I’ll start at the end of this 12-minute, intriguing TED Talk. Daniel Reisel, a neuroscientist who has studied the brains of socio-paths, asks us whether we should be concerned not only about changing the brains of criminals but also our own. I find the whole idea of changing our brains – and along with our brains our character and potential – simply fascinating because that idea emerges at the intersection of two deeply held beliefs. On the one hand, we often think of character as something that can be developed and so we stress moral and character development in our schools and churches and civic associations alike. On the other hand,...

Here are three pieces I enjoyed reading this week but haven’t had time to comment on (yet!) – perhaps they will supply you with some Memorial Day Weekend reading: 1) Jonah Lehrer, author of Imagine: How Creativity Works and How We Decide and one of my favorite science writers, dives into recent research that thinking about God improves self-control. In fact, even when subjects in a psychological test weren’t either a) religious or b) consciously aware that they were thinking about God, they still exercised more self-control when their attention was turned to subjects usually connected with God. In addition to reporting on...