The presidential race is ramping up quickly, both sides having moved assertively into attack mode. Politics in America has degraded to the point that the billions spent on advertising are all about trash talk. It’s hard not to feel like one must choose the lesser... Continue

Among the channels proliferating via Dish Network I’ve recently taken to watching reruns of old network TV westerns. I watched many of these episodes when I was 10 or twelve years old, black and white westerns about good guys and bad guys and the women... Continue

This past month marks what looks like the confirmation of the Higgs Particle, or what has been called “The God Particle.” Like most things quantum, the Higgs Particle is simultaneously the Higgs Field, and its confirmation is a big deal. The Standard Model in modern... Continue

The tragedy in Aurora, Colorado this past week reminds me of the killings by Charles Whitman in Texas during 1966. Whitman was the son of a middle class family, a former marine who climbed to the top of a tower at the University of Texas... Continue

Before our universe began, things were simple. All-and-everything, including time, space and matter, was compressed into an infinitesimal, dimensionless singularity of virtual probability. Then something happened; depending upon what you choose to believe either God initiated the big bang or quantum mechanical probability self-ignited and... Continue

An economy in shambles with persistently high unemployment; wide income inequality; increasingly belligerent saber-rattling by political parties; street demonstrations accompanied by vandalism and violence on the part of both demonstrators and police; legislative grid-lock; polarized elected officials unable to work together; political campaigns funded by... Continue

When Orwell penned this slogan in his book “1984” he was addressing political theory, not neuroscience, yet from the perspective of current brain research, he was spot on. Our consciousness is but a sliver of the operation of mind, the rest hidden from our awareness.... Continue

If you read my column regularly, by now you know that I enjoy a cup of tea. My tastes in tea run to classic Chinese varieties like Oolong and Pu’er, and I can joyfully spend an hour or two exploring new varieties of fine tea.... Continue

“We can’t return, we can only look behind.” - Joni Mitchell Despite the persistence and power of memory, the seduction of the past and 20/20 hindsight, the arrow of time appears to go in one direction only: forward. It might be more accurate to say... Continue