Materialism and popular culture: The human brain as a machine?
The Immanent Frame, an interesting blog, offers "Spiritual Machines: an interview with John Lardas Modern" (October 5, 2009) by Nathan Schneider: John Lardas Modern, an assistant professor of religious studies at Franklin & Marshall College, draws on the Beat poets, phrenologists, prison reformers, and Moby-Dick to show why taking technology seriously forces us to think differently about the boundaries of religion. He spoke recently with Nathan Schneider about the ambiguity of agency in the age of technology and the porous border between the material a

Spiritual Brain: Polish translation rights bought
I am pleased to report that The Spiritual Brain is going into Polish translation.Maybe this is hopeful. For a long while we couldn’t sell TSB abroad because some commentators said the book was “too religious”.I have no idea why.The book isn’t especially religious unless … you mean if any book threatens materialists … ?But wouldn't people want to know why materialism probably isn't true? Well, I guess Poles do, and good for them.

Curiosity and the dead cat
In Does curiosity kill more than the cat?, prof Stanley Fish wondersLast Thursday, the new Chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities James A. Leach gave an address at the University of Virginia with the catchy title, “Is There an Inalienable Right to Curiosity?”Taking his cue from Thomas Jefferson’s “trinity of inalienable rights: ‘life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,’” Leach reasoned that even though Jefferson never wrote about curiosity, “a right to be curious would have been a natural reflection of h

Neurolaw: Could capital punishment kill it?
I sure hope so. Recently, I have said that I don't believe in capital punishment; anyway, Canada does not have it any more.Note: I am not in any way soft on crime or inclined to make excuses for serious perps. I've dealt with enough perps in my own life that I have zero interest in cutting them any slack.That said: a key problem is the drama that usually unfolds around capital punishment.A perp declaiming speeches at the foot of the scaffold sounds way more interesting than one who is merely disappearing into the pen system for yay years.

Neuroscience and popular materialism: What makes the human brain unique?
Here's a great reason for rejecting pop neuroscience, titled "We are neuroscientists and we come in peace": Hmmm. Just try coming to war here and see what happens. Just when it seemed things could get no worse, Hank Greely of Stanford Law School pointed to several areas of potential friction between neuroscience research and widely held religious beliefs (findings that point to consciousness, or a form of it, in nonhuman animals, for example, might undermine the notion that humans occupy a unique position in the world) and asked whether neurosci