1. There are many popular books that are seen as "dangerous" to religion in that they disenchant it through memetic and evolutionary analysis. What do you see as the fruits of this conversation? What are the downfalls?  

 

2. In his new book, The Universe in a Single Atom, the Dalai Lama explains that: "karma means 'action' and refers to the intentional acts of sentient beings. Such acts may be physical, verbal, or mental—even just thoughts or feelings — all of which have impacts upon the psyche of an individual, no matter how minute. Intentions result in act, which result in effects that condition the mind toward certain traits and propensities, all of which may give rise to further intentions and actions" [pp. 109]. Does this description of karma sound consonant with neuroscience? How does it jibe with western notions of causality?

 

3. In that same book the Dalai Lama says: "[t]he view that all aspects of reality can be reduced to matter and its various particles is, to my mind, as much a metaphysical position as the view that an organizing intelligence created and controls reality" [pp. 12]. Do you agree? Or disagree? Why?