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The confusion around stem cells is due, I think, in large part to a fundamental misunderstanding of the function of DNA. In the popular mind, DNA contains a complete description of a person’s body. From this perspective, the DNA in the 100 or so stem cells in a balstocyst fully describe what the person will…

The more alert among you will have long ago noticed that the cyberkrunk blog is, at its core, an extended rumination on the mind-body problem in the guise of chatty posts about pop music, restaurants and movies, all expressed in the language of a writing style I invented some time ago called “Gonzo Prufrock”. Since…

Reading Sam Harris’ The End of Faith. While it’s interesting, Harris really seems to go off on the deep end whenever he starts talking philosophy. Some ludicrous stuff on ethics. The he goes off on strawman arguments against relativism and pragmatism. Against pragmatism? Why that’s just un-American! In a lengthy end-note, he quotes Thomas Nagel’s…

“Every time you read it or say it, you make another copy in your brain.” Dan Dennett.

monkey bar – pam’s real thai – russian vodka room – the whispering gallery in grand central – the campbell apartment (closed, but we snuck a peek) – lombardi’s – bucket of live frogs in chinatown – a nice decanter at crate and barrel (we bought it) – some old port in the best wine…

Brunobaby done tagged me, and now I’m it. I didn’t even know I was in the game! But I’m a good sport, so I’ll play along and, nouvelle vague-style, submit to the interview. Please picture me as a 14-year old Antoine Doinel as I respond. 1) Name a book that you want to share so…

Fair daffodils, we weep to see you haste away so soon; as yet the early-rising sun has not attain’d his noon. Stay, stay until the hasting day has run but to the evensong; and, having pray’d together, we Will go with you along. We have short time to stay, as you, we have as short…

It was a late fall night in 1994. Living at the time in the cheerily dilapidated, spaciously boho upper two floors of a house on Concorde Avenue in Toronto. Not home long when the doorbell rang. Downstairs, the six-year-old girl explained to me that her kitten was trapped on the roof of the house next…

Owing mostly to an administrative error, and, I guess, partially to my “only-dining-below-14th-street” edict that was passed as of late, we ended up having dinner at Marion’s tonight. Now, the thing you have to know about Marion’s is that it has always been a fun place to have a cocktail–a wacky cocktail, that is. I…

As much as I was allured by the ubergeek appeal of running a site based on slashcode,  it  eventually became more trouble than it was worth.  For a couple of reasons, I needed to update my server to the most recent version of Redhat Fedora. Slash only runs on a very specific, and very ancient…

From the “two-post-in-one-day!” department: Reading through Eric Asimov’s year end wine wrap-up, I’m more interested his November state-of-the-union column about Rye whiskey. If you’ve never had a Manhattan made with Rye, then you’ve never had a proper Manhattan. Most people seem to prefer them with Bourbon these days, but Bourbon is a little too big…

Turn off your mind, relax and float down stream; it is not dying, it is not dying. Lay down all thought, surrender to the void; it is shining, it is shining. That you may see the meaning of within; it is being, it is being. That love is all and love is everyone; it is…

From the “extreme-krunk” department: A couple of weeks ago, I woke up in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and this is what I was thinking. In Philosophy in a New Key*, Suzanne Langer writes about static form and dynamic form. For an example of static form, think of a Henry Moore sculpture. And one example of dynamic…