Michael Gazzaniga: The Mind's Past

In The Mind's Past, Gazzaniga reminds me of age-old teachings in Buddhism and Advaita. Of course in this he is not out of tune with other neuroscientists.   I am reminded of Benjamin Libet,  I am also reminded of neurophilosopher Thomas Metzinger, who publishes opinions reminiscent of ancient Eastern views of self and mind. (Not that neurophilosphers intend it, although some borrow from the teachings without acknowledging their sources.) Neuroscience also provides evidence that corroborates some of the teachings.

The Mysterious Disappearance of Aimee Semple McPherson

Oral Roberts told his television audience that God would call him home if he didn’t raise $8 million in donations. Roberts didn't raise it and God let him hang around another 22 years. Long before Oral, Aimee Semple McPherson was a media evangelist before the term was invented.

Pancho Villa's Finger

Pancho Villa's Finger for Sale in a Texas Pawn Shop?

Barack Obama: A Profile

Even af­ter his parachute opened, Tyler Stark sensed he was coming down too fast. The last thing he’d heard was the pilot saying, “Bailout! Bailout! Bail—” Before the third call was finished, there’d come the violent kick in the rear from the ejector seat, then a rush of cool air.

With Orthodox Conservative Values, I Vote Left

The outcome of this election may prove to be a total surprise, but I doubt it. I say that while not allowing for voter fraud or statistical bias. Regarding bias, the photo for this piece has Truman gloating over the Chicago Daily Tribune's failed scoop. Its editors believed the data. The Tribune's expectations in the 1948 election were based on faulty Gallup polls. The problem was that Gallup had surveyed a specific sector of citizens—such as those who read Literary Digest, an upscale magazine of the era—rather than a cross section, and now in 2012 Gallup's lop-sided current data again shows it out of step with other polls.

Consciousness Remains

"As a neurosurgeon, I did not believe in the phenomenon of near-death experiences. I grew up in a scientific world, the son of a neurosurgeon. I followed my father’s path and became an academic neurosurgeon, teaching at Harvard Medical School and other universities. I understand what happens to the brain when people are near death, and I had always believed there were good scientific explanations for the heavenly out-of-body journeys described by those who narrowly escaped death." More Also see this.

Vulpine News (Vulpine: Sly Like A Fox)

In the interest of explaining the estimable Fox News and its highly reputable spokespersons, I have provided a lexicon of words used on the network. The words needed explanation and so to promote their valuable brand of, errr, uhmm, journalism, I list some below.

Wall Street Broker Becomes A Monk

"A former Wall Street broker has swapped Manhattan for a monastery in Bulgaria to become an Orthodox monk. . . .

America: The Next Agentina?

The parallels are instructive and interesting.  We have no crystal ball. We have been in deep economic hurt with legions of the unemployed and house foreclosures. Some people look at government policies, past, present, and possibly future, and worry that we are seeing only the tip of a tidal wave to hit us in this century. Consider this:

Your Great-grandmother's Fear of Storks Helped Shape Your Biology

Back in the dawn of evolutionary theory Lamarck argued that the giraffe got its long neck by stretching to reach trees, its length from "the inherited effects of the increased use of parts." If you daily turn book pages with your big toe, will your future generations also do it? Lamarck and giraffe necks, like Freud and penis envy, is passé. Or is it?

Sleeping In Mud With The Kalishnikov

Hiram Maxim's invention, the Maxim Gun, portable, fully automatic, led to WWI trench warfare and the machine gun could level whole platoons, even decimate battalions, as they climbed over the top to charge into No Man's Land. Like a scythe, it could cut them down at the knees. In 1882 when in Vienna, Maxim met an American who reportedly told him, "If you want to make a pile of money, invent something that will enable these Europeans to cut each others' throats with greater facility." A fine killing machine his gun was, and while an American, Maxim was knighted by the British.

Thinking About Not Thinking

"If I told you that I had a neurological disease which meant that for eight or more hours a day I lost control of my faculties, bade farewell to the outside world, and was subject to complex hallucinations and delusions . . . you would think I was in a pretty bad way. If I also claimed that the condition was infectious, you would wish me luck in coping with such a terrible disease, and bid me a hasty farewell."

But hold on! We are talking about sleep. Everybody does it. Everybody agrees it has biological purpose but nobody knows what the purpose is.

Intelligence Isn't What It Used to Be

People are getting smarter, and that is not just opinion. They are getting smarter throughout the world. Standardized, uniform IQ tests reveal this phenomenon. In fact, people today score an average of 20 points higher than those who took the same IQ test in 1930. It's called the Flynn Effect. More

Plumbing as a Predictor of Cities

The problems with New York City lie in the plumbing, according to theoretical physicist Geoffrey West.