Lives on Earth

suffering

  • The Biology Of Suffering

    “Where does suffering come from? Why do we suffer?” The questions open biologist Ursula Goodenough’s essay “The Biological Antecedents of Human Suffering” (in The Routledge Companion to Religion and Science (2012)). Through the ages, people have looked to religion for the… Continue reading

  • The Limits of Happiness

    If our expectations of happiness sometimes fall short. it may be because we often misunderstnad the nature of emotions in general. We tend to think that emotions come in pairs, that each pleasant emotion has its distressing counterpart, that happiness… Continue reading

  • Hindus Seek Detachment. Have Plants and Animals Already Found It?

    Here in suburbia, next to a glassy corporate office, sits a Hindu temple, its ornate façade surrounded by parking lots. Curious, I pulled in one day, removed my shoes at the temple door and walked into a large open space.… Continue reading

  • Ol’ Man River and Wilson the Volleyball; Two Spiritual, Secular Icons

    Two works of stage and screen, popular in their day, include physical objects that are, interestingly, infused with spiritual characteristics while remaining largely un-godlike. The first one is a river. Dere’s an ol’ man called de Mississippi Dat’s de ol’… Continue reading

  • The Music Man

    Recently I stopped by a music store in town to buy banjo strings. I hadn’t been in the store for at least ten years. I remembered it as a hive of kids and grown-ups trying out guitars, pianos, and clarinets,… Continue reading

  • Suffering

    This blog looks at ways in which the history of living things may be relevant to people’s largest questions about life. One of these questions is how to cope with suffering. Modern secularism and traditional religions differ widely in what… Continue reading

  • Forgetting

    A version of this post appeared here at this time last year, shortly after Sandy. Hurricane Sandy seems long gone, and the memory of ten days without light and heat is slowly fading. But I haven’t yet forgotten the train-roar… Continue reading