Thank you so much for your help
The data was collected by another lab. I don't know what they use. I
saved their excel file data into a csv file. I don't know if there is a
way of telling excel to do a better job. I am on panther, with
office 2004 for mac.

require "csv"
arr = CSV.read(File.expand_path("~/Desktop/FaceRetest.cvs"))

I get an error:
/usr/local/lib/ruby/1.8/csv.rb:607:in `get_row':
CSV::IllegalFormatError (CSV::IllegalFormatError)

Ara's formulation does the same thing.

I think there is a way to replace special characters in emacs but  what
I tried so far does not work.

I thought I could use readlines and a puts and then copy the ruby
output, which would not longer have the ^M, but somehow, ruby gets
mixed up, and suddenly stop parsing the lines, so I can't relie on ruby
readline either. It sounds like I need to figure out how to format the
input file better. And then I will be able to use your suggestions.

thank you