Is Your Mortality a Fatal Event?

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Is there something potentially deeper than just a lack of meaning that speaks to the fact that we're vulnerable to despair? Ernest Becker talked about in his book, Denial of Death, about the fear of death and being an important motivator in our life. Is it possible that this kind of search for meaning is coupled or can be seen from the perspective of trying to escape the thought of one's own mortality?

John Vervaeke is a psychologist and cognitive scientist at University of Toronto. Please support this podcast by checking out our sponsors:
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Books mentioned:
Flow: https://amzn.to/3cQDby9
On Bullshit: https://amzn.to/3PZDvYW
The Denial of Death: https://amzn.to/3KsIctp

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OUTLINE:
Here’s the timestamps for the episode. On some podcast players you should be able to click the timestamp to jump to that time.
(00:00) – Introduction
(07:03) – Meaning
(27:17) – Consciousness
(36:17) – Relevance realization
(47:40) – Wisdom
(54:54) – Truth
(59:38) – Reality
(1:11:59) – Meaning crisis
(1:35:27) – Religion
(1:43:17) – Nontheism
(1:58:26) – Distributed cognition
(2:16:37) – Flow
(2:36:35) – Psychedelics
(2:45:03) – Marxism and Nazism
(2:57:08) – Evil
(3:01:19) – Powerful ideas
(3:08:10) – Advice for young people