Author: Mark Vernon

Full details here. William Blake was a genius poet and an astonishing visionary. But he was also a brilliant thinker with a developed analysis of what was going wrong in society. Blake’s analysis is profoundly relevant to our own times coupled as it is to a sharp vision of what we lack, and what we… Continue reading William Blake in 42 Images. A new course at The Idler.

An audio version of this talk is on my podcast, Talks and Thoughts, available via podcast feeds. The labyrinth at Penpont offers a chance to reflect on suffering, with thanks too to William Blake.

An audio version of this talk is on my podcast, Talks and Thoughts, available via podcast feeds. A talk give at St Matthew’s Church, Wimbledon, London on 12th July 2022.

An audio version of this discussion is at my podcast, Talks and Thoughts, available via podcast feeds. The Scientific and Medical Network organised a gathering on Friday 8th July to mark Rupert’s 80th birthday and reflect on his work. In this episode of the Sheldrake-Vernon Dialogues, Rupert and Mark Vernon discuss the day, recalling remarks… Continue reading Science with Soul. Reflecting on Rupert Sheldrake’s 80th Birthday Celebration

I was delighted to meet David Wengrow at the Idler Festival. His coauthor, David Graeber, was a great friend of the Idler. David Wengrow and I spoke about their revolutionary, fascinating and inspiring book, The Dawn of Everything. It challenges the concensus history and prehistory of humanity, as found in writers such as Steven Pinker… Continue reading Freedom, power & the spiritual commons. More thoughts on The Dawn of Everything by Graeber & Wengrow

Bernard Carr is a leading cosmologist who worked with Stephen Hawking and now investigates time, multidimensionality and consciousness, amongst other things. Bernardo Kastrup cites him as at the vanguard of the great task to integrate matter and mind. So I was delighted to get the chance to ask Bernard about images from Dante. We talked… Continue reading Dante, cosmology, and a conversation at Rupert Sheldrake’s 80th do

This is a response to an article by Richard Beck in the new YoHo Journal. Richard Beck introduces us to “hope sickness”. And I agree: the world suffers from desperate delusions as to the nature of our story. However, I would advocate a slightly different antidote to this materialist poison. What the dominant worldview can’t… Continue reading “Death and life are asymmetrically joined. Therein lies hope.” – article in YoHo

My column in the new Idler magazine, out now. One of the best known comments in western philosophy has to do with rivers. The flowing thought was uttered by the ancient Ephesian hermit, Heraclitus. Born into a patrician family, during the sixth century BC, he despaired of the way human beings conduct themselves and so… Continue reading The Flux of the Matter – new Idler column