A brisk and engaging biography of Baruch Spinoza, the man who inspired many secular Jewish thinkers, is least convincing when it offers him as an example of ‘cancel culture’ In December 202...
A secret history of machine intelligence, from 14th-century horoscopes to 1930s ‘plot genies’ for coming up with storylines Hark. The end is nigh. “In the industrial age, automation came ...
The Gilead author explores the first book of the Bible and finds it full of meaning – even hope – for today In an extended dialogue between Marilynne Robinson and Barack Obama, published a ...
Implants like Elon Musk’s Neuralink offer great promise, but come with massive ethical questions Are we on the verge of a new era in which brain disorders become a thing of the past, and we ...
From Instagram to health apps, the modern world no longer allows for rich and complex storytelling argues the philosopher in an entertaining polemic that’s short on humility In Charlie Kaufma...
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2024/feb/18/the-crisis-of-narration-byung-chul-han-review
The prodigious output of the great biographer and novelist, now 74, shows no sign of slowing. With distractions such as booze long abandoned, the ‘monkish’ figure has now produced a history o...
I no longer belong to the Christian religion but I can pray to mother wolf or the divine mystery and feel better When we were little, my sister and I said our prayers every night before bedtime...
This fascinating and richly detailed study of the evolution of magic in the 15th and 16th centuries reveals that accusations of witchcraft rarely stuck to learned men In 1519, the German schola...
The rise of rightwing populists has sparked renewed interest in the political philosopher’s writing on totalitarianism, and Lyndsey Stonebridge’s timely biography is compelling and original ...
Through an Auschwitz commandant’s family life, Jonathan Glazer’s chilling new film reminds us of the banality of evil In a letter to his former student Hannah Arendt about the Nazi war crim...
We like to pretend that momentous events have big causes, but science says otherwise When we contemplate travelling back in time, we’re always given the same warning: be sure not to touch any...
Prof Ingrid Robeyns has spent a decade studying wealth and ethics and says that limits are essential if we want to eradicate poverty and protect social cohesion and the planet • Read a short ...
In this extract from her new book, Dutch political philosopher Ingrid Robeyns proposes a three-pronged plan of action to tackle extreme wealth concentration and reduce inequality • ‘There a...
A moral philosopher examines the cycles of suffering that perpetuate violence Jonathan Glover’s new book, on the seemingly intractable nature of the Israel-Palestine conflict, quotes George O...
Setting endless goals can lead to a downward spiral. Stop wasting your life resolving to improve yourself and you might just find you enjoy it more When you stop to think about it, the strange ...
An ingenious and accessible discussion of a big question we’ll never answer – the reason for our existence Why is there something rather than nothing? It’s meant to be the great unanswera...
Teaching the Enlightenment reminded me that the worse the world seems, the harder you have to hold on to your principles What brought us hope and joy in 2023? Writers share their stories The m...
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/dec/21/students-hope-change-enlightenment-world-worse
From psychology to AI, pandemics to popular culture, we survey the bigger picture Do you often find yourself dancing the “reasonable tango”? This is what the sociologist Kirsty Sedgman, in ...
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2023/dec/05/best-ideas-books-of-2023
Two republished titles sharing the same cover – one a Brazilian classic, the other a philosophical blurring of genres – deliver head-spinning insights into life in the rainforest In this bo...
The behavioural scientist engagingly lays out the reasons why our every action is predetermined – and why we shouldn’t despair about it The philosophical debate on free will has a way of bl...