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Decoding the Demons *Advance Episode* (Patreon)

Published:
2022-08-20 12:24:42
Imported:
2026-06
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Hey everyone,

We released the Elgen episode today so hopefully you are enjoying that but we also recorded a mini-decoding that we will release some time this week focused on a conversation between John Vervaeke and Jonathan Pageau on Demonology.

It's partly edited but not completely so might be some rough patches.

Feedback as always is welcome!

Enjoy!

Comments

Jenny

Magnum opus (not magnus opus) 🙂

Andy First

Can someone remind me the difference between Gurometry and Guru-ology? I always forget

Jenny

Regarding the malevolence vs benevolence, is it possible they’re using demon (daemon, daimon) in the more Classical sense that can also refer to a tutelary deity as well, not necessarily demonic as we understand it? https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Daimon

Allan Malcolm McPherson

I took the magnus bit as wordplay...hasn't Brett taught you anything? It's NEVER a mistake!

Allan Malcolm McPherson

I wish Jonothan had devoted himself to Dungeons and Dragons...missed his calling.

Geoff Fitch

Good episode and obvious, fair critiques. My only beef is with y'all accusing someone of fuzzy thinking when they repeatedly refer to their published work on the topic but not bothering to read said published work. A bit fuzzy, no?

Aaron Holder

I think you guys should make a making sense of sense-making board game. I can see game squares like, “Nice definitional two-step, advance to the next round of the conversation and collect 5 metaphysical stars.”

Mark K

Aristotle defined happiness as “eudaimonia” or “having a good daimon”. The Greek “daimon” became the Roman “genius” meaning “attendant spirit of a person or place.” Of course the Christians took the word to be “demon” and ran with it. In Spanish today if you say someone is “de mal genio” it means they are in a bad mood. Happiness = being in a good mood!

Paul Bowman

Just on "egregore". Yes, definitely a Theosophical reference, and the analogy with Theosophy fits really well with these guy's shtick, JBP, and to some extent the wider "sensemaker" milieu. But, quirky anecdote, it's a word I recognise as it's the name of the radio show of one the French libcom groups (OCL) I aggregate for our international news service. Although in this case its a reference to Capital. Because to a certain leftist, Capital as distinct from capitalism, is a kind of non-spiritual egregore. Which is worth keeping in mind for people from a reductivist materialist perspective, who would accept capitalism as the name for the system we live in, but would reject the metaphysical possibility of a non-human systemic emergent like "Capital" that dominates the motion of the system. For e.g. the idea of "(inhuman) self-expanding value" that drives capitalism to ever-expanding production, regardless of the human costs of the ensuing environmental catastrophe we are now living through.

Kristen Sweder

My take on the demons discussion, and why someone like Pageau might use the term (bless you both for having the patience, my blood pressure prevents me) is that it is part of an attempt to rehabilitate the historical Jesus. With so much of christian history and theology (not to mention congregation size) taking a hit in the 20th century, the historical Jesus must be preserved as still cool, progressive, wise and worthy of the cult. But Jesus subscribed to a world where demons and evil spirits inflicted chaos on our world and one of his primary claims to fame was that of an exorcist. So, in the post-enlightenment world, that sounds a little looney. Among otherwise rational Christians, Jesus’ belief in demons is…um…problematic. In any case, in trying to lend credence to demons (even as a metaphor) it leaves room to infer that Jesus himself was also seeing the world in a more sophisticated way (i.e., distributed cognition vs ghostbusters). So even if Jesus did talk about demons it was because it was the lingua franca of mental and physical illness. The foundational hero of Christianity, however, had a more subtle world view.