Exciting New Stuff

The Work Advances!

It’s been a while since I posted an essay here, but things have hardly been still, from podcasts to interviews to gatherings to book writing, etc. Thought I’d share some of the exciting things going on in recent weeks.

1. A Contribution to ‘Transcendent Naturalism’

John Vervaeke and Gregg Henriques are doing excellent work to chart a naturalistic framing of human meaning, spirituality, and the sacred in their new YouTube series Transcendent Naturalism. Wow, this is important stuff! I was honored to be a part of the discussion, with two episodes in which I synthesize their work in the context of my own:

Episode #7

Episode 8

Highly recommend the whole series if you have the time.

2. The Normativity and Complexity Discussion!

Does complexity have a normative aspect? That is, is there any way in which complexification relates to greater goodness? This is a complicated issue that easily and often falls into nasty oversimplifications. With Dr. Michael Mascolo, I finally got the deep, nuanced debate I’ve been craving on the subject! Dr. Mascolo worked with Kurt Fischer on the Dynamic Skill Theory model of hierarchical complexity and has also written on “relational morality.” I deeply enjoyed getting into this issue with him, and I think we explored some crucial terrain. Easily one of my favorite conversations on the Metamodern Spirituality podcast so far, so don’t miss this one. I hope to have him back to continue the thread.

The entire playlist of podcast interviews can be found HERE, and includes recent chats with Jared Morningstar on ‘Islam and Metamodernism’ and Bonnitta Roy on ‘The Limits of Complexity—also great conversations!

3. Voices with Vervaeke

The follow-up conversation to my chat with John Vervaeke about metamodern Neoplatonism has finally published in which we discuss meaning, mysticism, meditation, and other things. Here’s both episodes, the first on my channel published some time ago and the second on his which published just a few days ago:

Chat 1 on Metamodern Spirituality:

Chat 2 on Voices with Vervaeke (new):

4. Metamodern Sacred Harvest

At the end of August, I invited folks to Sky Meadow for a get-your-hands-dirty harvest party, in which we brought in the potatoes, beans, and carrots and stacked the winter’s firewood.

On Sunday night, we closed with a harvest meal prepared by Erin. Yum!

An incredible write-up of the whole event was done by Tony Wolf if you’re interested to hear more about this magical gathering:

https://cultpunk.art/2023/08/30/sky-meadow-a-place-to-be/

Keep it in mind for next year, as we hope to make these harvests a recurring event!

5. Books!

Finally, as a teaser, I’ll say that another book is now in the can: a 200 page introduction to metamodernism, in which I offer my take on the whole enchilada of metamodern discourse by synthesizing the major writers on the topic. Many people have been asking for something like this, and I felt it was an important thing to have out there. If you’re still one of those people asking, “So…what IS this metamodernism thing, exactly? I still don’t get it,” then this is for you. Also, if you’ve been in the scene for some time and read the various books and know the major ideas and feel you know quite well what metamodernism is, this book is still for you, as it will offer some clarity as to how they all hold together and relate. So it’s fun for the whole family. More info coming soon.

This book was actually an interruption of my major book project at the moment, provisionally titled The Evolution of Meaning: Learning, Value, and the Sacred in a Complexifying Universe, which at 500 pages is currently about half-way done. Now that the metamodernism book is done, I can get back to that tome, which I hope to put out sometime next year (publisher wanted). Stay tuned.

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More big projects are currently underway, about which I’ll be saying more soon. They include a new organization and press, a new academic journal, some exciting new retreats being planned at Sky Meadow, and other goodies. I also just presented to Michael Levin’s lab on Gödellian “worldview incompleteness” and “cultural light cones,” which will be publishing soon. Somewhere in there I need to find the time to do my day job, manage a retreat center, and get married at month’s end. Heck, maybe even post a few Substack articles here or there…

Cheers