It is commonly accepted that all human beings wish to be happy, but what is happiness, exactly? The framers of the U.S. Declaration of Independence believed that along with life and liberty, the pursuit of happiness was a primordial right of all people, yet they... Continue

Hi. My name is Larry, and I am a sarcastic. I don’t like being a sarcastic, and I’ve tried to change, but I am finding it, honestly, quite hard. Both my parents were sarcastics, and I suspect their parents were sarcastics, too. My father was... Continue

Biologists speculate that the adult human body is comprised of roughly 40 trillion human cells, give or take several trillion. Considering the rather remarkable fact that we begin life as a single cell containing enough information to organize 40 trillion anything (almost impossible to imagine)... Continue

A few months ago I wrote a column entitled “The Sutra of the Heart of Financial Knowledge” (5/08/08). It was a satire about the emptiness of money, but at its center was a serious message. Based on the famous Heart Sutra, I may have reached... Continue

On retreat in the mountains of Colorado, amid alpine ponderosa pines gnarled and majestic, aspens shivering in an afternoon breeze, sudden gusts of wind, torrential rain, thunder and lightening followed by crystal clear blue skies, I sat in silence for 14 days with 90 others.... Continue

The recent decision of the California Supreme Court affirming the right of same sex couples to legally marry marks a welcome step forward in affirming virtues of compassion, legal equity and benevolence. Of greater significance, it brings law into line with justice, recognizing that the... Continue

In his far-reaching and prescient 1996 work,“The Network Society,” author Manuel Castells opined that society will increasingly form around electronically processed information networks. Society has always involved the formation of networks, but in the past these were generally personal and socially driven. Even when such... Continue

I like the idea of a president who works tirelessly for the benefit of others, struggles to solve problems and strives to build a better tomorrow. I’ll tell you what I don’t want in a president: a fighter. The prospect of another fighter in the... Continue

In my twelve years on the Sonoma City Council, I spent two Wednesday nights a month singing praises and damning failures. Now my Wednesday nights are spent just singing. Vox Populi, a new Sonoma rock ‘n’ roll chorus, is the brainchild of Mark Dennis, my... Continue