Introduction to the Socratic Search Space
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- Опубликовано: 30 янв 2025
- Philosophy has an ambiguous relationship with “resolving” personal problems. It often concerns itself with big ideas. But big ideas only become real in the concrete experience of life, and the pains that come with moment-to-moment decisions. When we obsess over specific problems, we tend to lose the big picture. When we abstract to the big picture, we can lose the relevance and vitality that exist in specific problems. Philosophy fails us if it does not hold these two scales in tension. But if we put them in dialogue, we can notice patterns we couldn’t see before, and find perspectives that can change our capacities for action and decision.
The Socratic Search Space is a practice that helps to hold this tension, and search it for insight. In this exercise, a group of four people convene around one participant’s problem. The problem is introduced, explored, and translated into a dilemma. The dilemma invites each participant to share the tension, to bear part of the burden, and to find a virtue that can respond to the feeling of impasse. The Socratic Search Space is the evolution of the Dialectic into Dialogos practice. It does not try to solve our problems outright, but helps us to find fellowship within our dilemmas, and opens a communal space for curiosity, inquiry, and contemplation.
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I miss the days when practices shared and explored in After Socrates were out there for everyone to see and not hidden behind a paywall. I would love to at least see it before considering a course purchase. I'm often not available during those times and now as much of the world can't benefit from this work.
I understand that the organization has grown and more people need to be paid, but as the focus shifts to a walled garden locked behind a paywall, the less access this has and it feels more and more like an in-group. A guru-ification. "To engage and learn, you must buy our courses".
I don't think Awakening from the Meaning Crisis and After Socrates were made with that kind of spirit. I'd like to be open to the idea that this is still in good faith, but it's unfortunate that as a viewer of yours I'm getting less and less access and resources.
Well said. I've been saying the same thing for the last few months. Compared to the early days of Awakening from the Meaning Crisis and Voices with Vervaeke, his recent content has felt really inauthentic. He rarely uploads on YT anymore and when he does it's usually to advertise a "course" like this that's locked behind a very expensive paywall. I've said it before and I'll say it again: I believe there are certain people behind John at the Vervaeke foundation who are pulling the strings and turning his whole project into a money-making scheme. I refuse to believe that John himself would treat us, his long time followers, like this.
RIght. Is monetizing the practice an example of virtue? Buddha dhamma is always free, and it probably works better. : D
Dude has to make $.. & pay his help. He has done & is still doing a lot for people. It's difficult not to change(& is usually practical) a bit- alll the time. Luckily he's put so much free stuff out, I'm sure y'all could circle back around & learn some more. Js
Over the last five or six years, I’ve admired and benefited from your work immensely, John. It seemed to genuinely embody the Socratic spirit of inquiry. But I can no longer ignore what feels like a departure from those ideals. To see teachings of such value-rooted in the legacy of someone who rejected material gain-transformed into high-priced courses marketed with vague promises is disheartening. This feels less like a continuation of Socratic dialogue and more like the commodification of philosophy, closer to the sophistry Socrates himself opposed. With each new "course" (hidden behind a very expensive paywall) that pops up on this channel I grow more and more exasperated by this modern sophistry. The tension I now hold is not one of insight, but of disappointment. I'm afraid I'm now going to have to take a break from John and his channel for a while.
Sadly, yes… Reading OP’s comment felt eerily familiar, my gratitude is all I can give back…
People still need to eat, especially if the goal is to expand the pool of those putting their time and commitment to the project. Didn't Socrates predominantly serve as mentor to Athenian elites?
With that said, in my opinion, a Sam Harris/Waking Up model that is subscription/donation based would be awesome as a tool to distribute Vervaeke foundation content into mainstream (without negating how amazing this RUclips channel is in of itself. Of course, Harris does have the benefit of over 2 decades of mainstream celebrity that allowed him to sustain his current model.
Additionally, if the broader goal is to eventually build some degree of institutionalized structure with Vervaeke foundation at its root, that would necessarily require lots of resource accumulation.
@@lipto722 I am more in agreement with this comment. I have benefited immensely from everything that is free, namely AFtMC and AS, and if these courses help them grow more power to it. I don't even think the courses would be that good, specifically with the framing of trying to develop an ecology of practices, whereas I think the good stuff is found in the discord and in regular communal activities with this kind of community-pursuit.
@@lipto722yes
@ I agree that people need to sustain themselves, and building a long-term structure like the Vervaeke Foundation would indeed require resources. However, my concern lies in the manner of resource accumulation and whether it aligns with the very principles being taught. Socrates, while mentoring elites, lived a life of material simplicity and rejected payment for his teachings because he believed wisdom should not be commodified. Charging large sums for insight, no matter how valuable, risks alienating those who could benefit most-those outside the elite circles who cannot afford these courses.
I agree that a model like Sam Harris's, which offers accessible content and invites voluntary support, strikes a better balance. This approach would feel more aligned with the spirit of philosophical inquiry as a public good, accessible to all who seek it.
Lastly, while I deeply respect the work being done here, we must ask: Does the method of funding risk undermining the message? If the goal is to 'distribute insight into the mainstream,' shouldn't the delivery model reflect those values-fostering inclusivity and openness rather than exclusivity and high barriers to entry?
Thank you so much. After years of listening to your materials (and other sources of wisdom, and some personal practices), recently I realized that the right path out of my personal dilemma, to "get unstuck" so to speak, is to be in a different mode. I am being in that mode by realizing that, and I couldn't have done it without the loving and caring from others in my life, people like you guys, and myself. And to really be differently, I have to relate this personal dilemma to the broader human condition, to relay the caring and loving onward in my own way - which is the purpose of my being.
I couldn't name what was happening or has happened inside of me, until today. This Socratic Search Space project is exactly the long realization process that has happened and is happening in me - just like when you introduced the term domicide, you name the untangible. But the me who couldn't name the solution is different from the me who couldn't name the problem. Somehow I feel like these two terms bookend my appenticeship, and it's time to take on the journey. Thank you.
thank you very much for all your work on this, John - keep going - always learning & becoming!
This is great. “We See”
Dr.Repetti's comment about team is what I think too, though my internal struggle was real and it was healed by people like you people. I have been living with this internal symptoms too, but these days I don't feel it and it would be another sets of doubting to me, but I decide to live life without team.
Please, do not forget about the paradox of the "Dāna-paramita". It is a message from the collective intelligence you have created. 🙏 दान.
And thank you very much for all your work and time invested. I will support it in the best way i can.
Thank you for sharing the conversation.
Great the offering is evolving but it does come as a bitter pill once you realise all the ecology of practice high-quality content sits behind a paywall. For a curious mind, I was the content was more accessible and open.
What defines high quality is inherently subjective here. A well-documented psychological mechanism shows that higher price tags can trigger greater dopamine release, creating a perception of higher value. This explains why audiophiles might invest thousands of dollars in DACs, even when blind tests reveal no perceptible difference compared to a phone's built-in audio or a motherboard sound card-and certainly not superior to an affordable Apple dongle.
In essence, equally good-or even superior-content may be readily available elsewhere, but its value might feel diminished due to the absence of the psychological allure or status signaling often tied to higher price tags and authority figure.
In my view, developing genuine friendships is far more valuable than seeking enlightenment through paid services. Even when participation is free, I prefer to cultivate trusting relationships gradually. I've experienced dialectic into dialogos practice, and while it certainly evokes emotions I'd typically regard as positive, the process of creating a vulnerable state with people I barely know-without any shared history-feels inherently risky. To me, it resembles a form of brainwashing.
It'd be interesting to talk to Paul VanderKlay and/or John van Donk about how this compares and contrasts to the Estuary protocol. Several aspects sound similar.
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Perhaps Adding ai would be valuable to the distributive practice.
Hey John! Are you familiar with J Krishnamurti's work?
✌️❤️🙏
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The Diamond Approach
Something seems off about all this, perhaps a little too much refining was done and it lost that organic flow and cogency. Things that you all have discussed dozens of times can become assumed, and left unsaid. And completely lost in the near world salad of intellectualized flexing going on. You would really do well to simplify it down as much as you can. Love grows, fear controls.
Discipleship Group
I feel protective and annoyed when I read comments on RUclips about how John etc should provide more free / cheap stuff.
I wonder how many of these people have integrated AFTMC, AS, and all the resources and books referenced therein.
I can’t afford all the courses and workshops but am beyond brimming with things to do in order to continue my journey…
@@kz7115 there's absolutely a lot of stuff to still engage with, and personally I'm doing the practices and I'm trying to embody and integrate much of what I've learned from John, because I really look up to him. I'm just worried that I'll lose more and more recent content, new insights and discoveries, new work, and I'm worried that most of the good stuff will be behind paywalls. I could be wrong, but that's my worry.
Have you purchased a course?
People on youtube expecting to have content to watch for free. Really terrible.... I feel your frustration Bro 😂😂😂
With a paywall, how does this work, do you all pay each other to maintain individualism, or is this a silo with a payment filter to judge a human being by tokenistic grant?
The stage structure is predominantly wicked, the more smart, the less is shared and the larger the tokenistic value.
Yet as integrity goes, is it not ‘care before value’ that permits improvisation at the liminal space exhausted of encyclopedic names without subjective content or ability?
Ability likely being the main feature of being beyond talking and developing a muscle memory of ‘band’.
Maybe we need less rockstars and more community, just a thought!
To know of something, it must first be removed.
What is *being* Socratic as *verbing* instead of objective future rationality?
Presence is to be discovered through *conversation*, what does the word suggest?
Tension?
Difference?
Effort to think instead of borrow?
Is the care of carts before the *horse*
Have you even seen and lived with a horse?
Domesticide is not of the living world in relationship, but of escape.
Could just as easily be a video made by cult leaders talking about their secret practice to try to entice converts. I.e. meaningless word salad😂
yeah, in a way... this is Kumare 2: Torronto edition