In my view Epicurus was the real deal among the ancient thinkers. He got more right than any other about the human condition and sits behind the great humanistic tradition in Western thought. First point to make is that Epicurus does not recommend sybaritic excess! Forget delicatessen jars full of fine and exotic foods. Although he is […]
Epicureanism by Tim O’Keefe Read More »
Few lives of great men offer so much interest, and so many mysteries, as the life of Charles Darwin. His ideas are still inspiring discoveries and controversies more than a hundred years after his death. Many believe him simply to be the greatest figure of nineteenth-century science. Janet Browne (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Janet_Browne and http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~hsdept/bios/browne.html) offers a vivid and comprehensive picture of Darwin
Charles Darwin: Voyaging Read More »
How much do we really know one another? What are the things that have to be kept secret in normal family and social life for humans function? Celeste Ng (http://www.celesteng.com/) expertly explores and exposes such secrets in the family Lee of Ohio in her debut here. Long-hidden, quietly explosive truths, weighted by issues of race and gender, are
Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng Read More »
In middle age, Barbara Ehrenreich (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbara_Ehrenreich and http://barbaraehrenreich.com/) came across the journal she had kept during her tumultuous adolescence and set out to reconstruct that quest, which had taken her to the study of science and through a cataclysmic series of uncanny – or as she later learned to call them, “mystical”-experiences. A staunch atheist and
Living with a Wild God Read More »
There is a comparatively new discipline in biology which is ‘Behavioural Ecology’ (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioural_ecology). It seeks to provide theoretical frameworks to answer questions about animal behaviour especially in relation to ecological context. It has proven to be a highly fruitful and fascinating area of study. The book examines how animals struggle to survive and reproduce. It shows how they exploit
Behavioural Ecology Read More »
There are a number of premises in the town centre of Lanark in which one may place a bet. The bookie seems to be a stable presence on our High Street whilst the activity on online gambling is enormously popular. Both bookies and their clients deal in probabilities, or if you like ‘odds’. What, for
Probability by Hugh Mellor Read More »
Bestseller lists of popular fiction are dominated by established authors, and particularly the latest instalments of their successful series. For example Michael Connelly with Harry Bosch, David Baldacci with John Puller, C J Sansom with Shardlake, and James Patterson with Alex Cross (the latest being the 22nd outing!). It’s therefore quite refreshing to take a
So you’re sitting with your boiled egg, toast and coffee thinking ‘How can I entertain my mind today?’ Ah! plunge myself into a consummately realised 18th-century London of crime, horror and squalor. Excellent. You’ll discover that Tom Hawkins has been luxuriating in the capital’s fleshpots when he’s consigned to the debtors’ prison, Marshalsea. The gruesome murder
The Devil in the Marshalsea Read More »
Dr. Neil MacGregor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_MacGregor and http://www.britishmuseum.org/about_us/management/directors/neil_macgregor.aspx and ), http://www.theguardian.com/culture/2010/jan/02/neil-macgregor-british-museum-history Director of the British Museum, offers this sumptuous history of Germany through objects and art. Whilst Germany’s past is too often seen through the prism of the two World Wars, this book investigates a wider six hundred-year-old history of the nation through its objects. It examines the key moments that
Germany: Memories of a Nation Read More »
