關於
John Vervaeke 是多倫多大學認知科學教授，以其在「相關性實現」(relevance realization)、智慧與意義危機方面的研究著稱。他的系列講座《從意義危機中覺醒》(Awakening from the Meaning Crisis) 在全球累積了大批追隨者。他的相關性實現框架——探討心智如何判斷什麼重要——為理解人類認知，以及建構能真正理解脈絡與意義的 AI 系統所面臨的挑戰，提供了深刻洞見。
主要貢獻
- 提出 relevance realization 框架，說明心智如何在脈絡中判斷什麼重要
- 創作《Awakening from the Meaning Crisis》長篇講座，連結認知科學、哲學與靈性傳統
- 將多倫多大學的認知科學教學帶給全球線上觀眾，同時保留學術架構
- 將智慧、自我超越與轉化性經驗視為認知能力來研究，而非模糊的自我成長語彙
- 為 AI 討論提供有用對照：智能需要 salience 與脈絡，而不只是資訊檢索
- 其綜合吸引大量追隨者，但範圍太廣也使學術理論與存在性教學之間的界線不易劃分
細聽
影片與訪談
The Blind Spot in Perception: Cognitive Science, Asian Philosophy, and Mystical Insight
Conversation with John Vervaeke exploring how cognitive science, philosophy, and mysticism converge
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Iain McGilchrist & John Vervaeke: God, Being, Meaning
Deep dialogue on consciousness, meaning, and the nature of reality
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The Psychological Drivers of the Metacrisis: John Vervaeke, Iain McGilchrist, Daniel Schmachtenberger
Trilogue on the deep psychological and cognitive roots of civilizational challenges
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Awakening from the Meaning Crisis - Ep. 1
First episode of the influential lecture series on meaning, wisdom, and cognition
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John Vervaeke: Meaning Crisis, Atheism, Religion & the Search for Wisdom
Lex Fridman Podcast #317 - Discussion on meaning, wisdom, and what AI is missing
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Lost Psycho-Technologies: When Our Minds Were At Their Best | John Vervaeke
Vervaeke joins Hans Busstra of the Essentia Foundation to trace the historical roots of the meaning crisis through psychotechnologies — culturally developed mental tools that transform how humans think, perceive, and make sense of reality. The arc runs from shamanism and soul flight through the axial revolution, Socratic dialogue, and the Christian notion of agape, asking when meaning was at its peak and what was lost on the way to modernity.
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Poetry Wakes You to Reality | John Vervaeke & Adam Walker
A conversation with Adam Walker on how poetry awakens perception and reconnects us to reality.
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Emergence-emanation, Whitehead, Kastrup: a dialectic ontology w/ Matt Segall - Voices with Vervaeke
Segall and Vervaeke work the axis between emanation and emergence: does reality descend from the One, as Plotinus taught, or climb from below, as Whitehead's process philosophy suggests — and can a dialectical ontology hold both? A follow-up to their Whitehead dialogue, set between Vervaeke's conversations with Bernardo Kastrup.
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Ep. 18 - Awakening from the Meaning Crisis - Plotinus and Neoplatonism
Vervaeke's Meaning Crisis episode devoted to Plotinus — how he wove Plato, Aristotle, and the Stoics into a single spiritual system in which all reality emanates from the One, and the philosophical life becomes the soul's contemplative ascent back toward its source.
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Metaphysics of Mattering | John Vervaeke on Life’s Deep Connections
A keynote at "Metaphysics and the Matter with Things: Thinking with Iain McGilchrist" (CPS and CIIS, March 2024). Vervaeke starts from the psychology of meaning in life, where mattering turns out to count for more than purpose, and follows it down into relevance realization — the capacity to find what matters, which he argues is neither algorithmic nor arbitrary, and which LLMs only borrow from us. From there he argues that relation, not substance, is the ground of being, drawing on Aristotle, Nishida, and the Neoplatonists.
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“Science Will Never Be Anywhere Near the Truth”: Donald Hoffman with John Vervaeke
A conversation from Wonderstruck's "What Is Reality?" symposium, recorded in Malta in June 2026. Hoffman lays out his interface theory of perception and the fitness-beats-truth argument: evolution tuned us to see what keeps us alive, not what is there. Vervaeke answers with relevance realization. They then ask why science can never close on a theory of everything, what the wisdom traditions add, and whether a mind needs a body, before audience questions press Hoffman on how his theory could turn out wrong.
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思想連結
Iain McGilchrist
曾經對談精神科醫師、神經科學家與作家
Vervaeke 與 McGilchrist 把彼此的對話經營成一項持續的事業——本站就收錄了其中兩場，從《God, Being, Meaning》到元危機的心理驅力。讓他們一再交談的，是以不同工具抵達的同一個診斷：注意力不是探照燈，而是一種愛世界的方式；一個把注意力最佳化為「抓取」的文化，將失去那些只能被「相遇」的事物。
youtube.com
Plato
受其影響Philosopher of Classical Athens
韋爾維克直接點名——斯賓諾莎與柏拉圖是「對我影響極大的兩個人」——而這份債貫穿整個計畫。美諾悖論，你如何去尋找一個你還不知道該怎麼認出的東西，正是「相關性實現」被建構出來要回答的謎題；洞穴寓言提供了《從意義危機中醒來》從雅典一路追到當代的兩個世界圖像；對話錄則提供了方法：真理只能回顧地被知道，經由一段自我超越的過程。一位認知科學家，不把柏拉圖讀成教條，而讀成一套實踐的生態，然後試著把它重建起來。
youtube.com · youtube.com
蘇格拉底
受其影響雅典哲學家・提問者
Vervaeke 的《從意義危機中醒來》第四講整集圍繞蘇格拉底，用認知科學家的眼光來讀他：詰問法是一種練習，用來當場抓住心智如何自欺——「你可以唬弄你自己」——讓事物感覺切題，卻悄悄偏離了真實。在他的讀法裡，「認識你自己」指的是弄懂自己如何運作，是「你的使用說明書」，而不是你的自傳。相關性與真實脫鉤，是他給蘇格拉底所對抗之物的名字；這句話描述一個流利的人，也同樣描述一台流利的機器。
meaningcrisis.co
Donald Hoffman
曾經對談認知科學家，加州大學爾灣分校
兩人有紀錄的對話有兩次：2023 年在 Theories of Everything 上長達兩小時的對談，最後收在一場「時空是否真實」的正式辯論；以及 2026 年在馬爾他錄製、收於本站的 Wonderstruck 對話。Hoffman 從介面說起：演化把知覺調向適應而非真相；Vervaeke 以相關性實現回應，從另一面讀同一個發現：心智從不接收一切，只接收對它重要的東西。接著兩人一起轉向科學本身，追問它為何無法收束成一套萬有理論，以及智慧傳統握有哪些理論握不住的東西。
youtube.com · youtube.com
