he is exactly right with that point and is why i had my conversations with Paul because he is able to confront and address this problem. I imagine some pastors will be disturbed by people bringing these existential/lack of meaning issues to them. One of the priests i spoke to simply dismissed them. Another attempted to help but was still almost visibly distressed.

Are you going to talk with Mathieu Pageau sometime? The talks hes had with JP and JBP are very interesting..

Yay!

I wish I’d seen this before I started his 50 part series. At 14:20 here, he begins a great overview of the symptoms (definition, kinda) of the "meaning crisis." When he talks about historical forces that undermine our ability to deal with our genetic predisposition toward existential issues, it makes tradition sound like the population-level memory which has recorded what to do during existential challenges. So, in the Jewish tradition, what do you do when a family member dies? You sit shiva, among other activities. About the loss of culture/traditions upon immigrating or upon disconnecting from religion and the hope of replacing these with meta-psycho-technologies; I’m not sure religion works without "magic", but I suppose it’s an empirical question.

I am a simple man. I see a John Vervaeke video and I click.

IT'S HAPPENING!

Wonderful talk. I love the way this guy thinks and the conversation you’re having. I wish I had a professor like him. But I can’t help but be struck how his description of the flaws and or defects with autodidactic belief systems also is an excellent description of how universities have driven themselves so far to “the left” that many of the ideas coming out of the universities look like complete and utter non-sense to someone from outside that bubble. Inside the autodidactically (is that even a word?) constructed bubble everyone else is a heretic, and those that dare disagree are dangerous. I also wonder if his proclamation that he deeply disagrees with Peterson on political issues was at least in-part motivated by fear of being seen as not falling in line with the politically correct speech and thought that is demanded of anyone associated with a modern Western university.

Regarding Wiki Creeds, that's Orthodoxy, particularly the view on council's being legitimate based on the acceptance or rejection by the people (in contrast to the Catholics classic "the pope decides")

Cannot believe this is the first chat

o man, was looking forward to this for awhile! was great to hear vervaeke's history, gives some context for his project and conclusions. i do find his fear of autodidactism a bit curious, perhaps i'm not quite sure of how he means it. it seems to me that it'd b a bit silly to assume that anyone is a real autodidact, which places the question more on 'what sources are people choosing to learn from' rather than 'why is everyone creating their own knowledge', which to me is a vastly more manageable question. that said, there is certainly a problem in the dynamic between 'accessibility' and 'quality' of information. course, i went to a highschool that specifically taught the skills of autodidactical learning (good ol charter schools lol), which should perhaps be more of the focus rather than 'everyone should just go back into the institutions as all trusted sources of info'. i certainly get his points about the shallowness of understanding and terrible info being vetted thru confused social systems that can come with such a frame, just found his focus on the nature of the problem bizarre and not terrifically useful for making proper use of a tool like the internet (his own project seems to be against the nature of his critique, for instance lol). perhaps i did not understand what he was getting at properly. anyways, loved the convo and really hope you guys do more in the future (hopefully soon!). would really enjoy digging in to some of the 'problem areas' (i'm quite curious what vervaeke's telos is and how it follows from his philosophy, and wonder how his 'ecology of practices' can function without defaulting towards another-among-many variations on the 'newage' - how do his boundaries around this ecology work and differentiate it sufficiently to keep from forming 'mud', and many other subjects of course lol) between you two, and am def looking forward to vervaeke's talks with pageau. big thanks to vervaeke and paul for the conversation!

It's hilarious that he has finger puppets of Yung and Plato. Finger puppet fights is how I envision many of the arguments and discussions around BoM.

A lot of questions I had about Vervaeke could have been answered long ago if I just watched this video. (Doink!)

John, Paul, where's George and Ringo?

1:33:14 For Newman, the ongoing task is to distinguish between "development" of doctrine and "corruption". . .

Bookshelves on right has a lobster, therefore best bookshelves. Kidding aside, great conversation!

If you think you can wash away the blood from the death of God, you don't understand what the consequences necessarily are-- like the ontology of man, meaning and value. The only hope you have is being wrong. And there is good reason to believe you are, which seems like the real crisis that should be addressed.

22:28 "Circling" reminds me of "Collatio" [community meditation & sharing] of Scripture by the early desert fathers. . .

Two of my absolute favorite members of the Intellectual Web. Had to take time away from Paul to catch up with John... :)

1:35:16 More conversations ! 😀 Great !

1:11:48 Yes ! - "aggressive" and "assertive" are very different. . .

1:08:08 . . .words that fudge: "transformation" !

25:00 Spot on.

24:50 Exactly !

The basic reason people today come to Christ is surely the same as it was for St Augustine. In his autobiography Confessions he says, "Thou hast created us for thyself, and our heart cannot be quieted until it rests in thee". That is universal. Whatever the route taken by individuals, it is always prompted by the need for Him Who is our only rest, the source of all meaning. Christ found-crisis over.

Rev Vanderklay: I hope you get to dialogue more with Dr. Vervaeke. You both seem to be setting the foundation for a robust discussion. To the degree that it is not a show, or a competitive cage match I think it will be a fruitful exchange. For a real synthesis to occur ( if that is even possible) the obvious differences and boundaries that separate your different worldviews, projects, recommendations should be stated and looked at -- hard. You may have to turn the comment section off :):) 2 bits, 4 bits, 6 bits a dollar, all for Paul stand up and holler!!! Yeeaahhh !

39:00 (or a bit later) Meditation is an old-age Christian practice, only that's called to "pray ceassessly" (1 Thess. 5:17). It's a good practice. In fact, it improves your life by the margin as you tend to sin less, and become increasingly aware of the collateral damage that sin can produce (2 Sam 11 & 12). Once you realize this, the Commandments trascend the boundaries of Law, and become the scale by which you see yourself die and resurrect every day. A quite meaningful Christian practice indeed.

When he’s talking about these new religious communities being developed via “wiki”, I can’t help but think that’s what Christian theology has been through history.

What is the eschatology of the secular psychological technology? The soteriology?

Supernatural is a new word?? Mindblowing

When did Jonathan say that Christianity would resurrect? I heard him say that “the death of Christianity (might be) part of its story”, and make reference to Jesus’ question, “When I return, will there be any faith on the Earth?”. But in both cases, I take the death part to be in “this age”, and an open question whether the resurrection can happen in “this age”.

I think this is required viewing before I listen to him take over the Q&A this Friday. People have opinions and assumptions about John that go beyond his ideas. Time to hear from the man himself.

Is there a transcription of this conversation somewhere?

When they keep talking about Johnathan, who are they talking about?

I'm following John's course and I feel twice as intelligent as I used to (from a low base...) His teaching style really highlights, by contrast, JP's didacticism. I'd really like to hear what they say to each other about panpsychism, a conversation John mentions here. Hopefully JP won't lever the superiority of capitalist economics into a feature of the Universal Mind. (But he probably will).

19:43 For an early (1991 ! ) "prophetic" movie about this, see: Until the End of the World / Wim Wenders. . .

30:55 or so: pluralism leads to loss of belief in the specific. ‘I have no need of that hypothesis’, the reduction of multiple layers of explanation to the mechanical.

John Vervaeke is the second-most famous professor of psychology at University of Toronto. That's actually doing really well, when you think about it.

I've never clicked on anything faster.

KZfaq is a place for people with time to spare. But it feels like it is a good kind of time use. KZfaq makes ideas travel better and faster than before. You guys are the pioneers- thank you. But Joe Rogan will always be the first of the first of this thing. And I learned a new word today- "deep web" ! I am a deep webber! Fantastic 👍😊

On the bit about social media facilitating tribalism, I was wondering about how that relates to something different or similar I have been doing with how I consume information. What I've started to do is follow my salience, or what I find interesting and only explore in depth people or ideas that catch my interest. How is that different from tribalism, in which you circle around people who think like you. I guess with my salience thing, it seems more like I'm following a pattern or pulling at some strands in a tapestry. Any comments from the merits or problems with following salience? Or is this what we all do instinctively?

Does the Nigerian Anglican congregation that meets in your church building have connections to GAFCON?

Who was mentioned that makes videos about mindful parkour into an ecology of practices?

41:48 On this, see esp: Religion & Culture / Christopher Dawson. . .

I do not expect an answer, but what I would like to ask John: What about the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus Christ? To me that is the one 'fact' everything hinges upon, and with it all other meaning making projects stand and fall.

To answer your question briefly about Orthodoxy in America, it is VERY American, particularly right now. It is struggling to find it's identity amongst plural ethnic identities in a country founded on secularism. Also, it changes all the time. But it's principles don't.

Secular monastery-sounds as depressing as where two or three are gathered together not in my Name. Without Jesus Christ, ultimately meaningless.

55:58 . . .and for the Orthodox: a sure "compass". . . referring to the church fathers, their biblical interpretation, their theology. . .

Discussed here; www.reddit.com/r/Maps_of_Meaning/comments/cewf73/john_vervaeke_interviewed_by_paul_vanderklay?sort=confidence

39:14 . . .lectio divina / collatio of Scripture ! 🙂

1:27:17 I think the church is always the process of "dying". . . then "resurrecting". . .

Nice! Top 10 anime crossovers

2:28 Herman Hesse !

"What happens when we have more people in the church for a meetup, than for a worship service" How do you think the Early Church operated? Even in Augustine's time, there were crowds that came to listen and discuss, that were not yet catechumens. You used to have three parts to the service, for three categories of people: 1. People who come to hear the Bible readings (and then leave) 2. People who stay for the sermon (and then leave) 3. People who stay for communion. I've heard that part of the Orthodox liturgy involves showing people the door, who aren't communicant members of the congregation. So, we shouldn't be mystified by any of this.

I say this very respectfully, I just wish for everyone the Truth of Jesus Christ. As Paul said, For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified.

4:34 hunger for wisdom intensifies :)

55:04 . . .community !