When Yun-Men said that the Buddha was a dried shitstick, he may not have had the same intent as the movie makers who exploit the “yuk factor,” described in this New York Times article, but from a certain perspective they have … [Read more...]

My wife, Eve, has been staying with me for three weeks, and will be here through the month of November. Those of you who’ve been keeping track will know that we haven’t lived together for three years, although we’re best … [Read more...]

Lucid dreaming versus normal dreaming versus everyday reality: Tom Clark has an excellent article on this subject, which I just got around to reading, and it reminded me of a TED talk by David Perry, “Will Videogames Become … [Read more...]

“If any question why we died, Tell them, because our fathers lied.” That’s from Rudyard Kipling’s poem about the first world war, quoted by Roger Cohen in a great column in today’s New York Times. If you look at how we got … [Read more...]

I wrote about Eve Ensler, author and performer of “The Vagina Monologues,” and a talk of hers, “Finding Happiness in Body and Soul,” on TED in an earlier post. Another of her talks, “Security and Insecurity,” was recently … [Read more...]

“This is as good as it gets.” That was the thought that occurred to me as I was settling into the recliner for a nap, and it gave me a huge laugh. I’m going to explain the cause for laughter Southern style, but if you get … [Read more...]

What is your self, really, in essence? That’s a question that Socrates or Plato would ask, and actually, that kind of question goes back as far as the Upanishads, perhaps earlier—we don’t have any written record much earlier … [Read more...]

How do we free ourselves from conventional, erroneous, views of who we are as human beings, and develop an identity based on the realities of science? Everyone believes in science, at least implicitly, when they step on an … [Read more...]

I have written about love here, and talked about it in Bare Brains, as a perhaps necessary inducement to human reproduction, created by evolution, of course. That kind of description is not conducive to romance or poetry, … [Read more...]