Basically a book-length report from another Mind and Life conference, this one from 2000, but a fair bit longer and more detailed than the last one I read ('Gentle Bridges'), in that the narration includes background goings-on, facial expressions, assorted sidetracks and much more extensive reports from the afternoon sessions (mornings were presentation time; afternoons, discussion time). This conference focused on craving, anger and delusion - their origins, natures and effects, whether and how they can ever be beneficial, and what people can do about them.

Goleman, the Dalai Lama and a bunch of philosophers, Buddhist scholars and various western brain/mind scientists got together for a series of talks and brainstorms, examining areas where Buddhism could learn from science and vice versa. There was an overriding effort to be practical and constructive - no easy thing when so many of the subjects under discussion prompted conceptual and semantic conflict, not just between east and west but also within each discipline.

Goleman plays up his friend Paul Ekman's personal demons (a temper, related back to father issues) a bit heavy-handedly, maybe for dramatic effect, but overall he recounts the experience in good faith. There's also an interesting biographical chapter on Tenzin Gyatso, including an account of his student days - he received his geshe lharampa (the equivalent of a Ph.D., in Buddhist Studies) at the age of sixteen, after just twelve years of debate- and meditation-intensive effort (it normally takes 20 to 30 years, supposedly). All in all, a very good read. ( )