Firstly, EEG and brain oscillations are a highly imprecise way of mapping the brain and I doubt that signatures of such memory constructs are even agreed upon in the neuroscientific community.

I just read the NYT article as well. And here is how they experimented:
They compared statements such as ‘I bought Arsenic’ and ‘I met Udit at McDonald’s’ to “neutral” statements like ‘The sky is blue’.
Any decent scientist could clearly point out to the fools that the test neutral statements cannot serve as controls to the test statements simply because the test statement involves actions such as buying and meeting, whereas the neutral one is a factual statement with no action verb. So the difference in the signals could simply be one’s processing of an action statement and not the actual memory of it.

If what he did was so revolutionary and path breaking in science, he could have gotten a Nature or a Science publication out of what he did.

Are we living in the medieval ages? Might as well go witch hunting.

Great article Sumita (as always)

Even for me Manmohini is the best song out of album. I hope now on we will hear lot of songs from Vijay Prakash

I don’t know if you still remember me, but I remember you very well. I enjoyed reading you poem, it’s beautiful.

Aparna.

American empire? love the historical reference.

“wars have contributed greatly to the unraveling of the American economy “?
The unraveling of the American economy was rooted in the creation of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae. I really don’t know how the war changed anything.

United States - the most hated country in the world? Check the facts: http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/971013.html

“Who can possibly claim that the United States is winning the war on terror?” I can. Islamic fundamentalism, a major source of modern terror, is now on the defensive as a philosophy. It has had to move from one of its major bases in Afghanistan. It has had to advocate the killing of other Muslims. The philosophy is being alienated in its own base.

We have a hostile nuclear weapons state that is slowly spinning out of control as a neighbour-true, but it doesn’t mean we can’t secure our borders. After all, that is one of the most heavily defended borders

We have a military occupation in Kashmir-your cited article mentions election? Martial law is able to be declared in any state.

A shamefully persecuted, impoverished minority of more than 150 million Muslims who are being targeted as a community and pushed to the wall - I see the exact opposite happening. The level of preference given to a Muslim applicant to any government benefit is obscene. I would bet the average Muslim in India is more prosperous and more free than the average one in Pakistan. BUT, it doesn’t matter. This attack was not an attack on Hindus, it was an attack on Indians. It was planned and carried on by foreigners. This was not an internal issue. No matter how well we treated a particular minority, this attack would have taken place. The hotel was reconned AND attacked by terrorists.

What kind of Homeland Security can secure India? The smart kind. We have the manpower, the technology, and the money. What we need is will and a good implementation of policy.

Anti-terrorism laws are not for deterrence. They’re to get information and stop attacks. Laws created for deterrence is stupid.

I agree with your blowback statement. Our dirty deeds and quick fixes involved our complacency with corruption and inefficiency.

This is NOT an internal issue. It’s not a choice between civil war and justice. This is a simple issue of protecting life by improving and implementing our internal security procedures.

The Monster in the Mirror

By Arundhati Roy, The Guardian, December 12, 2008
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/dec/12/mumbai-arundhati-roy

—–
“How should those of us whose hearts have been sickened by the knowledge of all of this view the Mumbai attacks, and what are we to do about them? There are those who point out that US strategy has been successful inasmuch as the United States has not suffered a major attack on its home ground since 9/11. However, some would say that what America is suffering now is far worse. If the idea behind the 9/11 terror attacks was to goad America into showing its true colors, what greater success could the terrorists have asked for? The US army is bogged down in two unwinnable wars, which have made the United States the most hated country in the world. Those wars have contributed greatly to the unraveling of the American economy and who knows, perhaps eventually the American empire. (Could it be that battered, bombed Afghanistan, the graveyard of the Soviet Union, will be the undoing of this one too?) Hundreds of thousands people including thousands of American soldiers have lost their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan. The frequency of terrorist strikes on U.S allies/agents (including India) and U.S interests in the rest of the world has increased dramatically since 9/11. George Bush, the man who led the US response to 9/11 is a despised figure not just internationally, but also by his own people. Who can possibly claim that the United States is winning the war on terror?

Homeland Security has cost the US government billions of dollars. Few countries, certainly not India, can afford that sort of price tag. But even if we could, the fact is that this vast homeland of ours cannot be secured or policed in the way the United States has been. It’s not that kind of homeland. We have a hostile nuclear weapons state that is slowly spinning out of control as a neighbour, we have a military occupation in Kashmir and a shamefully persecuted, impoverished minority of more than 150 million Muslims who are being targeted as a community and pushed to the wall, whose young see no justice on the horizon, and who, were they to totally lose hope and radicalise, end up as a threat not just to India, but to the whole world. If ten men can hold off the NSG commandos, and the police for three days, and if it takes half a million soldiers to hold down the Kashmir valley, do the math. What kind of Homeland Security can secure India?

Nor for that matter will any other quick fix. Anti-terrorism laws are not meant for terrorists; they’re for people that governments don’t like. That’s why they have a conviction rate of less than 2%. They’re just a means of putting inconvenient people away without bail for a long time and eventually letting them go. Terrorists like those who attacked Mumbai are hardly likely to be deterred by the prospect of being refused bail or being sentenced to death. It’s what they want.

What we’re experiencing now is blowback, the cumulative result of decades of quick fixes and dirty deeds. The carpet’s squelching under our feet.

The only way to contain (it would be naïve to say end) terrorism is to look at the monster in the mirror. We’re standing at a fork in the road. One sign says Justice, the other Civil War. There’s no third sign and there’s no going back. Choose.”