Can Ayahuasca, Mr. Rogers and Mandatory Meditation Help us Solve the Meaning Crisis?

#Vervaeke #AwakeningFromTheMeaningCrisis

The Multiversity Project brainstorms ideas on how to solve the meaning crisis.

To understand the meaning crisis, we need to look backwards. In times past, people lived in societies which had systems of meaning. For example, before the Enlightenment, the Western world existed within the meaning system of Christianity. China lived within Confucian, the Middle East lived within Islam and so on. These systems both unified societies, and allowed individuals to live their lives with a sense of purpose.

Our modern world lacks such a unifying system. Instead, our society swarms with a multitude of contradictory belief systems, like neo-Buddhism, anarcho-communism, voluntarism, Scientology, and so on. The modern individual is tasks with choosing for him or herself what to believe, with no guidelines for how to compare different systems. Many individuals respond to this either by picking one and becoming dogmatic about it, by living lives of quiet apathy, or by embracing nihilism, the denial of all meaning.

So how do we solve this meaning crisis? Should we force everyone to be Christian? Should we become a hivemind? Should the government subsidize Ayahuasca ceremonies, and would there be drawbacks to making psychedelic drugs more widely available? Should we introduce children to mindfulness at a young age? Should we encourage young people to spend time not working, with measures like UBI? And do people who haven’t solved their own meaning crises even have the right to discuss these issues?

Join us on a whirlwind through these diverse and fascinating topics, inspired by John Vervaeke’s course, Awakening From the Meaning Crisis.

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