You wrote:

"You cannot tell tapioca from baseball in a brain state now, but the information has to be stored in a consistent manner. If you can remember which one you discussed yesterday, it is in principle possible to read that from your brain."

I grant that is, perhaps, in principle possible. But my point was a broader one referencing abstract concepts. One example Wilber uses is that we see that certain parts of the brain fire when one is contemplating the divine, and other certain parts fire when one is contemplating an apple. In the former materialists question the reality of the divine; in the latter no one questions the reality of the apple.

You also wrote, "What is missing from any such analysis is this: why are you aware?"

Now we are getting somewhere! I assumed from the context of the interview and subsequent letters that you were trying to make a broader point than you perhaps were. If so, my bad. Are you admitting a type of awareness that can't be materially verified--awareness, or just refining the question? If refining, can you suggest a material rationale for awareness?

John Cage, who it could be said devoted his life as composer, writer and speaker to highlighting the value of silence, reported on his experience of being in an anechoic chamber. In a room acoustically designed to reflect absolutely no sound, thus resulting in measurable absolute silence, Cage distinctly heard three sounds: a low, rhythmic sound; a higher-pitched, slower rhythmic sound; and a high-pitched whine. Of course these were the sounds of his circulatory, respiratory and central nervous systems.

In this context silence refers to a state of mind absent the endless stream of thoughts we generally experience rather than acoustic sound.

Sorry about your tinnitus, though. That sucks!

Good. I get what your driving at, and that makes a lot of sense.

I would argue, however, that you're still driving for a fully materialistic explanation of 'awareness'. And this might be possible if we each, as individuals, lived in a vacuum. But, each and every one of us lives in some sort of community where there exist collective awareness and understanding. It is this fact that leads me to believe that awareness is not something so simple as a firing of neurons.

Further, your statement, "But I see no evidence that any awareness occurs without neural activity, just that awareness is more fundamental and not tied to the "higher" types of mental activity that humans think they are good at." seems to me a wish that some more fundamental type of mental function will be discovered. Perhaps the whole thing is a chicken and egg proposition, and just as likely there could be no neural activity without awareness?

Ah, so I have misunderstood, entirely, your gist. I have no quarrel with you sir. I would say, in my defense, that your objections to my statements--again in the context of this thread--implied that you were objecting to the metaphysical aspect of my argument (metaphysical meaning here simply non-material or beyond material).particularly from your first post:

You are just continuing a long tradition of identifying what is not currently understood or observable and grouping it in with the spiritual.

I don't think I am, at least not in the way I assume you're defining "the spiritual". If you're equating "the spiritual" with "the unknowable" then yes, I'm guilty.

Now, there are things that are currently unknown that someday will be known. That goes without saying. But I am saying that there is an ultimate aspect of life that cannot be known (because we cannot truly stand as objective observers of 'Life' while we are living it as we are inherently a part of it. Objectivity in this case is impossible. That seems to be a point we agree on.

Thanks for the exercise!

I'm sorry Rebecca, I usually dig your posts and columns, but this time you are twisted!

Capital 'O' Outrage!, is the only story here--that much you got right. There's nothing here that should be viewed as offensive.

As a father of a 9 year old who only recently outgrew her Hannah Montana fixation, I checked every link in your post; honestly, there's nothing there. Nothing in any of those links was inherently sexualized.

Daughters are female. Fathers are male. Get over it. No amount of feminist ranting is going to change that. The only way these are sexual photos/videos is if YOU, the viewer, see the body as only a sexual entity.

Grow up.

Hey King,

I, for one, like the new layout. I actually think that the new byline (do blogs even have one?) makes it look a bit more newspaper-y-ish.

Posting more briefly and more often, at least for today, seems to free up your sense of humor, too. I haven't laughed out loud while reading for a long time: transitional sentence quip was awesome, and the eddie fisher story KILLED!

I do have one complaint. I'm more than a little hurt and surprised that your 'etc. and so on' links don't include a curling blog on! If one doesn't exist I think that should be your next venture.

I agree with Malloy. It would be better to have subsequent posts adjacent the way Machinist, War Room, How The World Works, etc. do. I think it makes navigation easier.

Berkley, you'll be receiving a nasty letter from Polynesian Hotties for Hillary any day now!

Well, MLB has already yanked the video from YouTube, and I couldn't find video on Yahoo either. I saw everything except the pitch last night though...