Nothing is more natural than to believe we have conscious control over our own choices. Indeed most of social behaviour including the criminal justice system is predicated on that conviction. What, though, if that presumption is simply not true? Professor Dick Swabb (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dick_Swaab) argues that everything we think, do, and refrain from doing is determined by our […]
We Are Our Brains by Dick Swaab Read More »
Ruth Rendell (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Rendell and http://literature.britishcouncil.org/ruth-rendell) is a phenomenally successful crime writer. She probes deeply into the psychological background of criminals and their victims, many of them mentally afflicted or otherwise socially isolated. She has (at the last count) 74 titles to her name covering crime novels, novellas, and short stories (some under the pen name of Barbara
The Girl Next Door Read More »
I was alerted to this recent publication by hearing Roger Scruton (http://www.roger-scruton.com/ and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Scruton ) on the radio last week. The publisher’s outline is as follows. In The Soul of the World, renowned philosopher Roger Scruton defends the experience of the sacred against today’s fashionable forms of atheism. He argues that our personal relationships, moral intuitions, and aesthetic
The Soul of the World by Roger Scruton Read More »
This is one for those of you concerned with the environment. There is no doubt we are trashing our planet and that current levels of consumption are unsustainable. Alarm over the contribution of affluent lifestyles to global warming and environmental destruction is combining with growing disquiet over the damage affluence does to consumers themselves. Consumerism
The Politics and Pleasures of Consuming Differently by Kate Soper Read More »
In 1980 I read ‘The Problem of Pain‘ (1940) by C.S. Lewis. It is essentially a defence of Christian doctrine – and the assertion of a loving God – in the face of ubiquitous suffering. It left many unresolved questions in my mind about the nature and existence of pain. Why, for example does pain have
The Story of Pain by Joanna Bourke Read More »
This month I’m only going to make one suggestion. It is Tom Devine’s (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Devine)(http://www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/history-classics-archaeology/about-us/staff-profiles?cw_xml=profile_tab1_academic.php?uun=tdevine) monumental 720 page history of Scotland – ‘The Scottish Nation‘. As I write there are 23 days to the referendum which will decide if Scotland remains in a union with the rest of the UK. This will unquestionably be the most historic
The Scottish Nation Read More »
Described by Glamour Magazine as the ‘doyenne of the modern blockbuster’, Penny Vincenzi (http://pennyvincenzi.com/) has a large and loyal readership. She is now onto her 17th book and nearly died last year from the rare disorder cryoglobulinemia. The summary of her latest is as follows. We’re introduced to ‘The House of Farrell’ a cosmetics firm
A Perfect Heritage Read More »
Plants have profoundly moulded the Earth’s climate and the evolutionary trajectory of life. Far from being ‘silent witnesses to the passage of time’, plants are dynamic components of our world, shaping the environment throughout the past as much as the environment has shaped them. In The Emerald Planet, Professor David Beerling of Sheffield University (https://www.shef.ac.uk/aps/staff-and-students/acadstaff/beerling) puts plants centre stage,
The Emerald Planet Read More »
The Fisher Professor of Natural History and Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard University takes us on a tour of the first 3 billion years of evolutionary history. Australopithecines, dinosaurs, trilobites -such fossils conjure up images of lost worlds filled with vanished organisms. But in the full history of life, ancient animals, even the
Life on a Young Planet Read More »
