Strange Attractor Roundtable - Ep1 with Z.Stein, J.Johnson, D. Görtz, R. Eshelman & A. Bard

In the last couple of years, we have witnessed the emergence of different meta-models, theories, and future visions which try to go beyond the worldview of postmodernism: a strange attractor that seems to run on new and exciting algorithms. But what—if anything—do all of these models and movements have in common?

Is there a shared deep-structure that is expressing itself, not only in new and more complex ways of thinking and cognition, but also in geopolitics, science, industry, religion, ecology, sexuality, parenting, culture, technology, architecture, the arts—and in every other area of contemporary life. Is there a strange attractor that emerges after postmodernity? What are its shape and characteristics?

What new and exciting vistas and opportunities do these new vistas open up for us? Can they contribute to solving the existential problems of the current meta-crisis? What are the moral and ethical injunctions that we could infer from the present emergence of these meta-tribes.

In this Roundtable-series - hosted by PARALLAX - we invite a multitude of ‘post-postmodern’ pioneer—thinkers, psychologists, sociologists, philosophers, educators, economists, and artists—to have an interdisciplinary discussion about the essence of Post-Postmodernity – given there is such a thing. More precisely, this podcast-series is an experiment which seeks to find out whether these movements and models after Postmodernity have something in common. Can these movements leave their respective bubbles and contribute something essential to the development of the world we live in? That is our primary question.

Guests of Ep. 1:

Daniel Görtz: Political philosopher and sociologist. Daniel Gortz is a leader of "the Nordic school" of metamodernism and co-author of “The Listening society” as well as “ Nordic Ideology”, which take post-postmodern developmental awareness in a secularized direction toward the truly comprehensive politics our world needs.

Zach Stein: Studied philosophy and religion at Hampshire College, and then educational neuroscience, human development, and the philosophy of education at Harvard University. He wrote two books, “Social Justice and Educational Measurement” and “Education in a Time Between Worlds”, and is now involved with the Consillience Project.

Jeremy Johnson: Jeremy Johnson, MA, is a scholar, writer, and editor for Revelore Press and founder of Nura Learning. He received his masters in Consciousness Studies from Goddard College, where he studied the intersections of media ecology, the structures of consciousness and depth psychology. He is the author of Seeing Through the World: Jean Gebser and Integral Consciousness.

Raoul Eshelman: is a Slavist teaching at the Ludwigs-Maximilian University in Munich. He studied Political Science, German and Slavics. As of the late 1990s he became more and more interested in comparative literature and film studies; His scholarship is now evenly divided between Russian, Czech and Comparative Literature, with the focus mainly on performatism, an epochal concept of post-postmodernism.

Alexander Bard: Alexander Bard is a Swedish author, lecturer, artist, songwriter, music producer, TV personality, philosopher and political activist, and one of the founders of the Syntheist movement along with his co-author Jan Söderqvist. His books include “The Futurica Trilogy”, “Digital Libido” & “Syntheism”.

[BrendanGrahamDempsey]

Enjoyed this. Would love to see more explicit comparing/contrasting of their different articulations of this post-postmodern attractor (metamodern vs. performatist vs. integral vs. syntheism vs. "between worlds" paradigms). Where do they fully overlap? Where do they differ? Why?

[krakatit]

Problem with Alexander Bard is that he completely makes up a lot of history for himself, for his own joy.

[RossHostetter]

I experienced this fascinating conversation as a call to action on various initiatives I have in the works, including claiming some 'teacherly authority' with the legal community I'm part of, creating better normative structures, and working on my next work of fiction. Zach, it was nice to see you again and learn a bit more about what you're up to. Well done!!

[lynnlavoy]

What a delight in my inbox this morning. Thank you gentlemen!