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Brain circuits, bioturbation, and a new physics doc
Yale researchers study a mass extinction from the distant past, uncover hidden brain networks, and share expertise at an international meeting on enhanced weathering.
First college sports CBA proposal unveiled as players association pushes reform
Athletes.org, a group that reps around 5,000 current and former athletes across all sports and divisions, has drafted the first CBA in college sports history.
Golden Globes enter the world of podcasts and tread carefully, avoiding controversy
The Golden Globes have introduced a best podcast category that's likely to spark conversations
The surreal Skate Story shreds skating game convention
Surreal, metaphysical, and often psychedelic, Skate Story has a better understanding of skating's true nature than most skating games.
In My Words: What college freshman taught me about politics
The longest government shutdown in US history painfully illustrated that most elected officials are not good at interacting productively with the opposite political party. Far from this embarrassing...
“The Matilda Effect”: How Pioneering Women Scientists Have Been Written Out of Science History
Photo via Wikimedia Commons The history of science, like most every history we learn, comes to us as a procession of great, almost exclusively white, men, unbroken but for the occasional token woman—well-deserving of her honors but seemingly anomalous nonetheless. “If you believe the history books,” notes the Timeline series The Matilda Effect, “science is a guy thing.
Raptors and Knicks meet Tuesday in NBA Cup group stage
The Toronto Raptors host the New York Knicks in an NBA Cup in-season tournament group play matchup
Rally House Breaks Company Online Sales Record After Electric Sports Weekend
LENEXA, Kan., Dec. 07, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Rally House is thrilled to announce that the company has achieved the largest single-day online sales total in its history. Fueled by an extraordinary combination of high-stakes sports moments and early holiday shopping energy, Rally House saw online sales soar more than 50% year-over-year, marking a historic milestone for the brand and showcasing the company’s commitment to customers, fans, and partners. Fans across the country turned to Rally Hou
University of Utah Health research funding reaches record $531M in 2025
University of Utah Health this year achieved record research funding totals, surpassing the half-billion mark for 2025, reaching $531 million.
A Love Triangle Isn’t The Real Story In ‘Materialists’
The most compelling parts of Celine Song’s new film lie not in a classic love triangle, but in a poignant observation of modern dating culture.
Fruitcake, Savory Soups, and Entertainment
SUNDAY December 7, 2025 {READ IN BROWSER} FEATURE Corsicana: Your Adventure Awaits One of the Corsicana’s most intriguing aspects is its bronze statue tour, a life-sized art exhibit telling stories about the unique individuals who shaped its history. Created by different artists, most of the lifelike sculptures interact with the cityscape: an oil field worker…
A Russian opera opens La Scala's season as the theater defends art over politics
Milan’s Teatro alla Scala celebrates its gala season premiere with a Russian opera, Dmitry Shostakovich’s “Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk.”
Camille Bordas Reads “Understanding the Science”
The author reads her story from the December 15, 2025, issue of the magazine.
Sick in a Hospital Town
The story of Phoebe Putney Memorial Hospital — the dominant political and economic institution of Albany, Georgia — is the story of American health care.
Rhythm Doctor Review
A super challenging one-button rhythm game with great music and a moving story.
ENTERTAINMENT: ‘A Christmas Story’ reprise onstage in Argenta; Dolly’s ‘Christmas Carol’ at UCA
Right Angle Entertainment puts on its touring “Dolly Parton’s Smoky Mountain Christmas Carol” 7 p.m. Wednesday in Reynolds Performance Hall at the University of Central Arkansas.
Politics-first Christians are living in the wrong chapter of history
Ryan Sanders: The Bible describes distinct chapters in humanity’s relationship to the divine. The mistake of many modern evangelicals, like 7 Mountain...
Game Center: No. 11 BYU vs. No. 4 Texas Tech
Follow along as the No. 11 BYU Cougars take on the No. 4 Texas Tech Red Raiders at AT&T Stadium in Arlington, Texas, with KSL.com's live Game Center.
CAA Football Recap
Villanova advanced to the quarterfinals of the FCS playoffs with a 14-7 victory over previously unbeaten Lehigh.
Threats pile up as Indiana Republicans confront pressure from Trump on redistricting
Republicans in the Indiana Senate are facing threats as President Trump pushes for lawmakers to redraw the state's congressional map
Analysis: The cracks in Trump’s base
No politician in modern history has held as much sway over his base as President Donald Trump. And perhaps nothing has mattered more to his political career than that.
Jets’ Gabriel Vilardi opens up about mental health struggles: ‘You just see the negatives’
This story is not about Gabriel Vilardi. He is sharing the details from his life in case he can help somebody else.
BOOKMARKS: Blast off for the final frontier with science fiction reading suggestions
Science fiction, like most other genres, contains multitudes. Any story that incorporates futuristic science or technology can fall under this umbrella, so there’s plenty for any reader to enjoy.
Gueye, Providence Friars to visit Moore, St. John's Red Storm
St. John's plays Providence in a matchup of Big East teams
Western Carolina plays Queens (NC) on home skid
Western Carolina will attempt to stop its four-game home slide when the Catamounts face Queens (NC)
The ‘War on Drugs’ felt over. Donald Trump re-started it
The Trump administration’s undeclared war on what it calls “narco-terrorists” in Latin America opens an aggressive new chapter in US history and reignites the War on Drugs.
Golden State plays Cleveland, aims to end road skid
Golden State comes into a matchup with Cleveland after losing three road games in a row
Science history: Female chemist initially barred from research helps helps develop drug for remarkable-but-short-lived recovery in children with leukemia
In December 1954, Gertrude Elion and colleagues described a new compound they had developed that sent children with leukemia into remission. It would guide a new approach to "rational drug design."
Long Beach must claim a larger share of sports market, mayor says
Long Beach is home to new professional teams and has a long history of athletic success at the high school and collegiate levels. Soon, it will have worldwide attention as host to nearly a dozen events at the 2028 Olympic Games.
Comanche Entertainment discusses impact of new Indigenous in-room programming
In addition to letting guests experience Indigenous and Native culture from the comfort of their hotel rooms, the partnership between Comanche Entertainment and First Nations Experience (FNX) is also shedding light on the rich history of Native American casinos in the United States.
Natalie Ring leads Marquette to win in NCAA volleyball tournament
The Golden Eagles won a match in the first round of the NCAA tournament for ninth time in program history.
New 'KnoWay' robotaxis cause chaos in upcoming Grand Theft Auto Online DLC
The inclusion of the Waymo look-a-likes appears to be part of a larger storyline that will encourage players to "stop the development of a mass surveillance network."
NFL Week 14 Preview: Stats and Storylines for 6 FOX Sports Games
Week 14 brings six games to the FOX Sports lineup and we preview a busy slate, including Bears at Packers.
Tennessee Tech Leads 2025-26 OVC Commissioner's Cup Standings After Fall Championships
After the completion of the fall sport championships, Tennessee Tech leads the 2025-26 Ohio Valley Conference Commissioner's Cup all-sport trophy standings; the Cup is a symbol of overall athletic excellence in Conference-sponsored championships.
Mel’s Sports History: Watertown’s Championship win
For Mel’s Sports History, Mel Busler takes a look back 25 years ago when the Watertown boys basketball team won a championship game.
Dec. 5, 2025: 'If you can keep it' on unprecedented politics; Maintaining Mustang; Tech firm commits to downtown
Our series continues about unprecedented politics, named for the famous Benjamin Franklin line in 1787: "A republic, if you can keep it." University of Denver political scientist Seth Masket provides historic context. Then, it takes a lot of work to keep Mustang standing strong outside DIA. Also, tech firm Ibotta makes a 10-year commitment to downtown Denver, which other businesses have fled. And the family stories behind Denver's Little Saigon at History Colorado Center.
Shops empty in a Hispanic neighborhood as immigration crackdown comes to Louisiana
Federal border agents have descended on a Hispanic enclave just outside New Orleans and local business owners are suffering
Exclusive: "Transformative" AGI is on the horizon, DeepMind's Hassabis says
The DeepMind CEO describes AGI as "the most transformative moment in human history."
Detroit legacy businesses get $50k grants to boost growth, preserve history
Thousands of dollars in grants are being awarded to longtime Detroit companies, giving them a much-needed business boost. An exclusive celebration captured the moment’s excitement for recipients of the Detroit Legacy Business Project grants.
New Dawn of War 4 story trailer reveals surprise inclusion of Dark Angels sub-faction and everyone's favourite 10,000+ year-old grandpa
New Dawn of War 4 story trailer reveals surprise inclusion of Dark Angels sub-faction and everyone's favourite 10,000+ year-old grandpa.
It’s official, politics has ruined Eurovision
A toxic anti-Israel boycott has created the biggest crisis in the song contest’s history – it’s hard to see how it can move forward
2026 FIFA World Cup draw storylines: USMNT's path, Yamal's first crack and more
The Americans will hope to avoid the Group of Death and receive a clear path to the knockout stages
NCAA-backed effort to reshape college sport regulations has hit a wall in Congress
House Republicans plans to vote on a bill regulating college sports has been scrapped due to divisions within their caucus
15 holiday romance books to get you in the festive spirit
Whether you're looking for a romantic take on "How the Grinch Stole Christmas" or a hockey love story, we found the holiday romance book for you.
Inside the tightest playoff race in NFL history: Five divisions separated by a game or less
The top two teams in the AFC North, AFC South and NFC North all play each other on Sunday, too.
EBay's New Sports Card Price Guide Could Change The Game for Collectors
EBay Inc. (NASDAQ:EBAY) is rolling out a comprehensive pricing tool designed to revolutionize how trading card collectors navigate the marketplace. New Pricing Tool Targets Trading Card Collectors The online marketplace giant is introducing a price guide for trading cards that draws on actual marketplace data from completed and paid transactions, collectible news site CLLCT reported last week. The feature offers "a clearer view of everything from rarity to real market value," eBay Vice President
AMC Entertainment CEO remains in charge of world's largest theater chain after stroke
AMC Entertainment said Thursday that CEO Adam Aron suffered a minor stroke last month but recovered rapidly and will continue to lead the world’s biggest movie theater chain
Four with MIAC ties to be honored at National Girls & Women in Sports Day-Minnesota
BLOOMINGTON, Minn. – Four individuals with ties to the Minnesota Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (MIAC) will be honored with awards during the 2026 National Girls & Women in Sports Day-Minnesota Celebration on Wednesday, February 4, 2026.
Anderson leads Xavier against Cincinnati after 28-point game
Xavier hosts the Cincinnati Bearcats after Roddie Anderson III scored 28 points in Xavier's 96-74 victory against the Saint Francis (PA) Red Flash
Vermont Catamounts to host Bucknell Bison Friday
The Vermont Catamounts will play host to the Bucknell Bison
New Hampshire faces Merrimack, seeks to stop 3-game skid
New Hampshire will try to stop its three-game losing streak when the Wildcats take on Merrimack
Working with monkeys was this lab tech’s dream job. Now she’s staffing an IT help desk
Trump’s reshaping of science has fueled fears researchers will leave the U.S. This lab tech's story shows it can drive people out of science altogether.
Orlando and Miami meet for conference matchup
The Magic will play host to conference opponent Miami
The Blood Ravens are not alone in a new Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War IV story trailer
Reinforcements are on the way.
Nominate a Small Business for the Crowns of Enterprise Awards
2026 marks the 15th year that the Crowns of Enterprise Awards will recognize the hard work of small businesses and the economic impact they have on the Charlotte-Mecklenburg area. The winners will be named during an awards ceremony in May 2026.
NCAA women's soccer championship winners: All-time list
North Carolina is the winningest program in women's NCAA soccer history, with 22 titles. Check out other championship-caliber teams now.
The Hollywood Reporter’s 100 Most Powerful Women in Entertainment 2025
After another wild year for the industry, the women making the biggest impact across film and television reveal their predictions for Hollywood 2026, discuss the perks and pains of AI and even pitch their dream storylines for The Studio.
2026 World Cup: The Most-Watched Sporting Event in History?
Excitement is building ahead of the tournament staged in the U.S., Canada and Mexico.
2,500-Year-Old Chronicle Is Oldest Known Record Of A Total Solar Eclipse And Reveals Some Surprises
Because this record survived, we know more about ancient Chinese history, the rotation of the Earth, and past solar activity than we would otherwise.
Lyles and Akron host Bucknell
Akron faces the Bucknell Bison after Amani Lyles scored 25 points in Akron's 105-81 win against the Milwaukee Panthers
Commentary: Mix up your holiday entertainment with a history of Texas’ lawless influence on Old West
Bryan Burrough's "The Gunfighters" examines how the Lone Star State was central to "a kaleidoscope of personal violence."
Bizjack's 29 lead Butler over Eastern Michigan 84-68
Led by Finley Bizjack's 29 points, the Butler Bulldogs defeated the Eastern Michigan Eagles 84-68 on Tuesday
'Story that isn't a story': town official states amid businesses' outdoor area closures
More business owners in Black Mountain say sudden enforcement changes by the town are threatening their livelihood.
Where Science Meets Storytelling: Twelve Years of the Science Blogs Web Archive
More than a decade after its launch, the Science Blogs Web Archive continues to grow and evolve. In this interview, Jennifer “JJ” Harbster reflects on building and maintaining the collection, while intern Yahir Brito brings a fresh perspective on updating and expanding it. Together, they share a few of their favorite blogs and discuss why it is important to preserve these unique examples of scientific communication.
Mulvaney addresses future of politics and populism at Brooks School event
Director Mick Mulvaney, the 2025–26 Nixon Distinguished Policy Fellow, delivered a keynote on the rise of populism in America to a full lecture hall of Cornell students, highlighting shifts in U.S. politics and engaging in wide-ranging discussion on contemporary policy challenges.
Verticals Platform DramaBox Courts Up-and-Coming Writers With Stage 32 Partnership (Exclusive)
The companies are launching a writer development program and competition as DramaBox looks to expand the pool of storytellers schooled in the fast-moving, addictive format.
Politics of Presence: Native and Nonnative Natures
The idea of a fixed “native range” is, at best, a human snapshot, one moment in a much longer story of flux.
Horses Review
This unsettling horror game banned from Steam tells a harrowing story you won’t soon forget.
Wait, did the Galaxy S26 Ultra just lose TWO of its only real upgrades over the S25 Ultra?
We were to get a 5,200 mAh battery – now that's history. Allegedly.
YouTube Launches ‘Recap’ Personalized Year-End Reels, Unveils 2025 Top-Trending Lists
YouTube released its annual end-of-the-year trending lists for 2025 and launched the first YouTube Recap, a personalized, shareable highlight sizzle reel of users' watch history for the year.
Afghanistan's Taliban rulers carry out public execution in sports stadium
Afghanistan's Taliban authorities have carried out a public execution in the eastern city of Khost
One month after Melissa, Jamaica scrambles to get back to business
Maj. Gen. (Ret.) Antony Anderson had been on the job for exactly five months as Jamaica’s ambassador to the United States when his country suffered its worst natural disaster in history.
MiMedia Provides Business Update Heading into Calendar Year-End
All Partners Shipping Devices with MiMedia Integrated at Same TimeNew York, New York--(Newsfile Corp. - December 2, 2025) - MiMedia Holdings Ltd. (TSXV: MIM) (OTCQB: MIMDF) (FSE: KH3) ("MiMedia", "Company"), is pleased to provide a brief business update heading toward the end of the 2025 calendar year. Management is excited to announce that, for the first time in the Company's history, all MiMedia partners are shipping devices or readying device shipments for the end of the year. The Company...
The best history and politics books of 2025
The revolutionary spirit in politics and architecture; histories of free speech and civil war; plus how the Tories fell apart and Starmer won
The science of storytelling: How narrative accelerates the bioeconomy
In the bioeconomy, breakthroughs alone don’t drive change. Storytelling translates complexity into clarity, turning data into belief through stories
Longwood hosts Troy following Dyer's 22-point game
Troy faces the Longwood Lancers after Zay Dyer scored 22 points in the Trojans' 74-70 win against the Florida Gulf Coast Eagles
Science history: Computer scientist lays out 'Moore's law,' guiding chip design for a half century
At a small local chapter meeting of a professional society, Gordon Moore's talk laid out the rudiments of what would become "Moore's law, which would govern the electronics industry for a half century.
Pete Carroll searches for answers as Raiders' dismal season continues
Pete Carroll remains optimistic about the Raiders' chances despite their 2-10 record
Bills show resilience in overcoming mistakes, injuries by dominating Steelers
Put aside the turnovers, middling passing production, poor tackling and all the other issues that have hounded the Buffalo Bills for much of this season
MAX Accelerator Business IDEA Competition culminates with Dec. 3 live pitches at the IDEA Bank
The culmination of the MAX Accelerator Business IDEA Competition at Troy University is a pitch competition with a dozen students vying for some $8,000 is prize funding, the largest such pool in the program’s history.
Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame Elects Little Rock Volleyball Coach Van Compton
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. – One of the most decorated coaches in Little Rock Athletics history is adding another major honor to her résumé. The Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame announced Sunday that Trojan head volleyball coach Van Compton has been elected for induction into the 2026 Class. Compton will be formally inducted on April 10, at Oaklawn in Hot Springs.
Goodman: Lane Kiffin is the biggest villain in SEC sports history
Tommy Tuberville famously lied about leaving Ole Miss before going to Auburn. What Kiffin has done is so much worse.
CNN Academy Brings Real-Time Sports Newsroom Simulation to Georgia Tech
ATLANTA—CNN and the Georgia Institute of Technology today announced the launch of the CNN Academy Sports Journalism Bootcamp and Simulation, a two-week immersive program designed to prepare the next generation of storytellers for the fast-paced world of sports media.
Lesley Netter-Snowden named executive vice president and chief business officer
Kennesaw State University President Kathy S. Schwaig has appointed Lesley Netter-Snowden as executive vice president and chief business officer (EVP/CBO) effective immediately, following a national search.
Science must move from materialism to mystery
Theoretical physicist and neuroscientist Àlex Gómez-Marín argues that modern science has become trapped in a framework that mistakes matter for the whole of reality. In this wide-ranging interview, Gómez-Marín challenges the foundations of materialism, defends the scientific study of near-death experiences, and calls for a new type of science grounded in mystery and a renewed sense of the sacred. He suggests that abandoning materialism could open the door to a deeper understanding of consciousness, death, and the purpose of human existence. Simon Custer: You are both a theoretical physicist and a neuroscientist, and you have also been fiercely critical of materialist theories of mind and consciousness. What do you think the ultimate nature of reality is?Àlex Gómez-Marín: I don't know what the ultimate nature of reality is, but what I try to first assess is whether the stories that they [mainstream science] have told us about it are right, or maybe whether there are other alternatives. That's why I've been a fierce critic of materialism. As a scientist, I realized that they had sold us this idea that to be a good scientist you also had to subscribe to many other -isms, like materialism, reductionism, and even secularism. And so first I think one needs to unmount these -isms, and then, as is happening today in consciousness studies, we have a huge landscape where there isn't only one game in town, the idea that matter is the only thing that really exists. But because we are studying the hard problem of consciousness, it may be the case that other views of reality, like idealism, or even dualism, or other theories like dual aspect monism... these are philosophical ideas that now, I think, have room in science to be taken seriously. How does something like materialism relate to dualism or idealism? What is materialism in the first place?Well, materialism is the philosophical position that matter is the only really ‘real’ thing in the universe. And I think that worked kind of well because science started 400 years ago and Galileo made that split, I call it the foundational wound. It was a great business move.He said, let's start doing science on that portion of reality that lends itself more easily to mathematization and measurement. So, for some reason, the solidity of this table or the movement of planets lend themselves very well to this foundational idea of science. But as time went on, 400 years later, we realized that we had forgotten the other side, which is what really matters.What really matters is pain, is love, is feelings, sensation, consciousness, which is very hard to define, but very intimate. We all know what it is. It's that thing that disappears when we go into deep sleep and comes back in the morning. SUGGESTED VIEWING On the edges of knowledge With Michael Shermer, Rupert Sheldrake, Güneş Taylor It's what it is like to be, as Nagel said. It's the feeling of being alive. So, materialism is good to study certain things, but then when it ossifies into this ideology and then is dressed like science, now it's preventing us from understanding these key questions that are really that everybody wants to know.Why are we here? Why do we feel reality? Where do we go when we die? And so we need other ways. We need pluralism. I'm only asking for having more options on the table and taking them seriously. Why does materialism fail to explain consciousness? For example, if you were to lobotomize me, I would not be a functional human being. What do you say to someone who might think that materialism adequately explains the mind?Well, here we could speak about different things. We could talk about physics or about neuroscience. I happen to have training with both.For instance, for neuroscientists, 99% of them, I'm not included in that portion, believe that the brain can only be a productive organ. It's an organ that somehow, somewhere, consciousness emerges. It's like a lamp. And then something happens, magic happens, and then consciousness emerges.That's the position you need to be if you're a materialist because if the only really ‘real’ thing is matter, then you need to say, just give us some more time and money and we'll figure out how mind emerges or is produced from matter. There are many philosophically sophisticated ways of criticizing this.Now there's another option, which is the brain as a permissive organ. This was said by William James more than 100 years ago.Now then the brain wouldn't be like this machine, like for instance, a heat engine whose smoke is consciousness, which is what we would have in the first big model, the productive model. But in the permissive model, the brain would be a kind of a filter. And so the brain would still have a very important role in consciousness, but it wouldn't be a productive role.It would be permissive, much like a filter or much like a prism which would receive light. And - I'm speaking metaphorically - it would receive the light of the mind and then it could reflect it and refract it.Now, with these two big options on the table, I think we can make progress into what I call the edges of consciousness, which are all these experiences, weird experiences that many people have, but we don't talk about enough, like near-death experiences, precognitive dreams, synchronicities. These experiences are very important for humans and they have a place in the permissive hypothesis and they are literally impossible in the productive hypothesis. So that's yet one more reason to explore alternatives to materialism. There may be anecdotal evidence for near-death experiences, but is there robust evidence that would be accepted by the majority of scientists who subscribe to the scientific method?Sure. And the plural of anecdotes, someone said, is data.And there's a lot of data. Actually, this year is the 50th anniversary, half a century, since Dr. Raymond Moody realized that we have two ears and one mouth and started listening to what his patients had to say about their experiences while they were clinically dead.The heart had stopped, breathing had stopped in these patients. These patients would come back and tell him these amazing stories that some people may say are hallucinations, but for the patients were hyper-real, like seeing light at the end of the tunnels, seeing deceased family members waiting for them, feeling bliss.___I would say the evidence suggests that the mind can survive the death of activity of the brain.___And so he and others started taking them seriously and writing their accounts down. And then you can do a science based on that material of experience that people have. Now, on the more objective side, more recently people have started to measure what's going on in the brain when people are clinically dead and brought back. This has opened a proper field of study, which is near-death studies.Evidence is a difficult word, because sometimes people think that when you say evidence, this is just the final proof. Evidence is like in a jury. You bring testimony, you bring pieces of data that point in one direction or another.I would say the evidence suggests that the mind can survive the death of activity of the brain. When brains are broken or shut off, there can still be mind going on. And that's revolutionary.That would entail that when we die, it's not game over, which, by the way, is the thesis of materialism. If consciousness survives, materialism dies. It's game over for materialism if something of us continues after we die. Do you think that there is mental continuity after death?Well, I think so, and I believe so, and I could also say I may have experienced it myself, because four years ago I had a near-death experience. I was in the hospital, I lost a lot of blood, and I saw those beings at the end of the tunnel, three beings, and there was yellow light. I was in a well, I was looking upwards, and I hadn't read about NDEs by then, but when I came back from this experience, I decided I would try to integrate this also in my professional life. Not just my personal life, of course, but my professional life as a physicist and as a neuroscientist. So I may have had the experience of glimpses of what an afterlife would be, and I'm not ashamed to say it in this way, and then one can do science of it, and then one can do philosophy of it.One can think about what -isms we were discussing, what views on reality would allow those experiences to be really ‘real,’ as opposed to, well, poor guy, the brain was kind of broken, it must have been a hallucination. Do you have a view about whether individuality or “the ego” persists after death, or whether we sort of merge into some sort of cosmic consciousness instead?I don't know, but my view would be along those lines you're suggesting. I think we could speak about a kind of universal mind, and then the problem is not how we emerge from matter, but how we fragment from a more holistic consciousness into these individual eddies and then when we die, this kind of dissipates.But I'm not sure. For instance, idealism would promote that view, but then what would survive of us after these eddies just vanish and become again the big Consciousness, I'm not sure what that would be. I don't know for sure, but I would tell you I believe something of us survives.And there are other lines of research, not just near-death experience, that can address this really hard question of survival. For instance, there are children who remember previous lives. This was studied by Ian Stevenson at the University of Virginia for more than 50 years.___Research takes place within a selection mechanism that also sometimes reinforces things that are not very scientific.___It's amazing research. He went all over the world, especially in the East, and collected all these case studies, all these stories. In plural, these were data of kids, very young age, who would describe up to 40 items that then he could go and verify.There was no internet. There was really no way the kid could know. Why would the kid say that when I was living in this other body and I was a woman and that's how my house would look like or that's how I would die, right? Again, there is evidence, not proof, but there's evidence not only that something weird and interesting is happening as we cross the threshold, but also when we come back to this life.Scientists should not be afraid of studying this, but they are because there's stigma. There's usually stigma upon the enigma, and this is so unfortunate. And one of the reasons is because of the ideology of materialism, because those things cannot be possible. What is wrong with the politics of science such that they have generated this stigma?So many things. Science is a human activity to begin with.So it falls prey to all our passions and ego and greed. That's one thing. Science is a job for the good and for the bad.You need to get a salary. You need to get grants. Research takes place within a selection mechanism that also sometimes reinforces things that are not very scientific.And then, we didn't have time to unpack this, but science for many years become entangled, as I was suggesting before, to other -isms, materialism, secularism. So anything that smells like the afterlife, people may think has to do with God, and then they freak out.Anything that suggests that there's something about the mind that may not need a physical material substrate to exist, it smells like non-materialism. So, all these -isms are ideologically blocking that kind of research, and then there are all these sociopolitical constraints as to what should be studied and what shouldn't be studied.I call it the backstage of science. Sometimes we scientists or science communicators seem to speak as if the data is the only thing that matters. We say, well, data and theory.But then there's a third leg of this stool, which is all the politics that goes behind the scenes. And we often don't speak about this, and it's quite vicious and petty, and it's very real. Why is materialism so attractive to most scientists?Well, an easy answer is because we've grown up with it.It's what the educational system promotes, and that's what you hear when you go to university. So it's like growing in a culture. It feels like the air in which you breathe.So it's very hard to begin with to detect, well, maybe there's another alternative. Maybe there are other ways of doing science, other environments in which one could do science. That's one reason.And other reasons maybe are more profound, and I'm not qualified to explain them, but I could say, looking at this 400-year history of science, since it started around 1623 with Galileo's book The Assayer, that science went and coupled with all what's going on in the West.And so the fall of religion, you could say, and science presented us this new alternative that then could be coupled very well with other -isms, and this idea of growth, and then science losing its good twin brother, which was philosophy. There's a whole natural history of science starting as philosophy, kind of emancipating or breaking out from philosophy, and then marrying technology, and then marrying other social systems.From that point of view, materialism is a very convenient idea to propose. There were attempts, like the German idealists tried to do a more romantic science. But no, the idea prevailed, like Francis Bacon said: You should pursue nature through all her corners, he said, and make her spill her secrets.Our attitude towards nature in the science that dominates is very much reflecting how we treat nature in our society, in our culture, like a resource to extract secrets by force and then dominate it. How is materialism related to the notions of growth and progress? What's wrong with having a productive citizenry?This is another very interesting and very difficult question to answer.But there's this recent book coming out by Paul Kingsnorth. In it, he explains this idea of the machine and this idea of progress. And this, again, this conflation of more is better, of we need to go forward always, and convincing us that the way to do that is to continually extract more from nature. But because we don't have the religious context anymore, because God is dead, then what do we have? We have what we can do as humans with our own gadgets.It's kind of the story of the Promethean fire. We will just build anything to make ourselves God.A good example today is transhumanism. Transhumanism is this pseudo-religion dressed in technoscientific language whose goal is very religious. They promise immortality, they promise redemption, they promise transformation of the entire natural world, but it's done by human means through technology. Are you suggesting that we can't have ethics without religion?Well, we should have ethics with or without religion. That's another pruning that has happened in science. We say, forget about aesthetics, although some physicists still think that beautiful means probably true, and forget about politics. We pretend there's no backstage of science, and even let's forget about ethics.___Science needs to be in the service of mankind.___Scientists, when they become more like engineers, they're just thinking how to make things work so that they can go to the moon, go to Mars, make machines that think, but they don't think whether that's a good idea.And also consider metaphysics. Many scientists for a long time pretended, and maybe that comes from the stream of positivisms, that really one doesn't need metaphysics at all, except that materialism is always the metaphysics running the system.You see, it's not just ethics. It's the pruning of all of these, you could say, five main legs of philosophy that just makes a kind of unconscious science, a science that doesn't really know what it's doing. It's doing it very well locally, but it just doesn't know what it's doing globally. Do you think science has to have an ultimate vision and purpose behind it for it to be effective or for it to be meaningful and transformative?Yes, a way I would say that is that science needs to be in the service of mankind. And it hasn't been that. And we can see it through, you know, when we discovered the secrets of the atom, and all of a sudden, the Manhattan Project, and then we create nuclear weapons.And now we're trying to crack how machines may think, and now we're creating this mess, right? So science needs to be in service of mankind, not in service of a few ideas that maybe want to make more money or just dominate upon nature. What about planes, trains, automobiles, and modern medicine? Hasn't science served mankind by helping us develop those technologies?Yes and no. I see where you're going, and it's fair.I came here by plane, and it's a blessing. When I almost died, the surgeons did their job, and they saved my life. But these two forced choices between Luddites and Silicon Valley types, I think, of course, it's a false dichotomy.Progress, in a way, it's good, but we often don't speak about the dark side of the moon. We say the great things that progress has brought, and we don't speak about the disasters, the side effects that it has come with, and the same when we promise new technologies. We tend to think that any technology is great, that email is going to save us so much time because we don't need to write letters and send them anymore.Is that true? I spend so many hours a week writing emails. Let's just say there are great things about it and bad things about it. People like Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker, for example, argue that we've made moral progress over time because of the Enlightenment. Do you think that's totally wrong-headed?I think he's emphasizing a side of the moon, and he does that very well, and you can find tons of plots where there's a slope going up and say it's great. But I think he should also tell the not-so-friendly story.But if your ideology is just to resist and continue to explain that the Enlightenment is the best thing ever and reason is the best thing ever… this feels to me like you're worshipping these abstractions.I'm very critical of it and also of these, again, science communicators and scientists that say, Oh, science says, in the name of science, experts say. It's like, come on, let's be careful because we can shoot ourselves in the foot by putting forth to the people an image of science that we know is not really true. Recently there's been a resurgence of spirituality and of people who say that they're spiritual but not religious, especially in the United States. If materialism is going away, what is going to fill that gap? Are we going to return to traditional religion? Do you see that being connected with the rise of the political right?I'm not a fortune teller, so I don't know what's going to happen. But, yeah, we could say we're in this post-materialist age and even post-secular age. One cannot come back to the past, but maybe just to contact with the roots is a good idea.What do I mean by that? I think we need to do a science 2.0, a science that says thank you to Galileo and thank you to materialism, but we need to reinvent even a new kind of scientific method. We need to do so in a culture where we realize humans cannot thrive in a vacuum where there's this idea that the sacred has to be removed.Now, how do we do that without bringing in back all the vices of religion? I don't know. I'm from a Catholic country.Here we are in England, so there are differences and interreligious dialogue has always been a challenge. But I think maybe a way of putting it is: after all these conflicts and branchings I was quickly alluding to, science from philosophy and then also from religion, now there's a time of reconciliation perhaps and maybe debates in the proper sense, like exchange of ideas in service of learning and getting into something higher than both poles. We need science to talk to religious people and it's interesting when people say they're spiritual and not religious.I think this is just a way of saying, no, I don't want to go back, I want to go forward. But at the end of the day, religions have offered us practices and grounding that we now desperately need. Everybody can and should just meditate or pray or do whatever they want, but we're in a crisis and it's time for reconciliation. What do you say to critics that say you are merely projecting our need for meaning onto a fundamentally indifferent universe?Yeah, I know that the typical science communicator says something like this. But we're not projecting. Human beings feed on meaning.It's the other way around. If you're a materialist, because the only thing that there is is matter, all that comes next, free will, consciousness, meaning, this is a kind of illusion that we need to explain.They're just craving for meaning, but there isn't really for them. I would also like to remind my materialist friends that for decades, if not centuries, they've said in the name of science, we know that this and this and this doesn't really exist. I think now they sense they're forced to say, well, actually, we don't know. We've been saying, for instance, that there's nothing after you die, and now probably they need to admit that they don't know the answer.___We need to do a science 2.0, a science that says thank you to Galileo and thank you to materialism, but we need to reinvent even a new kind of scientific method.___So it's a moment to open up possibilities and also to gently but fiercely critique these claims that I think harm society. If you say in the name of science, get on with it, when your father dies, you'll never see him again. Well, what the F do you know about it? You haven't studied the literature, you haven't had any of those experiences, and basically what you're doing is you're just doing marketing on ideology. This needs to stop. Do you think that it's scarier for some people to entertain the thought that there might be life after death, compared to a materialist worldview where you just die, given that there might be consequences for unsavory behaviour?Well, death and dying is scary. It's maybe the ultimate ending. It's a limit on life, and when we're in this conquest mode, we don't like limits.And it also has, there's a shockwave backwards, so I think if you change your notion of what death is or may be, you live differently. It also has consequences, as you're saying, for the future because this is not our only goal here and we come back in whatever form. And again, different religions would say different things. I the East, they are more happy with the idea of reincarnation, and here in the West, there are other preferences. But in any case, it changes how we live, and that's really what matters.It's not about just projecting or imagining what we'll be after, but how we live now and also how we treat those who are dying. So it goes from the individual to the families, to the hospitals.Now in the near-death research I do, this has ramifications at all these levels, all the way to society.But our society is thanatophobic. It has a phobia of death. We don't want to hear about death, and this is another thing we need to put on the table and be willing to talk about it. Do you think that we might get closer to answering ultimate questions like why is there anything at all if we jettison materialism?That’s an excellent question, Simon. Two things: we should stop treating reality, I believe, as a great sudoku, as an enigma, as something that with intelligence, money, and time that we will crack and instead treat reality more like a mystery. And what you do for in front of a mystery is not to be the clever guy in a class and say “I’ll solve you” but more like “I will bow and you will transform me.”I know this sounds a bit like a scientist speaking like a mystic. But I think this reorientation is needed. In the end, we won’t crack the big questions, but they will transform us. If we free ourselves from this prison of materialism, the way we will explore these questions will be freer, more creative, and in service of mankind. Do you think exploring mystery is the reason why we are here?I think we are here because, and this pseudo-theological argument I’m making off the cuff, But the One, the Absolute, if there is such a thing, had everything except limitation. We are that absolute experiencing that contingency. It’s like an act of divine proprioception. It’s a wonderful adventure, it’s just incredible to be alive. Perhaps we have forgotten why we are here and the whole point is to experience the flesh.Let me end by saying this. I criticize materialism harshly. I bang on this dead horse, because I think it’s dead. But matter is a great mystery. So maybe my invitation is as follows: hey materialist friends, come here, let’s work on materialism 2.0! Consciousness is a mystery, but matter is also a mystery. The fact that we can have an intersubjective experience consensus, the fact that we can apply mathematics, that we can measure things... the physical world we take for granted, but it is a great mystery too.Maybe that’s related to your last question: why are we here? Why did spirit decide to incarnate? Being in the flesh may be a great thing if spirit decided to do so.Àlex Gómez-Marín, thank you very much.My pleasure.
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