Entries

08/20/2007: My Nominee for World’s Wisest Brain: Edward O. Wilson, Who Knows a Bottleneck in an Ant Colony When He Sees One

07/20/2007: Of Course, the Brain Can Change Itself. But It’s Going to Take Some Time to Figure Out How to Talk About the Fact ... And Which "Facts" Are Really Facts

06/23/2007: The Brain’s Problem with Information Overload Is Prompting Calls for Changes in How Laws, Policies and Rules Are Written. Sometimes, All It Takes is a Nudge

06/01/2007: Winning Elections May Not Exactly Be Brain Surgery, but Progressives Are Paying a Lot of Attention to These Days to a Brain-Framing Expert

05/14/2007: When Confronted by the Bully, the Mugger, the Rapist, the Carjacker Or Anyone Else Who Sees You as Prey, Your Safely May Come Down to Brain-Oneupsmanship

04/27/2007: Was One Side of Moses’ Brain Talking to the Other Side at the Burning Bush? New Questions, New Possibilities…But Few Answers As Yet

04/17/2007: Reader in Costa Rica Urges Us to Recognize that YuGiOh, Donald Trump and Direct TV Have Far Too Much Sway in "Alpha" Land

04/01/2007: Our Prized Human ‘Six Degrees of Non-Separation’ Failed IT Blogger Kathy Sierra, and the Blogosphere Now Needs a Double Dose of Sack-Cloth-and-Ashes

03/20/2007: Malcolm Gladwell Comes to Town, Believing as Strongly as Ever in “the Power of a Situation.” You Can Thin-Slice. Or Tip the Point. But He Wants You to Pay Attention

03/09/2007: We Don’t Yet Have the Kind of Brain that Can Take the Idea of Colonizing Space Seriously. But Stephen Hawking Seems to Be Saying that We Need to Get One

03/02/2007: The Brain Loves to Make Boxes. Which Explains Why I Discovered the Muslim Yellow Pages at My Favorite Lebanese Restaurant. And Why Box-Making Can Be Such a Dangerous Thing

02/12/2007: The Dirty Little Secret of Every Courtroom Is That Every Witness’s Memory is a Leaking Sieve or Shifting Sands or a Shaky Pastiche, the Scooter Libby Trial's Included

02/03/2007: A Blog for Brainy People Is, I Suspect, Like a Favorite Off-the-Beaten-Path Eating Hole: You Only Drop In When in the Mood. So, Here’s a Reprise for When the Mood Strikes You

01/24/2007: It’s Not Just the President’s Psychology that Should Give Us Pause, It’s the Whole Bias of Human Psychology toward Believing that We Are “The Decider”

01/14/2007: Does the Mind Evolve? We Argue It Does but Admit that More Than 2,000 Years After the Roman Gladiators, It Is Still More Likely to Beat Itself Up Than Lift Itself Up

01/07/2007: One of the World’s Smallest “Engines of Change” Is Also One of Its Most Powerful. On An Almost Unimaginable Scale, the Amygdala Rules

12/14/2006: The Buck Stops with You and Me on the Issue of Breaking the Cycles and the Spells That Cauterize Our Brain’s Ability to Provide Sane, Safe, Suitable Actions and Answers

12/02/2006: What the Brain Does With the Waves It Makes May Be the Most Important Discovery (So Far) in All of Brain Science. A New Book Explains Why

11/20/2006: Why Tony Robbins Never Talks about Funerals on Larry King Live and Other Dirty Tricks that Life Plays on the Happiness-Is-a-Vibration Gurus and Their Followers

11/11/2006: Let's Just Hope That God Is Indeed (As Some Physicists Claim) Left-Handed Or We Just Might Find Our Beloved Planet Abruptly Reversing Its Spin!

11/03/2006: If Your Sense of Curiosity Likes Big-Picture Inquiries and Great Mysteries That Run in Sequels, Then You Couldn’t Have Picked a Better Time (So Far) to Live

10/25/2006: Philosophers Aren’t a Modest Bunch: They Argue That Few of Us Would Know Much About Anything If Philosophy Didn’t Know Something About Something

10/17/2006: “Metaphors Are Only As Good As Their Interpreters,” Said the Spider to the Starfish Just Before He Flung Him Into the Fire

10/05/2006: Here’s a Test for You: How Young Were You When You Were First Able to Recognize a Teacher Who Couldn’t Teach?

09/19/2006: Unhappily, When This Talented Academician’s Dual Worlds of Art and Science Meet in His “Brain on Music” Book, the Bridge Often Seems to Be Out

09/04/2006: A Few Good Words, If You Don’t Mind, for An Instrumental Utopianism. And Who Better to Frame the Case in the Fewest Words Possible Than the Late Ernest Becker?

08/31/2006: “To Be or Not To Be?” Really Isn’t the Question, and Never Has Been. So What IS the Really Important Question that the Brain Needs to be Trained to Handle Adeptly and Maturely?

08/21/2006: Maybe I Just Haven’t Watched Enough National Geographic Specials, But Notice of Some of History’s Most Influential Persons Seems to Have Passed Me By.

08/14/2006: If You Want Sage Advice on What Needs to Be Overhauled at the Highest Reaches of American Government, Here Are Two Well-Seasoned Advisers Who Seem to Have Their Fingers on the Controls of D.C.’s Acrimonious and Hideously Incompetent Cook Stove

08/08/2006: Wanna Know Which World Capital Has the Most NLP Charlatans Per Square Mile? Let’s Check In with My “Alpha Geek” Contact on River Skerne.

07/31/2006: So Just How Skilled at Lying Do We Americans Want Our President to Be? Some Thoughts from the Front Lines of Falsehood.

07/24/2006: All We Need to Do to Avoid Watching the Current Madness on the Evening News Is Change the Channel to Something Inane and Fatuous. But Now's No Time for Consoling Fictions.

07/23/2006: After This Harvard Psychologist Explains What We Humans Do That No Other Animal Does, He Then Explains What Our Brain's Greatest Achievement Is. Tip: It's Not the Great Pyramid of Giza, the International Space Station or the Golden Gate Bridge

07/16/2006: What's a Seasoned Woman Leader Used to Being Valued and Respected to Do When Surrounded by Young Sharks? Develop the Dolphin's Ruthless (When Necessary) Determination and See to Her Own Needs for a Change

07/05/2006: The Minds We Use Have Consequences in the Lives We Live. Here Are Three Telling Examples.

06/23/2006: Two Different "Triune" Brain Theories But the Same Crucial Conclusion: We Are Makeshift Entities Still Under Development, and That Can Creates Serious Problems for Us

06/14/2006: As Our Understanding of Our Human Nature Changes and Our Abilities to Employ Such Understandings Grow, It Stands to Reason That Our Ethics Are Evolutionary, Too

06/09/2006: If You've Got a Moment, I've Got a Vivid, Articulate Account of One Mind Seeking to Set Itself Aright to Share With You

06/02/2006: A Medical Expert on Healing, Meaning and Purpose Tells Us More About How Valuable Reading Plans and Celebratory Notes Can Be to Mentally Ill Persons

06/01/2006: This Reader Is Struggling with Fears About the Environment and Her Frustration at Not Finding Anyone to Talk About Them

05/27/2006: For a Seller of Books and Music Products, It Seemed Like the Mother Lode, and Still Does. But It Has Also Turned Out to Be a Remarkable Window on a Gifted and Disturbed Mind

05/19/2006: Dear Amanda, Twelve Years Later I'm Wondering if You Have Gotten Any Closer to Answering Your Own Question?

05/15/2006: ADD Expert Edward Hallowell Extends His Theories and Insights from the Specific to the General—And Concludes We're Headed Pell-Mell Towards "Some Epochal Phase Change"

05/13/2006: John Muir Would Have Said It Differently, But I Think He'd Agree Were He Alive Today: I'd Rather Take My Cues from the Amazing Workings of DNA, the Latest Cosmological Discoveries or Insights on How the Brain Functions Than on the Most Brilliantly and Beautifully Inventive Suppositions About How to Get the Most Good from Who I Am

05/09/2006: Six Years Ago I Wrote About Where Mr. Bush Clocked Out on the Timepiece of Presidential Candidates. I Continue to Think It Was a Timely Reading.

05/01/2006: A Report from Dolphin-Shark-Carp Waters in Australia: What Can Happen When an Organization Takes the Model to Heart...And to Lunch on Fridays!

04/18/2006: Our Man in Jonesboro is "Teacher of the Year" at Arkansas State University

04/17/2006: Because of the Long-Tail Influence of the Internet, We've Suddenly Found Ourselves at Brain Technologies Busier Than We Ever Dreamed We'd Be Running the Bookstore We've Always Wanted to Own

04/07/2006: You Can Call Me a Conservative-Liberal-Socialist, In No Particular Order, And All At the Same Time, If You Wish ... And Here's Why

04/03/2006: Playing Deja Vu and Dat You On the Issue of Who's Nukes Are Holier Than Who's

03/24/2006: Our Person in Riyadh is Getting the Word Out to Saudi Women: Developing New Brain Skills is the Key to Personal Empowerment

03/21/2006: A Favorite Poem from a Poet One Reviewer Says "Breathes Poetry Like the Rest of Us Breathe Air. When She Exhales, the World Becomes Different. Better."

03/04/2006: Yes, I'm Convinced That We Are Progressively "Evolving" How We Wire and Use the Wiring in Our Brains, But We Still Don't Any Means to Stand Back and Take a Good Look at How It All Works.

02/20/2006: From that Other Denmark (The One in Western Australia), Leo Bakx Offers Several History Lessons and Raises a Number of Questions About My Suggestion that We Use Mouthwash (Figuratively Speaking) Before Publishing Cartoons About Mohammed

02/16/2006: Robert Theobald Rode Out of the West with Some Prescient Ideas about the Interconnectedness of Reality and People. I'm Glad He Moseyed Past My Newspaper Desk More Than Once, Mustache, Sideburns and All

02/08/2006: If John Adams Were Around Today, I Suspect He Might Retire Early to the Farm at Quincy and Brood About What America Has Lost Along the Way

02/06/2006: The Muslims Can't Help It At the Moment That They Find Such Easy Upset over Religious Matters, And I Suspect That We Are All Going to Have to Help Them Move Past This

02/02/2006: When You Get Around to Organizing the Dinner Party of the Ages, I'd Like to be Seated between Mr. Shakespeare and Mr. Jesus, If You Don't Mind

01/18/2006: Forget About Six Degrees of Separation. Today Is Trending Toward No Degrees of Separation When It Comes to My Neighbors and Neighborhood Being in the News

01/03/2006: If You Really Want to Know What I Have Against "Motivational Experts," I'm Glad You Brought the Subject Up

12/27/2005: If You Are Wondering Why We Haven't Reached a Point of Autocatalysis Sufficient to Make Up for All the Entrenched Stupidity, Here's Some New Academic Disciplines Trying to Find the Answer

12/16/2005: While the Greedy Merchandisers of Children's Electronic Entertainment Are Counting Their Shekels, Their Viewers—or So It Appears to Grammie and Me—Are Simply Learning to Count

12/10/2005: Here's a Book that Supports "The Best Guess I've Ever Had": That No One Really Has Much of a Clue About What's Supposed to Be Happening Here; That Everyone Is Guessing

12/08/2005: Our Reader in Jakarta Reminds Us of Michael Persinger's Quest for "the God Spot" in the Brain

12/05/2005: If Everything is Progressing Like the Idea of Progress Suggests It Should Be, Why Does It Feel Like Things Are Going Well for Only A Few?

12/01/2005: Mr. Papa Likes Most Things Texan, The House Band, Geb Foley, Celtic Music and My Comments on Religious Beliefs

11/28/2005: Just When I Was Ready to Discuss What We Could Do to Encourage New Thinking Skills in a Seminar at Her Employer, I Get This Question about Believing in God

11/26/2005: "Tableaus of Greatness" Department: Dr. Schweitzer's Sensitivity Toward the Living Extended to the Single, Solitary Ant

11/25/2005: Topics and Attitudes—Not to Mention the Opening Event's Keynote Speaker—at This Year's Neuroscience Society Conference Suggest an Important Corner Has Been Turned on the Nature Versus Nurture Debate

11/22/2005: More from Our Correspondent in the Middle East: Some NPR-Like Snippets About Bank Accounts, Apartment Hunting and Condoms in the Dust from the Front Lines of Daily Existence in the Deserts of the Gulf Region

11/20/2005: And In These Times of Great Changes, Chaos and Conflict, A Little Levity for Our Souls' Sake

11/16/2005: We Just Keep Making the Same Old Mistakes and Using the Same Old Arguments—As One of Mark Twain's Most Brilliant Stories Warns Us

11/14/2005: If You Think Jacob Marley's Ghost Was on a Mission, Then Get the Ghost of Peter Drucker on Your Case

11/09/2005: Hark! Is It the Voices of Sinclair Lewis and H.L. Mencken We Are Beginning to Hear Again After Years of 1920s-Like Self-Delusion?

11/06/2005: Turn With Me Now to the Mind of a Great Philosopher as He Muses on the Issue of the Political Religion

11/05/2005: In My Next Life, I Want to Be Able to Watch Newshounds Interview CEOs and Then Write Things Like, "What By Being Not Is—Is Not By Being."*

11/03/2005: I Have Been to the Mountaintop (Actually It's a Small Rise in the Texas Prairie Just Down the Street), and Seen the Future of Education: a Medievalist Who Wants All Our Kids to Be Translators

11/01/2005: Like the Story of the Headless Horseman, the Story of the Man With a Hole in His Skull Never Ceases to Intrigue Us. And It Illuminates a Lot about How We Think.

10/30/2005: Will All Mentats Please Call the Office? There's a Lengthy List of Pressing Assignments That Need to Be Tackled Now.

10/29/2005: The World Now Has Nine Billion and Two Blogs. That's Because Dilbert Has Started One. And, Of Course, There's Mine. And Dr. David Cox Is Making Noises Like Maybe He's Testing the Waters.

10/28/2005: There Are Few More Important "Thinking Skills" Than Being Able to Think At Least Once a Day About How to Best Take Care of Your Teeth

10/27/2005: What Do I Think of Edward de Bono, the King of Po? Well, the Man is a Walking, Talking, Sometimes Floating Encyclopedia of Information

10/26/2005: I Often Say, "Argue For Your Limits And You Get to Keep Them." Otherwise, Simply Assume That You Are Going to Change Perhaps More Often Than You Realize

10/24/2005: Forgive Me, But I Need Moment to Revisit One of My Favorite Topics: Dolphin Strategy and the Pools Where Sharks Routinely Bloody the Waters

10/22/2005: The New Sign on the Door of a Restaurant I Frequent Says "Dinner Is No Longer Served." And Therein Lies a Story About the Importance of Niches.

10/21/2005: Riddle: When Is a Lawyer Not "Thinking Like a Lawyer"? Answer: When He Hits His Thumb with a Hammer While He's Watching Himself in a Mirror

10/19/2005: I Just Hope I Haven't Won the Lottery in Beijing Or Been Named a Beneficiary of a Long Lost Irish Ancestor Who Struck It Rich in Shanghai

10/18/2005: I Think I May Have My Epitaph: "He Was Born to Handle Books."

10/17/2005: Can This President, His Party and His Policies Really Be As Phantasmagoric As They Seem to Be? Yup, 'Fraid So.

10/15/2005: Reaffirmed at the Texas State Fair: At Every Pause Along the Road Most Traveled, the Human Spirit Can Summon the Creative Spark

10/14/2005: In These Days of Ceaselessly Impassioned Assertions by People of Faith, I'm Reminded Almost Hourly of My Favorite Quote

10/13/2005: A Cautionary Note to a Warm-Hearted Soul: Don't Let the Noble Instinct of Doing Good Keep You From Being Your Best

10/13/2005: More on the Dutch "Mental Fitness Studio": It's a Work in Progress, says Its Creator

10/11/2005: Okay, Whole-Brain Advocates, Listen Up! These Dutch Folks Are Serious!

10/11/2005: "The Fairer Sex" Plus Fair Turn About Equals Far More Than Just Fair Results!!

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