Neuroscience and discussions about the brain and consciousness are powering ahead at a fomidable pace. It’s hard to keep up without being involved full time in the research. Here, though, is a book from 2014 which will take you to the cutting edge. Stanislas Dehaene (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanislas_Dehaene and http://www.college-de-france.fr/site/en-stanislas-dehaene/#|m=#course|) describes the pioneering work his lab and the labs […]

Existentialism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Existentialism) was fashionable in the 1960s. Much of this is to do with the fact that its ideas were presented and consumed in theatre, literature, and popular culture. It insists that thinking begins with the human subject—not as a disembodied exercise in reason, but the acting, feeling, living human being. This chimed with the zeitgeist, and

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