Wallace assumes that consciousness is distinct from biological or physical systems. So, it follows that consciousness cannot be measured or studied by making hypotheses about biological or physical indicators of consciousness. This presumption undermines everything else he says. He is not making a scientific hypothesis. He is presuming to have access to a kind of knowledge that cannot be scientifically understood.

His main point is that Buddhist practice is a surer way of understanding consciousness than any other method. Yet, meditation is inherently subjective and prone to idiosyncratic interpretations. The splintering of Buddhist sects testifies to the diversity of possible interpretations Buddhist practice can generate.

Western science is predicated on the idea that theories must be produce results that are publicly comprehensible, reproducible, and falsifiable. It is not enough for Mr. Wallace to believe that he "gets it right" when he contemplates his own consciousness. He must also be able to identify when someone else does the same, when they fail to do so, and how someone else who claims to get it right about his own conscious experience can differ in his experience from Wallace's experience. What are the characteristics of consciousness that tie it uniquely or generally to the experience of a living, breathing, person? What is the mechanism that ties consciousness to personal experience? How can we know when someone is pretending to be in touch with his consciousness? How can it be possible for someone to be out of touch with his own consciousness, and who is to say such a failure has occurred, when no physical or biological measurements pertain?

It seems clear that Wallace is trying to legitimize his religious experience as being, somehow, better in touch with a more meaningful reality. It is not enough for him to be satisfied with his own beliefs and be content in his beliefs about his own consciousness. He wants science to affirm him in his accomplishment. But he has set out the terms of the inquiry in such a way that no scientific method can penetrate the veil of his personal experience.

This effort is as doomed as the efforts of Christians to co-opt science to legitimize their cosmology with the poorly conceived, pseudo-science of "Intelligent design." There may be many satisfactions to religious beliefs, but confusing them with verifiable scientific methods is not the way to make them manifest.

John Kerry is the epitome of the sort of candidate that anyone who wants real progress in this country would like to have vanish from the scene, entirely. He can't even tie his shoes without running it past a focus group, and his ear for the American language is so tinny that condensed soup dribbles from it.

As with many a man who confuses public passion against a common enemy for loyalty and admiration, Kerry will find himself quickly abandoned, when any person of substance and vision appears on the scene. If you put Kerry and Obama on the same stage, Kerry would appear to be about the size of a gnat, and he'd be just as welcome.

Soy = Small Penis = Feminine = Gay?

I know a few guys who could show him different! I've even known a few really good drag queens who could disprove his quaint little theory. I don't know what their baby formula was made of, but I wouldn't want to mess with them, when they get their panties in a bunch!

Where do people get these notions?

You have scooped TIME!

Each of my parents was raised in a very large, very poor family. With all of the difficulties that having few resources can create, they struggled for many years just to get by. Nevertheless, they were decent people, and they took pride in their honesty, frugality and diligence. They may have been born into a challenging situation, but they made the best of it and emerged as very suitably comfortable members of the middle-class.

I am deeply compassionate toward those who have not been so advantaged as to have been brought up by two wonderful people, who put me first in their lives, gave me every opportunity to succeed, and lifted me up whenever I had fallen short. They knew how hard life could be, and they wanted me to have a better place to start from than they had.

They also taught me that no job is without dignity, if done well and that no person is to be looked down on simply because of the size of his paycheck. I continue to hone these values, and I always try to err on the side of good will.

So, Ms. Dickerson's article is deeply saddening. I recognize all of the truth in it. I've lived around some very depressed neighborhoods in Washington, DC, and Brooklyn. My modest income was often contrasted with the poverty-level subsidies of my neighbors. Most of them were trying to make it through life with some dignity, but a considerable number were sociopathic. They destroyed whatever they touched. They broke glass on the sidewalks and busted out the street lights. They were malevolent storms of desolation, whereever they went.

After all these years, I still do not understand the destructive impulse, the desire to ruin whatever possibility of goodness and beauty that life may hold, only to bring everything down to the same level of depravity. Yet, it exists. It drains us liberals of our progressive resolve. It is a monster that seems to be unredeemable, once it has fully taken root.

Perhaps we must await new developments in neurology to thwart the damage done in such horrid circumstances. We must keep our hope alive, if only for a better solution to come.