I think the idea that we "co-create" reality is generally right, but the way you're framing it may be backwards - at least as a corrective to that thinker (Nietzsche) whom you preface this entire essay with in the collage.
Nietzsche's statement, "God is dead," is the definitive assessment of modern disenchantment. In response to the supposed revelation of our living in a cold, meaningless universe, we must - like the deceased deity - become Creators ourselves: we must create something out of nothing, ex nihilo.
You are right to emphasize the importance of mythos for our ability to make sense out of reality, but saying we must "co-create" it keeps us stuck in the same mode that has created the dead-end we currently find ourselves in. Although it attempts to overcome the subject-object distinction, it preserves the parameters (and barriers) that separate us from the world. We remain a mind, a self, separate from the thing we are trying to understand and act upon.
To really break out of this, we must reorient ourselves to the idea that we are PARTICIPANTS in the unfolding of reality, not its creator. It is not we who exert our will upon the world (as Nietzsche posits). The world acts upon us and it is up to us to attune ourselves to it - to the demands of the moment.
I think that is likely what Putnman and Wheeler believed, and yourself as well. But the language of creation keeps us stuck in the modern mastery of nature mindset.
Great comment. I fully agree and just didn't go into this here. I think "co-create" give an interesting mystery and a sense of cosmic responsibility, but, you're right, that's just the beginning.
Yes, I like that. That helps me with certain thoughts I have on technology - and techne more generally - especially in regards to the aha moment of inspiration.
As I have commented a few times upon this article, I could not recommend the book The Inward Morning by Henry Bugbee more to you. Definitely the greatest American statement in this vein.
And The Koinos Project just so happens to be releasing (not to keep doing self-promotion, but this article is just so perfectly aligned with it) a podcast seminar about the book. We also just released an interview with one of his students https://www.koinosproject.org/p/who-is-henry-bugbee
Stop reading about it and start experiencing it. The silent observer of your own thoughts is a great place to start. Hallucinogens can help. I understand meditation works very well, music does too.
"The Inward Morning" by Henry Bugbee - a beautiful prose poem about the nature of being. Or as its subtitle has it, "a philosophical exploration in journal form." He wrote it while on paid sabbatical at Harvard in 1952-53 instead of the expected academic treatise. Ended up making him an early victim of the "publish or perish" paradigm now plaguing our higher education.
The Koinos Project is actually just about to launch a study guide podcast on it. You should read along with us! It is not an easy work, although it is all complete common sense.
This doesn't quite cohere for me, which is frustrating, because it seems to be talking about something special. Your style of writing makes it seem as though something breathlessly exciting is just around the corner, but at the crucial moments it's as though you just take it for granted that we know what it is.
The first key building block seems intended to fall into place across paragraphs 5, 6 and 7 (about the photon's perception [?] of time as one instant, etc.) but it left me confused. I think the ideas and the underlying argument in those paragraphs need to be unpacked and explicated.
The same goes for the two subsections, "The Danger of Trying to Draw a Circle Around Yourself" and "The True Story". These seem to be the pivotal moments of the essay, as you marry the Wheeler/Putnam idea that consciousness is involved in the creation of reality, with the spiritual conditions and flawed cosmology of our own time. But the marriage doesn't quite happen.
I hope this doesn't seem like a disenchanted, reductive materialist sort of criticism. I am convinced that a coherent and truthful ontology must have the stream of time at its heart -- transformation, sublation, music -- and so your ideas are tantalising. But my powers of imagination and inference are pedestrian enough that a few parts of this essay seemed like non sequiturs.
This is probably the criticism I'd give this piece too, in a certain mood. But, ultimately, I'm not trying to make a coherent system of thought. I actually don't think that's possible and even the pretense of rigor is often a comforting illusion. I'm just crafting something until I think it looks pretty and putting it out there as an offering. Take what you like and leave the rest.
If answers do not exist, then your framing of the problem in terms of answers is specious. Wisdom is an internal state, not a semiotic formulation. It can, however, be navigated towards and/or accumulated through the use of language – but only in the sense that a lake can be swum by the use of water.
The linked nautilus piece is a genuinely good read, and I think does a better job of talking about Putnam in a more grounded way.
I have my own biases, and I randomly stumbled upon Foreman's essay. As a someone who studied science, and physics in particular, I have my criticisms of some of Foreman's claims, but I doubt I'd be a convincing counter.
With that said, the nautilus piece is fun, and I think contextualizes things better. After reading it, I had a better idea of how Foreman connected Putnam to his own beliefs, and I found that my own conceptualization of Putnam was much clearer. It's just one of those things where what you get out is shaped a bit by what you bring in.
Great stuff, I'll have to read more of Wheeler and Putnam...
Incidentally, have you read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance? If not, I think you'd really enjoy it. You're drawing from a similar well as Pirsig
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance is indeed a profound book. Robert Pirsig’s story is similar in many ways to Peter Putnam’s, except Pirsig was committed to a mental asylum and given electroconvulsive therapy.
I think that is spot on. It is even more explicit in the sequel Lila.
Interestingly, at the same time (and ultimately also in the same place - Montana), there was another thinker named Henry Bugbee saying many things similar to Pirsig - but I believe at a much deeper level. Bugbee to me is somehow both the greatest 20th century American philosopher AND poet.
He only wrote one book - a beautiful prose poem about the nature of being. Or as its subtitle has it, "a philosophical exploration in journal form." He wrote it while on paid sabbatical at Harvard in 1952-53 instead of the expected academic treatise. Ended up making him an early victim of the "publish or perish" paradigm now plaguing our higher education.
The Koinos Project is actually just about to launch a study guide podcast on it. You should read along with us! It is not an easy work, although it is all complete common sense.
I think you're right on the money with your allusion to the Hero's Journey, as I also believe that this always has been (and fundamentally, always will be) the only effective means of organizing our psyches - individual and collective.
Any secular "myth of organization" that goes beyond that places the perceiver on an metaphysical tightrope between nihilism ("Nothing matters - especially not me - because my individual life makes no difference in the grand scheme anyway.") and narcissism ("Nothing matters BESIDES me, since my individual decisions have no bearing on the grand scheme anyway.").
The localized "self", on the other hand, re-enchants by giving you an "enemy" to fight (your own flaws), something to fight FOR (the well-being of your community) and grounds it in the eternal timeline ("My life matters, because it will serve as an example to those who follow after me - my children, their children, etc..").
It is for this reason that the algorithmic, post-modern paradigm (in the West, at least) has severely limited our developmental horizon as a SPECIES, because it has downplayed the mythos that portrays one's life - and all of it's requisite "adventures" - as THE cosmic mystery to be tangled with.
Cultures, technologies and artistic innovations (or degenerations) are always in flux, but human experiences AMONG these things do not.
Wonderful and needed piece. Enchantment isn't dead; just buried (for a while) under the current myth. We've had many myths as humans, and each one serves it purpose for only so long -- I think they always run up against the limits of their own logic). We'll need another myth soon.
What am I working through? I'll answer this, though it's difficult.
Everyone in my generation (and class) was told "follow your dreams, you can do anything." I always stood out as a bit unique, and was told this more than most I think: that I would do something really interesting. It's a bit like Great Expectations though. It's fine to think that when you're 17 -- but what is that unique Thing one is supposed to do? I never had an answer. I felt drawn to art, to science, to humanities -- I felt somehow there was some resolution to them out there; but how to even look at the problem square on? So, not ever having know what grand adventure to take, I took none. I work with computers, in an ordinary way, supporting my family, etcetera. It's hard to reconcile that with my assumptions from earlier in life, and with the persistent sense that there is some great project I should undertake.
I'm sure I'm not alone in this, but I feel it acutely. To those of older generations, or poorer, it probably sounds stupid. But some ideas are so ingrained in you as a young person, I think it's very hard psychologically to ever give them up, even if they contradict reality.
I find this relatable, as I am 18 and on the precipice of going to college and finding a path to walk. I have so many, perhaps too many interests. Arts, humanities, design, psychology. I've been told the same thing as you, that I can do so much.
I wonder if in my urge to learn everything, I will be stuck doing nothing. I want to do something but I don't exactly know what. I'm trying to forget the impulse to optimize what I do, and just do something. Any free time and energy I'm gifted will go towards side projects and community-building and learning and research - that's my way of resistance to the paralyzing urge to do everything which simultaneously makes me do nothing.
Do you have any advice, as someone further along in your path? Any regrets? Any questions for me? Perhaphs a dialogue between us could remind you of the spark of youth and inform my trek forward.
I like your hope for dialog: spark of youth indeed! Luckily I have three daughters and they do provide that (plus poop in diapers).
I was much like you, as you intuited: too many interests, too many possible paths, starting about in college (before that, you're just "preparing" so it's safe). I'm not really sure what I can say to resolve that conflict (i.e. what I would have said to myself). But I'll tell you four regrets and maybe that will be helpful.
- Everyone said "you're smart, do more education". More more more. I had resisted that idea, but then gave in, because indeed I do like reading and am autodidactic, and had no better alternative. Academia was then the logical career track, starting with a PhD. I regret that. I didn't finish, and so it was a waste of time. You need to be more committed than "it's better than the alternatives". Also the career prospects mostly suck, as the internet will tell you (not a lie). But the advice is really more that education doesn't always help: it just prolongs your period of not deciding and therefore suffering. My sister in law is a serial academic (two doctorates now) because she just can't face real life. Don't do that.
- Pursuant to the above: It's really hard to make decisions about life from a perch far removed from life. I wish I had done Peace Corps or something like that. It might very well have sucked. But it would have been instructive. Take a gap year and do something with a result. A friend of mine (form Europe) went in to the military, helped flood victims; it really changed him in a good way. Thinking about thinking about thinking.... that sucks. Get away from that.
- Don't wait to have your family. You can push that off forever, and you existential crisis will be eternal (or it might be). So just get on with life. Marry some girl (or whatever), and have kids. I mean, do think about timing. But get on with it.
- Our society tells everyone to aim for the moon. "You can be a famous artist/illustrator" if you want to be! The thing is, all alternatives to fame and glory then look miserable and second-rate. It's far, far, better to be in a position where your goal is good but not crazy. If you overshoot, great; if you reach it, you feel good. And these days just "buy a house, have a kid, and read a shit ton of books and host the best smart-person dinner parties in town" is hard enough. If you can do that, you're winning.
- BONUS: This is kind of dumb internet advice but also true. Do sports or some physical thing that can keep you in shape. I didn't totally fall down there, but I wish I had done more earlier. It's easier to stop than to start, so start young and don't stop (change to pickle ball later if you must).
I really hope that's helpful. It's been helpful to write.
What I'm hearing, is that I should get out into the real world as soon as possible, perhaps pursuing something even while I'm in college instead of using college as an excuse to sit and atrophy. By understanding the real world through both the lens of education and personal experience is how I will find my way. And also, aim small. Small is better than nothing.
There are big questions I have yet to explore - do I want a family? What field do I want to pursue? The answers you seem to say come from experience more than thinking about thinking.
I'm double majoring in philosophy and psychology but I may change majors and will definitely change fields based on opportunities and internships that come.
Definitely going to take your advice and get out in the real world instead of getting boxed in my mind. But I do think education can also shift the way we see the world in an important way. Balance, I suppose.
Also I do exercise - I run almost every day! Will keep that habit up no matter what.
I would not recommend changing majors a lot, much less planning to do so. That's what I did: physics, biology, english, anthropology... and eventually double majored in bio and medieval studies. The thing is, opening yourself up to endless choice keeps you unfocused and in the endless loop of "what's the perfect major?" But there is no perfect major, and all the moving around is a great way to stay in school too long (instead of doing something). I wished I had just done one thing. Once you have one thing, you can build on it. And you can be a well rounded person by reading a ton. You don't need degrees in it all (you can't do that anyway).
I also want to be practical with you. Which I hesitate about. I don't know your background or what kind of school you're going into. But philosophy has a bad reputation for a reason. It has one of the worst employment records (especially in the sense of using it specifically). But most academic degrees are like that: useless except for going into PhD-land. You can read philosophy any time and enjoy it; hell you can even write about it on Substack. But the chances you'll become a professional philosopher (in academia) are about 0% unless you are already well set up to do that: are you at an Ivy League school (with stable funding from parents)? Are your parents academics themselves, or well connected in that kind of world? If not, you have a huge disadvantage (like, practically insurmountable one). If you have to, double major in (a) something practical, (b) something for your own edification like philosophy. But that will take longer (probably).
It's better to be focused, and shift when needed, then to be scattered. The world only respects focus and specialization. You can be a generalist, but you have to be specialized enough that other people care.
More than I meant to write. I've hardly used any degree I ever had for work (except on paper). It was all side projects. Don't obsess over your degree too much.
Sadly true for many, I agree. Part of raising a child is giving them vision, if not a vision. Helping them find purpose outside themselves, if not the purpose. Rails, guidelines, a view of ultimate issues, perspective... Self actualization became the buzz, whatever that is; Hitler was self actualized. We dumped Western Civ with it's study of Aristotle's search for the good. We dumped Christianity with it's Clarion call to love God and our neighbor as ourself. We were left with a wasteland. Ecclesiastes is such a search for meaning under the sun.
Yes, I think the idea of finding a purpose to SERVE was never even mentioned; the focus was very individualistic, i.e. selfish. Growing up on fantasy novels, I always hoped to find a druid in a grove (or to become one). Well, I'm now Orthodox -- closest thing available ;)
Don't forget - you asked for something .. something you could shape the rest of your life around that has Meaning.
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My pro-Life arguments to great success in 2+ key articles, God Willing. As far as I know these have never been formed before. The first is dry and the second is more interesting with some rougher language I have not gotten around to change.
Using Constitutional and Natural Law I argue that The State must make major changes or make illegal Abortions or Loose the monopoly on violence, and father or any adult willing may replace the father and have same legal status of father with moral, legal, natural rights and obligations to protect his child from extrajudicial murder.
"Multiverse Journal - Index Number 2221:, 11th July 2025, Court Motion: State is Obligated to Assist Father/Public Duty to Protect a Child from Abortion."
This is in the form of a letter to a Bishop but contains two main arguments. 1st extends Saint Thomas Aquinas' damage from sin, 2nd uses modern psychological method to same ends, the Key-Log that is at fault.
Ever wonder Why is this world insane and most women are so Sick?
Some would argue it started with Decartes long before the cold war. I like the theme of finding a new basis (mythos) to weave the best of materialism and re-enchantment. Too much modern commentary is of the 'Fuck Decartes' moevemtn as I jokingly call it.
this is a good point. I don't know how necessary it is to point out, it may just be moving the goal posts but Descartes is the indirect byproduct of the east/west schism initiated by the latin franks in the 9th century (surface level history marks the schism in 1050 between the Orthodox & Catholic but as with many things, a minimally careful look demonstrates 1050 was "the end" of what began 100+ years prior. It really is the first time we see a sweeping sense of "dis-enchantment" if you will (within the church). And then Reductionism, Materialism & Nihilism would naturally appear in the culture at large as the direct descendants as the next 8-10 centuries unfold.
The Cosmos is influenced by mind; God's mind. Humans were created with a free will; and rebelled. What does it mean to be a slave to sin? dead in our sin? Does our sin change the Cosmos? What might it be like when all things are restored? Perhaps this is what Tolkien and Lewis were exploring in their myth making.
There are parts of this that I didn't feel smart enough to apprehend on the first read so I will have to read again a few times but there were also parts that were filled with such truth and beauty that I felt them to my core.
It feels like the world itself (the human world) is struggling with a massive contradiction, in that it is trying to feed its superficial needs (for stuff, wealth, ‘happiness’ defined in questionable ways) and at the same time avoiding things it sees as ‘discomforts’ (having to relate to other people, mutual support, boredom, labor) when in fact the ‘happiness’ makes us sick and the boredom and labor make us better - like a kid trying to toss his broccoli into the trash and swap it for a piece of cake, refusing to admit that eating just the cake is giving him indigestion while the broccoli would have made him feel better.
This is very jumbled I am not sure I am making sense.
I do question the photon ‘knowing it is heading for one particular eye’ thing, though perhaps my brain just doesn’t warp the right way. But what if the photon falls into the eye of a frog, is the frog’s consciousness then participating in creating the universe? What of all the photons that miss everyone? Is the photon’s journey ended when it hits the eye, does it cease to be?
Sometimes I wish I were smart enough to play like this at the very edge of human understanding, but then I do think the suicide risk becomes greater. I doubt it’s just because of the disenchantment, extremely smart and sensitive people had that issue even before this age. In fact it makes me think of something my dad used to say when I was little and asking too many questions - he would always say ‘don’t ask all your questions today, you don’t want to learn everything all at once. Whoever learns everything, they die.’
I think in a way he was right. People who know too many things…..die.
I appreciate the vulnerability inherent in this essay. It's not common to reflect on the nature of reality and couple it with a story about grief. I had a hard time getting past the initial paragraph on some level though. All I could think about is how many Peter Putnam's there are out there shoving mops around or flying under the radar while the world suffers. Thanks for sharing!
This is excellent. I enjoyed the piece and appreciated being introduced to Peter Putnam. A few thoughts came to mind that mapped closely to your themes around meaning, myth, and re-enchantment:
1/ Your critique of disenchantment strongly echoes Iain McGilchrist’s view that modernity suffers from left-hemisphere “usurpation”—a dominance of abstraction, fragmentation, and control over presence, participation, and symbolic depth. What you describe as a longing for re-enchantment looks, in McGilchrist’s terms, like a yearning for the right hemisphere’s mode of attention to return to its proper role—receptive, relational, and attuned to meaning.
2/ Interestingly, physicist David Deutsch approaches from the opposite direction—a rigorous rationalist path—but arrives at something surprisingly resonant. His claim that explanatory knowledge is infinite leads to a view of the universe that is perpetually open, never fully graspable. Mystery, in this light, isn’t an illusion to dispel—it’s a feature of reality that invites awe, participation, and ongoing discovery.
3/ René Girard offers another lens on myth. While Campbell sees myth as a symbolic guide for personal growth, Girard shows it’s also a social mechanism that once masked collective violence. Myths worked because they hid the scapegoat—the victim whose exclusion restored order.
Modern materialism claims to have outgrown myth, but Girard would argue it just tells a new one: the myth of disenchantment. It still produces victims—only now through systems, markets, and abstractions—while denying any need for sacrifice.
Girard helps us see that true re-enchantment won’t come from reviving old myths, but from confronting the hidden violence still at work beneath our supposedly rational world.
Thanks again for this piece. Looking forward to reading more.
Thanks for this comment - I think you get where I'm coming from better than I've seen. Very influenced by McGilchrist, Campbell (Jung) and Girard.
This last thing you said clicked something into place for me: "Modern materialism claims to have outgrown myth, but Girard would argue it just tells a new one: the myth of disenchantment. It still produces victims—only now through systems, markets, and abstractions—while denying any need for sacrifice.
Girard helps us see that true re-enchantment won’t come from reviving old myths, but from confronting the hidden violence still at work beneath our supposedly rational world."
I think the idea that we "co-create" reality is generally right, but the way you're framing it may be backwards - at least as a corrective to that thinker (Nietzsche) whom you preface this entire essay with in the collage.
Nietzsche's statement, "God is dead," is the definitive assessment of modern disenchantment. In response to the supposed revelation of our living in a cold, meaningless universe, we must - like the deceased deity - become Creators ourselves: we must create something out of nothing, ex nihilo.
You are right to emphasize the importance of mythos for our ability to make sense out of reality, but saying we must "co-create" it keeps us stuck in the same mode that has created the dead-end we currently find ourselves in. Although it attempts to overcome the subject-object distinction, it preserves the parameters (and barriers) that separate us from the world. We remain a mind, a self, separate from the thing we are trying to understand and act upon.
To really break out of this, we must reorient ourselves to the idea that we are PARTICIPANTS in the unfolding of reality, not its creator. It is not we who exert our will upon the world (as Nietzsche posits). The world acts upon us and it is up to us to attune ourselves to it - to the demands of the moment.
I think that is likely what Putnman and Wheeler believed, and yourself as well. But the language of creation keeps us stuck in the modern mastery of nature mindset.
Great comment. I fully agree and just didn't go into this here. I think "co-create" give an interesting mystery and a sense of cosmic responsibility, but, you're right, that's just the beginning.
Yes, I like that. That helps me with certain thoughts I have on technology - and techne more generally - especially in regards to the aha moment of inspiration.
As I have commented a few times upon this article, I could not recommend the book The Inward Morning by Henry Bugbee more to you. Definitely the greatest American statement in this vein.
And The Koinos Project just so happens to be releasing (not to keep doing self-promotion, but this article is just so perfectly aligned with it) a podcast seminar about the book. We also just released an interview with one of his students https://www.koinosproject.org/p/who-is-henry-bugbee
Any book recommendations on this?
Stop reading about it and start experiencing it. The silent observer of your own thoughts is a great place to start. Hallucinogens can help. I understand meditation works very well, music does too.
What do you think the role of logos is in our experience of the world - logos meaning both speech and reason?
I posted an answer as a note if you want to check it out, interesting question!
As I recommended to another commenter here:
"The Inward Morning" by Henry Bugbee - a beautiful prose poem about the nature of being. Or as its subtitle has it, "a philosophical exploration in journal form." He wrote it while on paid sabbatical at Harvard in 1952-53 instead of the expected academic treatise. Ended up making him an early victim of the "publish or perish" paradigm now plaguing our higher education.
The Koinos Project is actually just about to launch a study guide podcast on it. You should read along with us! It is not an easy work, although it is all complete common sense.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Programming_the_Universe
This doesn't quite cohere for me, which is frustrating, because it seems to be talking about something special. Your style of writing makes it seem as though something breathlessly exciting is just around the corner, but at the crucial moments it's as though you just take it for granted that we know what it is.
The first key building block seems intended to fall into place across paragraphs 5, 6 and 7 (about the photon's perception [?] of time as one instant, etc.) but it left me confused. I think the ideas and the underlying argument in those paragraphs need to be unpacked and explicated.
The same goes for the two subsections, "The Danger of Trying to Draw a Circle Around Yourself" and "The True Story". These seem to be the pivotal moments of the essay, as you marry the Wheeler/Putnam idea that consciousness is involved in the creation of reality, with the spiritual conditions and flawed cosmology of our own time. But the marriage doesn't quite happen.
I hope this doesn't seem like a disenchanted, reductive materialist sort of criticism. I am convinced that a coherent and truthful ontology must have the stream of time at its heart -- transformation, sublation, music -- and so your ideas are tantalising. But my powers of imagination and inference are pedestrian enough that a few parts of this essay seemed like non sequiturs.
This is probably the criticism I'd give this piece too, in a certain mood. But, ultimately, I'm not trying to make a coherent system of thought. I actually don't think that's possible and even the pretense of rigor is often a comforting illusion. I'm just crafting something until I think it looks pretty and putting it out there as an offering. Take what you like and leave the rest.
Agreed. It’s diffuse, vague and titillating. But then, how could it not be? The author doesn’t have the answers. No one does.
If answers do not exist, then your framing of the problem in terms of answers is specious. Wisdom is an internal state, not a semiotic formulation. It can, however, be navigated towards and/or accumulated through the use of language – but only in the sense that a lake can be swum by the use of water.
The linked nautilus piece is a genuinely good read, and I think does a better job of talking about Putnam in a more grounded way.
I have my own biases, and I randomly stumbled upon Foreman's essay. As a someone who studied science, and physics in particular, I have my criticisms of some of Foreman's claims, but I doubt I'd be a convincing counter.
With that said, the nautilus piece is fun, and I think contextualizes things better. After reading it, I had a better idea of how Foreman connected Putnam to his own beliefs, and I found that my own conceptualization of Putnam was much clearer. It's just one of those things where what you get out is shaped a bit by what you bring in.
i agree! would love to see you unpack these points at length because i do feel there’s something intuitively true here just needs some more precision
Great stuff, I'll have to read more of Wheeler and Putnam...
Incidentally, have you read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance? If not, I think you'd really enjoy it. You're drawing from a similar well as Pirsig
Yes, I have. Very formative, actually.
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance is indeed a profound book. Robert Pirsig’s story is similar in many ways to Peter Putnam’s, except Pirsig was committed to a mental asylum and given electroconvulsive therapy.
I think that is spot on. It is even more explicit in the sequel Lila.
Interestingly, at the same time (and ultimately also in the same place - Montana), there was another thinker named Henry Bugbee saying many things similar to Pirsig - but I believe at a much deeper level. Bugbee to me is somehow both the greatest 20th century American philosopher AND poet.
Here's a short intro to him we recently released, if you'd like to check him out. https://www.koinosproject.org/p/who-is-henry-bugbee
oh cool, thanks for the recommendation! I'll have to check him out too.
He only wrote one book - a beautiful prose poem about the nature of being. Or as its subtitle has it, "a philosophical exploration in journal form." He wrote it while on paid sabbatical at Harvard in 1952-53 instead of the expected academic treatise. Ended up making him an early victim of the "publish or perish" paradigm now plaguing our higher education.
The Koinos Project is actually just about to launch a study guide podcast on it. You should read along with us! It is not an easy work, although it is all complete common sense.
Sounds cool! I'll check it out sometime
David Whyte uses the term “the conversational nature of reality.” Feels apt.
Thought provoking piece, as always!
I think you're right on the money with your allusion to the Hero's Journey, as I also believe that this always has been (and fundamentally, always will be) the only effective means of organizing our psyches - individual and collective.
Any secular "myth of organization" that goes beyond that places the perceiver on an metaphysical tightrope between nihilism ("Nothing matters - especially not me - because my individual life makes no difference in the grand scheme anyway.") and narcissism ("Nothing matters BESIDES me, since my individual decisions have no bearing on the grand scheme anyway.").
The localized "self", on the other hand, re-enchants by giving you an "enemy" to fight (your own flaws), something to fight FOR (the well-being of your community) and grounds it in the eternal timeline ("My life matters, because it will serve as an example to those who follow after me - my children, their children, etc..").
It is for this reason that the algorithmic, post-modern paradigm (in the West, at least) has severely limited our developmental horizon as a SPECIES, because it has downplayed the mythos that portrays one's life - and all of it's requisite "adventures" - as THE cosmic mystery to be tangled with.
Cultures, technologies and artistic innovations (or degenerations) are always in flux, but human experiences AMONG these things do not.
Yes. I'm intrigued but need more.
Wonderful and needed piece. Enchantment isn't dead; just buried (for a while) under the current myth. We've had many myths as humans, and each one serves it purpose for only so long -- I think they always run up against the limits of their own logic). We'll need another myth soon.
What am I working through? I'll answer this, though it's difficult.
Everyone in my generation (and class) was told "follow your dreams, you can do anything." I always stood out as a bit unique, and was told this more than most I think: that I would do something really interesting. It's a bit like Great Expectations though. It's fine to think that when you're 17 -- but what is that unique Thing one is supposed to do? I never had an answer. I felt drawn to art, to science, to humanities -- I felt somehow there was some resolution to them out there; but how to even look at the problem square on? So, not ever having know what grand adventure to take, I took none. I work with computers, in an ordinary way, supporting my family, etcetera. It's hard to reconcile that with my assumptions from earlier in life, and with the persistent sense that there is some great project I should undertake.
I'm sure I'm not alone in this, but I feel it acutely. To those of older generations, or poorer, it probably sounds stupid. But some ideas are so ingrained in you as a young person, I think it's very hard psychologically to ever give them up, even if they contradict reality.
I find this relatable, as I am 18 and on the precipice of going to college and finding a path to walk. I have so many, perhaps too many interests. Arts, humanities, design, psychology. I've been told the same thing as you, that I can do so much.
I wonder if in my urge to learn everything, I will be stuck doing nothing. I want to do something but I don't exactly know what. I'm trying to forget the impulse to optimize what I do, and just do something. Any free time and energy I'm gifted will go towards side projects and community-building and learning and research - that's my way of resistance to the paralyzing urge to do everything which simultaneously makes me do nothing.
Do you have any advice, as someone further along in your path? Any regrets? Any questions for me? Perhaphs a dialogue between us could remind you of the spark of youth and inform my trek forward.
I like your hope for dialog: spark of youth indeed! Luckily I have three daughters and they do provide that (plus poop in diapers).
I was much like you, as you intuited: too many interests, too many possible paths, starting about in college (before that, you're just "preparing" so it's safe). I'm not really sure what I can say to resolve that conflict (i.e. what I would have said to myself). But I'll tell you four regrets and maybe that will be helpful.
- Everyone said "you're smart, do more education". More more more. I had resisted that idea, but then gave in, because indeed I do like reading and am autodidactic, and had no better alternative. Academia was then the logical career track, starting with a PhD. I regret that. I didn't finish, and so it was a waste of time. You need to be more committed than "it's better than the alternatives". Also the career prospects mostly suck, as the internet will tell you (not a lie). But the advice is really more that education doesn't always help: it just prolongs your period of not deciding and therefore suffering. My sister in law is a serial academic (two doctorates now) because she just can't face real life. Don't do that.
- Pursuant to the above: It's really hard to make decisions about life from a perch far removed from life. I wish I had done Peace Corps or something like that. It might very well have sucked. But it would have been instructive. Take a gap year and do something with a result. A friend of mine (form Europe) went in to the military, helped flood victims; it really changed him in a good way. Thinking about thinking about thinking.... that sucks. Get away from that.
- Don't wait to have your family. You can push that off forever, and you existential crisis will be eternal (or it might be). So just get on with life. Marry some girl (or whatever), and have kids. I mean, do think about timing. But get on with it.
- Our society tells everyone to aim for the moon. "You can be a famous artist/illustrator" if you want to be! The thing is, all alternatives to fame and glory then look miserable and second-rate. It's far, far, better to be in a position where your goal is good but not crazy. If you overshoot, great; if you reach it, you feel good. And these days just "buy a house, have a kid, and read a shit ton of books and host the best smart-person dinner parties in town" is hard enough. If you can do that, you're winning.
- BONUS: This is kind of dumb internet advice but also true. Do sports or some physical thing that can keep you in shape. I didn't totally fall down there, but I wish I had done more earlier. It's easier to stop than to start, so start young and don't stop (change to pickle ball later if you must).
I really hope that's helpful. It's been helpful to write.
I really appreciate your words of wisdom!
What I'm hearing, is that I should get out into the real world as soon as possible, perhaps pursuing something even while I'm in college instead of using college as an excuse to sit and atrophy. By understanding the real world through both the lens of education and personal experience is how I will find my way. And also, aim small. Small is better than nothing.
There are big questions I have yet to explore - do I want a family? What field do I want to pursue? The answers you seem to say come from experience more than thinking about thinking.
I'm double majoring in philosophy and psychology but I may change majors and will definitely change fields based on opportunities and internships that come.
Definitely going to take your advice and get out in the real world instead of getting boxed in my mind. But I do think education can also shift the way we see the world in an important way. Balance, I suppose.
Also I do exercise - I run almost every day! Will keep that habit up no matter what.
Running's great. I do it too.
I would not recommend changing majors a lot, much less planning to do so. That's what I did: physics, biology, english, anthropology... and eventually double majored in bio and medieval studies. The thing is, opening yourself up to endless choice keeps you unfocused and in the endless loop of "what's the perfect major?" But there is no perfect major, and all the moving around is a great way to stay in school too long (instead of doing something). I wished I had just done one thing. Once you have one thing, you can build on it. And you can be a well rounded person by reading a ton. You don't need degrees in it all (you can't do that anyway).
I also want to be practical with you. Which I hesitate about. I don't know your background or what kind of school you're going into. But philosophy has a bad reputation for a reason. It has one of the worst employment records (especially in the sense of using it specifically). But most academic degrees are like that: useless except for going into PhD-land. You can read philosophy any time and enjoy it; hell you can even write about it on Substack. But the chances you'll become a professional philosopher (in academia) are about 0% unless you are already well set up to do that: are you at an Ivy League school (with stable funding from parents)? Are your parents academics themselves, or well connected in that kind of world? If not, you have a huge disadvantage (like, practically insurmountable one). If you have to, double major in (a) something practical, (b) something for your own edification like philosophy. But that will take longer (probably).
It's better to be focused, and shift when needed, then to be scattered. The world only respects focus and specialization. You can be a generalist, but you have to be specialized enough that other people care.
More than I meant to write. I've hardly used any degree I ever had for work (except on paper). It was all side projects. Don't obsess over your degree too much.
Sadly true for many, I agree. Part of raising a child is giving them vision, if not a vision. Helping them find purpose outside themselves, if not the purpose. Rails, guidelines, a view of ultimate issues, perspective... Self actualization became the buzz, whatever that is; Hitler was self actualized. We dumped Western Civ with it's study of Aristotle's search for the good. We dumped Christianity with it's Clarion call to love God and our neighbor as ourself. We were left with a wasteland. Ecclesiastes is such a search for meaning under the sun.
Yes, I think the idea of finding a purpose to SERVE was never even mentioned; the focus was very individualistic, i.e. selfish. Growing up on fantasy novels, I always hoped to find a druid in a grove (or to become one). Well, I'm now Orthodox -- closest thing available ;)
Don't forget - you asked for something .. something you could shape the rest of your life around that has Meaning.
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My pro-Life arguments to great success in 2+ key articles, God Willing. As far as I know these have never been formed before. The first is dry and the second is more interesting with some rougher language I have not gotten around to change.
Using Constitutional and Natural Law I argue that The State must make major changes or make illegal Abortions or Loose the monopoly on violence, and father or any adult willing may replace the father and have same legal status of father with moral, legal, natural rights and obligations to protect his child from extrajudicial murder.
AI generated audio overview of article;
https://notebooklm.google.com/notebook/05bdb7f7-536c-4e50-90f4-e3dbfa6024b3/audio
"Multiverse Journal - Index Number 2221:, 11th July 2025, Court Motion: State is Obligated to Assist Father/Public Duty to Protect a Child from Abortion."
https://stevenwork.substack.com/p/multiverse-journal-index-number-2221
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This is in the form of a letter to a Bishop but contains two main arguments. 1st extends Saint Thomas Aquinas' damage from sin, 2nd uses modern psychological method to same ends, the Key-Log that is at fault.
Ever wonder Why is this world insane and most women are so Sick?
AI generated audio overview of article;
https://notebooklm.google.com/notebook/dcc1110c-6fdc-4966-a0a6-10948155a59c/audio
"Multiverse Journal - Index Number 2220:, 9th July 2025, A Letter to Traditional Catholic Bishops, Calling for Champions."
https://stevenwork.substack.com/p/multiverse-journal-index-number-2220
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These also provide a antiAbortion argument that does not depend on an unborn existing.
God Bless., Steve
Some would argue it started with Decartes long before the cold war. I like the theme of finding a new basis (mythos) to weave the best of materialism and re-enchantment. Too much modern commentary is of the 'Fuck Decartes' moevemtn as I jokingly call it.
An excellent article. Thanks...
this is a good point. I don't know how necessary it is to point out, it may just be moving the goal posts but Descartes is the indirect byproduct of the east/west schism initiated by the latin franks in the 9th century (surface level history marks the schism in 1050 between the Orthodox & Catholic but as with many things, a minimally careful look demonstrates 1050 was "the end" of what began 100+ years prior. It really is the first time we see a sweeping sense of "dis-enchantment" if you will (within the church). And then Reductionism, Materialism & Nihilism would naturally appear in the culture at large as the direct descendants as the next 8-10 centuries unfold.
The Cosmos is influenced by mind; God's mind. Humans were created with a free will; and rebelled. What does it mean to be a slave to sin? dead in our sin? Does our sin change the Cosmos? What might it be like when all things are restored? Perhaps this is what Tolkien and Lewis were exploring in their myth making.
I believe so.
Christianity is the meta-net that catches all insight like the Eddington’s net example. I love this article my friend. My favorite one so far.
Love the way these threads braid the old trivium-quadrivium vision back into life. This is the way.
There are parts of this that I didn't feel smart enough to apprehend on the first read so I will have to read again a few times but there were also parts that were filled with such truth and beauty that I felt them to my core.
Totally.
It feels like the world itself (the human world) is struggling with a massive contradiction, in that it is trying to feed its superficial needs (for stuff, wealth, ‘happiness’ defined in questionable ways) and at the same time avoiding things it sees as ‘discomforts’ (having to relate to other people, mutual support, boredom, labor) when in fact the ‘happiness’ makes us sick and the boredom and labor make us better - like a kid trying to toss his broccoli into the trash and swap it for a piece of cake, refusing to admit that eating just the cake is giving him indigestion while the broccoli would have made him feel better.
This is very jumbled I am not sure I am making sense.
I do question the photon ‘knowing it is heading for one particular eye’ thing, though perhaps my brain just doesn’t warp the right way. But what if the photon falls into the eye of a frog, is the frog’s consciousness then participating in creating the universe? What of all the photons that miss everyone? Is the photon’s journey ended when it hits the eye, does it cease to be?
Sometimes I wish I were smart enough to play like this at the very edge of human understanding, but then I do think the suicide risk becomes greater. I doubt it’s just because of the disenchantment, extremely smart and sensitive people had that issue even before this age. In fact it makes me think of something my dad used to say when I was little and asking too many questions - he would always say ‘don’t ask all your questions today, you don’t want to learn everything all at once. Whoever learns everything, they die.’
I think in a way he was right. People who know too many things…..die.
I appreciate the vulnerability inherent in this essay. It's not common to reflect on the nature of reality and couple it with a story about grief. I had a hard time getting past the initial paragraph on some level though. All I could think about is how many Peter Putnam's there are out there shoving mops around or flying under the radar while the world suffers. Thanks for sharing!
This is excellent. I enjoyed the piece and appreciated being introduced to Peter Putnam. A few thoughts came to mind that mapped closely to your themes around meaning, myth, and re-enchantment:
1/ Your critique of disenchantment strongly echoes Iain McGilchrist’s view that modernity suffers from left-hemisphere “usurpation”—a dominance of abstraction, fragmentation, and control over presence, participation, and symbolic depth. What you describe as a longing for re-enchantment looks, in McGilchrist’s terms, like a yearning for the right hemisphere’s mode of attention to return to its proper role—receptive, relational, and attuned to meaning.
2/ Interestingly, physicist David Deutsch approaches from the opposite direction—a rigorous rationalist path—but arrives at something surprisingly resonant. His claim that explanatory knowledge is infinite leads to a view of the universe that is perpetually open, never fully graspable. Mystery, in this light, isn’t an illusion to dispel—it’s a feature of reality that invites awe, participation, and ongoing discovery.
3/ René Girard offers another lens on myth. While Campbell sees myth as a symbolic guide for personal growth, Girard shows it’s also a social mechanism that once masked collective violence. Myths worked because they hid the scapegoat—the victim whose exclusion restored order.
Modern materialism claims to have outgrown myth, but Girard would argue it just tells a new one: the myth of disenchantment. It still produces victims—only now through systems, markets, and abstractions—while denying any need for sacrifice.
Girard helps us see that true re-enchantment won’t come from reviving old myths, but from confronting the hidden violence still at work beneath our supposedly rational world.
Thanks again for this piece. Looking forward to reading more.
Thanks for this comment - I think you get where I'm coming from better than I've seen. Very influenced by McGilchrist, Campbell (Jung) and Girard.
This last thing you said clicked something into place for me: "Modern materialism claims to have outgrown myth, but Girard would argue it just tells a new one: the myth of disenchantment. It still produces victims—only now through systems, markets, and abstractions—while denying any need for sacrifice.
Girard helps us see that true re-enchantment won’t come from reviving old myths, but from confronting the hidden violence still at work beneath our supposedly rational world."
Thanks for this great comment.
Excellent posting. I will forward it to my brother.
Godspeed
This is very good.
Hey, I think the image you’re talking about is from Joshua Citarella: https://substack.com/@joshuacitarella/note/c-131745885
Yes! Thank you I was hoping someone would find it. And much better done by him.