The Post-Axial Reconstruction of Meaning: Cognitive Architecture, Metaphysical Crisis, and Emergent Ecologies of the Sacred

Contemporary civilization is navigating a structural phase transition comparable in scale and ontological depth to Karl Jaspers's first Axial Age (Achsenzeit, c. 800–200 BCE). Spanning the long modern arc from 1500 to 2100 CE, this "Second Axial" hinge is defined by the terminal exhaustion of inherited post-Axial institutions alongside an acute crisis of meaning, attention, and ecological coherence. This monograph synthesizes four convergent domains of inquiry to diagnose this crisis and evaluate the emergent cultural architectures attempting to resolve it: Macro-Historical and Continental Diagnostics: Drawing on evolutionary institutionalism (Eisenstadt, Abrutyn) and continental social theory, we examine how Federico Campagna's cosmogonic regime of Technic, Byung-Chul Han's neoliberal psychopolitics of consensual auto-exploitation, and Hartmut Rosa's catastrophe of resonance converge to collapse the crucial ontological distance between the ineffable ground of existence and its instrumental representation. Cognitive Architecture of Enchantment: We ground these sociological diagnostics in contemporary cognitive science, uniting John Vervaeke, Mark Miller, and Brett Andersen's theory of Relevance Realization (RR) with Karl Friston's Predictive Processing Framework (PPF), 4E Cognition (Embodied, Embedded, Enacted, Extended), and Patrick McNamara's four-stage neurobiology of ritual decentering and REM-homologous counterfactual self-transformation. Neoliberal Capture and Technological Projection: We analyze the pathological capture of these cognitive mechanisms under late capitalism: the depoliticization of contemplative practice into corporate "McMindfulness" (Purser) and the projection of Cartesian functionalism onto artificial intelligence as an algorithmic oracle (O'Gieblyn, Barsalou). Emergent Post-Secular Architectures: We conduct a comparative institutional analysis of three emergent post-secular archetypes—horizontal civic ritual design (Sacred Design Lab, The Nearness), vertical neo-monastic crucibles (Monastic Academy / MAPLE), and intergenerational land rematriation (Nuns & Nones)—deriving four foundational design principles for a durable Second Axial ecology of wisdom.