Crack open for a hard boiled think
Frank M. Turner (1944–2010) was John Hay Whitney Professor of History, Director of the Beinecke Library, and University Librarian, all at Yale University. Turner delivered a landmark lecture course on European intellectual history that drew hundreds of students over many years. His lectures were lucid, accessible, and beautifully written. With a notable lack of jargon they distilled […]
European Intellectual History by Frank M. Turner Read More »
In the period 2013-2015 The European Union has been desperately trying to prevent Greece from crashing out of the Euro. Bailout follows bailout. Why? It is a basket case of an economy saddled with a 320 billion Euro debt, a society mired in corruption from top to bottom, and with a hopelessly divided political class. For every
Introducing the Ancient Greeks by Edith Hall Read More »
Bettany Hughes (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bettany_Hughes) has been gracing our TV screens since 2012 presenting the history of the classical world. Her programme ‘Genius of the Ancient World – Socrates‘ (http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/proginfo/2015/32/socrates-genius-of-the-ancient-world) was broadcast on 12 August 2015 on BBC 4. Whether to follow up the programme or in preparation for a second viewing I would recommend her 2010 book The
The Hemlock Cup by Bettany Hughes Read More »
It was in 1980 that I first plunged into the ‘science versus religion’ debate. The standard text of the day was still Ian G. Barbour’s 1966 book ‘Issues in Science and Religion’. Interest in the subject area has shown no sign of abating since that time. A recent contribution is Faith versus Fact (2015) by University of
Faith versus Fact by Jerry Coyn Read More »
Journalist Paul Mason (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Mason_(journalist)#Books) has become familiar to us in recent months on TV news reports about the Greek debt crisis, and the possibility of Greece crashing out of the Eurozone. His open necked engaging style is delivered with a distinctive Lancashire accent. The author of four previous books on politics and economics, he now
Postcapitalism by Paul Mason Read More »
There is much talk these days about artificial intelligence, and whether advanced computer systems could ever really ‘think’. Might they, after we have birthed them, go on to replicate and take over the world? This is not idle speculation, or the draft plot for a science fiction novel. Stephen Hawking is only one of many
The Philosophy of Artificial Intelligence by Margaret Boden Read More »
I’m assuming you don’t spend a lot of time picking out unwanted insects from your best friend’s fur. Yet the function of that activity in apes is exactly what Robin Dunbar (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robin_Dunbar) believes language does for us. Apes and monkeys, humanity’s closest kin, differ from other animals in the intensity of their social relationships. All their
Grooming, Gossip and the Evolution of Language by Robin Dunbar Read More »
After the daily, and lengthy, reading from Scripture in her home in Lewis my Grandmother was in the habit of glancing at a framed photo permanently positioned on the mantlepiece. It was of her brother who had been killed in The First World War. As often as not she would mutter ‘Wars and rumours of wars, for
Violence by Richard Bessel Read More »
Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_the_Origin_of_Species) fell like a nuclear weapon into Victorian consciousness. The implication for many thinking people was that the whole of the living world is engaged in a brutal, pitiless competition for survival. Worse than this realisation is that if Man is co-terminus with the natural world, then we
Does Altruism Exist by David Sloan Wilson Read More »
