Acemoglu, Daron, and James Robinson, Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity and Poverty, Crown Business 2012 "Some time ago a little-known Scottish philosopher wrote a book on what makes nations succeed and what makes them fail. The Wealth of Nations is still being read today. With the same perspicacity and with the same broad historical perspective, Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson have retackled this same question for our own times. Two centuries from now our great-great- . . . -great grandchildren will be, similarly, reading Why Nations Fail." —George Akerlof, Nobel laureate in economics, 2001  
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Chesterton, Gilbert Keith, The Father Brown Stories: 49 Immortal Stories, Cassell 1960 The classic series of detective stories.back

Cornwell, Patricia, Port Mortuary, Little Brown 2010 From Booklist: 'Cornwell returns to form—somewhat—after the plodding Scarpetta Factor (2009). Told in the first person, the story finds Kay Scarpetta, now the chief medical examiner of the new Cambridge Forensic Center in Massachusetts, involved in a couple of cases: the mysterious sudden death of a man and the murder of a child (whose confessed killer seems to be innocent). Soon she begins to suspect the two cases are related—joined by a piece of high-tech hardware found in the first victim’s apartment—and before too long, she realizes she’s facing what could be her most clever foe yet. For the first time in a while, Cornwell seems genuinely interested in Scarpetta again, giving the novel that spark of life that has made the series so enjoyable for its many fans. The book is still a long way from the glory days of Postmortem (1991) and From Potter’s Field (1995), but it’s definitely a step in the right direction.' David Pitt 
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Damasio, Antonio R, The Feeling of What Happens: Body and Emotion in the Making of Consciousness, Harcourt Brace 1999 Jacket: 'In a radical departure from current views on consciousness, Damasio contends that explaining how we make mental images or attend to those images will not suffice to elucidate the mystery. A satisfactory hypothesis for the making of consciousness must explain how the sense of self comes to mind. Damasio suggests that the sense of self does not depend on memory or on reasoning or even less on language. [it] depends, he argues, on the brain's ability to portray the living organism in the act of relating to an object. That ability, in turn, is a consequence of the brain's involvement in the process of regulating life. The sense of self began as yet another device aimed an ensuring survival.' 
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Hume, David, and David Fate Norton and Mary J. Norton (editors), A Treatise on Human Nature (Oxford Philosophcal Texts), Oxford University Press 2000 ' The Oxford Philosophical Texts series consists of truly practical and accessible guides to major philosophical texts in the history of philosophy from the ancient world up to modern times. Each book opens with a comprehensive introduction by a leading specialist which covers the philosopher's life, work, and influence. Endnotes, a full bibliography, guides to further reading, and an index are also included. The series aims to build a definitive corpus of key texts in the Western philosophical tradition, forming a reliable and enduring resource for students and teachers alike. David Hume's comprehensive attempt to base philosophy on a new, observationally grounded study of human nature is one of the most important texts in Western philosophy. It is also the focal point of current attempts to understand 18th-century philosophy The Treatise first explains how we form such concepts as cause and effect, external existence, and personal identity, and how we create compelling but unverifiable beliefs in the entities represented by these concepts. It then offers a novel account of the passions, explains freedom and necessity as they apply to human choices and actions, and concludes with a detailed explanation of how we distinguish between virtue and vice. The volume features Hume's own abstract of the Treatise, a substantial introduction that explains the aims of the Treatise as a whole and of each of its ten parts, a comprehensive index, and suggestions for further reading.' 
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Miles, Jack, God: A Biography, Vintage Books 1996 Jacket: 'Jack Miles's remarkable work examines the hero of the Old Testament . . . from his first appearance as Creator to his last as Ancient of Days. . . . We see God torn by conflicting urges. To his own sorrow, he is by turns destructive and creative, vain and modest, subtle and naive, ruthless and tender, lawful and lawless, powerful yet powerless, omniscient and blind.' 
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Prigogine, Ilya, From Being to Becoming: Time and Complexity in the Physical Sciences, Freeman 1980 Jacket: 'How has order emerged from chaos? In this book, intended for the general reader with some background in physical chemistry and thermodynamics, Ilya Prigogine shows how systems far from equilibrium evolve elaborate structures: patterns of circulation in the atmosphere, formation and propagation of chemical waves, the aggregation of single-celled animals. In an effort to understand these phenomena, he explores the philosophical implications of the work that won him the 1977 Nobel Prize in Chemistry.' 
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Snow, Charles Percy, In Their Wisdom, Encore Editions 1974 'Economic storm clouds gather as bad political weather is forecast for the nation. Three elderly peers look on from the sidelines of the House of Lords and wonder if it will mean the end of a certain way of life. Against this background is set a court struggle over a disputed will that escalates into an almighty battle.' 
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Acedia - Wikipedia, Acedia - Wikipedia, 'Acedia (also accidie or accedie, from Latin acedĭa, and this from Greek ἀκηδία, negligence) describes a state of listlessness or torpor, of not caring or not being concerned with one's position or condition in the world. It can lead to a state of being unable to perform one's duties in life. Its spiritual overtones make it related to but distinct from depression.[1] Acedia was originally noted as a problem among monks and other ascetics who maintained a solitary life.' back

Age of Enlightenment - Wikipedia, Age of Enlightenment - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'The Age of Enlightenment (or simply the Enlightenment or Age of Reason) was an elite cultural movement of intellectuals in 18th century Europe, that sought to mobilize the power of reason, in order to reform society and advance knowledge. It promoted science and intellectual interchange and opposed superstition, intolerance and abuses in church and state. Originating about 1650–1700, it was sparked by philosophers Baruch Spinoza (1632–1677), John Locke (1632–1704), Pierre Bayle (1647–1706), mathematician Isaac Newton (1643–1727) and historian Voltaire (1694–1778).' back

Angelo Campodonico, Bonum ex integra causa. Aquinas and the sources of a basic concept, '"Bonum ex integra causa, malum ex particularibus defectibus" . Aquinas finds this clause first of all in Dionysius' De divinis nominibus, which he read in the early years of his academic career when he was an assistant of Albert the Great in Cologne. We must remember that during the Middle Ages Dionysius was considered an auctoritas: he was considered a disciple of Saint Paul, a Saint. Therefore the content of his works was highly considered by medieval theologians. In particular: the fourth chapter of the De divinis nominibus, in which we find that clause, concerns goodness and evil.' back

Anne Applebaum, Unlearning the lessons from Chernobyl, ' But Russia is not the only country in which science is suspect, conspiracy theories multiply and politics is a series of coverups. In President Trump’s Washington, scientific advisory panels are being cut. Environmental rules designed to protect the public from dirty air and pollution are being rolled back. Positions at environmental regulatory agencies, once held by people with scientific expertise, are now routinely held by people who come from the industries being regulated; once they are done with government service, they are almost certain to go back to those industries and reap their rewards. Most of this happens not in secret but in silence. . . . ' back

Ansatz - Wikipedia, Ansatz - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'In physics and mathematics, an ansatz (German: initial placement of a tool at a work piece) is an educated guess that is verified later by its results.' back

Ballistic Missile - Wikipedia, Ballistic Missile - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'A ballistic missile is a missile that follows a ballistic flightpath with the objective of delivering one or more warheads to a predetermined target. Shorter range ballistic missiles stay within the Earth's atmosphere, while longer range ones are designed to spend some of their flight time above the atmosphere and are thus considered sub-orbital.' back

Boltzmann's entropy formula - Wikipedia, Boltzmann's entropy formula - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'In statistical mechanics, Boltzmann's equation is a probability equation relating the entropy S of an ideal gas to the quantity W, which is the number of microstates corresponding to a given macrostate:
S = k ln W
where k is the Boltzmann constant, . . . which is equal to 1.38062 x 10⁻²³ J/K. back

Claude E Shannon, A Mathematical Theory of Communication, 'The fundamental problem of communication is that of reproducing at one point either exactly or approximately a message selected at another point. Frequently the messages have meaning; that is they refer to or are correlated according to some system with certain physical or conceptual entities. These semantic aspects of communication are irrelevant to the engineering problem. The significant aspect is that the actual message is one selected from a set of possible messages.' back

Damien Cave, She's 83 and a Famous Nun. Australia's Catholic Leaders Want Her to Stay Away, ' SYDNEY, Australia — Sister Joan Chittister, a well-known American nun, feminist and scholar, was looking forward to speaking at a Catholic education conference in Australia next year, figuring there would be plenty to discuss in a country where Catholic schools educate roughly one in five children. But then Sister Joan, 83, received an email a few weeks ago effectively telling her not to come, saying that the Archbishop of Melbourne, Peter Comensoli, had not endorsed the invitation. back

Dana Milbank, The Trump economy house of cards collapses, ' How dumb does he suppose we are? At his 2020 campaign launch this week, President Trump rehashed a familiar boast. “Thanks to our tariffs, American steel mills are roaring back to life. You know that,” he said. His supporters may indeed think that. In reality, the exact opposite is happening. A few hours before Trump made that boast at his campaign kickoff, U.S. Steel announced that, because of falling steel prices and softening demand, it was mothballing some operations. “We are idling two blast furnaces in the United States and one blast furnace in Europe,” the company said. Roaring back to life.' back

David Wearing, Saudi Arabis Is Running Out of Friends, ' LONDON — Last week was especially bad for the monarchy of Saudi Arabia. On Wednesday, a United Nations expert released a report calling for an investigation into the role of Mohammed bin Salman, crown prince of Saudi Arabia, in the murder of the journalist Jamal Khashoggi. The next day in Washington, the Senate voted to block arms sales worth billions of dollars, the latest in a string of congressional efforts to halt American support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen. And in London — on the same day — a court ruled that Britain had acted unlawfully in approving arms exports to Saudi Arabia.' back

Dwight Garner, On the Centennial of Iris Murdoch's Birth, Remembering a 20th-Century Giant, 'Later in her life, Murdoch said that she found her first novel, “Under the Net” (1954), to be immature. I’ve recently reread it, and it holds up just fine. In it, Murdoch writes, “To find a person inexhaustible is simply the definition of love.” It’s also the definition of a writer worth rereading over a lifetime. back

Edmund Burke - Wikipedia , Edmund Burke - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Edmund Burke PC (12 January [NS] 1729 – 9 July 1797) was an Irish statesman, author, orator, political theorist and philosopher, who, after moving to England, served for many years in the House of Commons of Great Britain as a member of the Whig party.' back

Felix culpa - Wikipedia, Felix culpa - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Felix culpa is a Latin phrase that comes from the words felix (meaning "happy," "lucky," or "blessed") and culpa (meaning "fault" or "fall"), and in the Catholic tradition is most often translated "happy fault," as in the Paschal Vigil Mass Exsultet O felix culpa quae talem et tantum meruit habere redemptorem, "O happy fault that earned for us so great, so glorious a Redeemer." The Latin expression felix culpa derives from the writings of St. Augustine regarding the Fall of Man, the source of original sin: “For God judged it better to bring good out of evil than not to permit any evil to exist.” (in Latin: Melius enim iudicavit de malis benefacere, quam mala nulla esse permittere.' back

Glenn Greenwald, The personal side of taking on the NSA: emerging smears, 'Distractions about my past and personal life have emerged – an inevitable side effect for those who challenge the US government' back

Guardian Staff, Edward Snowden and the NSA files — timeline, 'A month after arriving in Hong Kong from Hawaii, the whistleblower is on the move again' back

Ibrahim Fraihat, The 'deal of the century' as a deliberate deception, ' The development and prosperity that Kushner is promising can only happen if the Israeli occupation is lifted. As Palestinian politician Hanan Ashrawi neatly put it in a recent tweet, "first lift the siege of Gaza, stop the Israeli theft of our land, resources &funds, give us our freedom of movement & control over our borders, airspace, territorial waters etc. Then watch us build a vibrant prosperous economy as a free & sovereign people." ' back

Iris Murdoch - Wikipedia, Iris Murdoch - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' Dame Jean Iris Murdoch DBE (15 July 1919 – 8 February 1999) was an Irish-born British novelist and philosopher. Murdoch is best known for her novels about good and evil, sexual relationships, morality, and the power of the unconscious.' back

Isac Stanley-Becker, Who's behind thr law making undocumented immigrants criminals? The 'unrepentant' white supremacist.', ' The provision of federal law criminalizing unlawful entry into the United States — which some Democratic presidential candidates now want to undo — was crafted by an avowed white supremacist who opposed the education of black Americans and favored lynching, which he justified by saying, “to hell with the Constitution.” ' back

Jess Carter-Morley, The new age of discipline, 'From the 5:2 diet to Tiger Mothers and the furore over skivers-and-strivers, discipline has become the guiding principle that informs our lives. But is it a step too far when having OCD and increased workloads become a badge of honour?' back

Ludwig Wittgenstein - Wikipedia, Ludwig Wittgenstein - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein (26 April 1889 – 29 April 1951) was an Austrian philosopher who worked primarily in logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language. He was professor in philosophy at the University of Cambridge from 1939 until 1947.[ . . In 1999 his posthumously published Philosophical Investigations (1953) was ranked as the most important book of 20th-century philosophy, . . . Bertrand Russell described him as "the most perfect example I have ever known of genius as traditionally conceived, passionate, profound, intense, and dominating."' back

Marc Bennetts, Western liberalism is obsolete, warns Putin, ahead of May meeting, “The liberal idea has become obsolete [Putin said]. It has come into conflict with the interests of the overwhelming majority of the population.” The claims brought a short response from European council president Donald Tusk at the G20 summit in Osaka on Friday. “I strongly disagree with the main argument that liberalism is obsolete. Whoever claims that liberal democracy is obsolete, also claims that freedoms are obsolete, that the rule of law is obsolete and that human rights are obsolete,” he said. “For us in Europe, these are and will remain essential and vibrant values. What I find really obsolete are: authoritarianism, personality cults, the rule of oligarchs. Even if sometimes they may seem effective.” ' back

Michael Gerson, Mass incarceration's tragic success, 'Crime is among those rare issues that, over time, have cooled as a culture-war conflict. And one of the main reasons is the emergence of an odd ideological coalition that favors reform. It includes liberals concerned about the racial implications of current policy; libertarians offended by vast, routine imprisonment; and evangelicals who have adopted the humanitarian cause of prisoners.' back

Missile - Wikipedia, Missile - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'In a modern military, a missile is a self-propelled guided weapon system, as opposed to an unguided self-propelled munition, referred to as just a rocket (weapon) .' back

Modernism (Roman Catholicism) - Wikipedia, Modernism (Roman Catholicism) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Modernism refers to theological opinions expressed during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, but with influence reaching into the 21st century, which are characterized by a break with the past. Catholic modernists form an amorphous group. The term "modernist" appears in Pope Pius X's 1907 encyclical Pascendi Dominici gregis.' back

Never Look Away - Wikipedia, Never Look Away - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' Never Look Away (German: Werk ohne Autor) is a 2018 German drama film directed by Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck. It was nominated for a Golden Lion at the 75th Venice International Film Festival and for a Golden Globe by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association. It was nominated for two Academy Awards at the 91st Academy Awards in the Best Foreign Language Film and Best Cinematography categories. . . . At its very first screening, in Competition at the 76th Venice International Film Festival, Never Look Away received a 13-minute standing ovation and came in first place.' back

Paul Krugman, Notes in Excessive Wealth Disorder, ' Through a variety of channels — media ownership, think tanks, and the simple tendency to assume that being rich also means being wise — the 0.1 percent has an extraordinary ability to set the agenda for policy discussion, in ways that can be sharply at odds with both a reasonable assessment of priorities and public opinion more generally.' back

Peer group - Wikipedia, Peer group - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Peer group may be defined as a group of people who, through homophily, share similarities such as age, background, and social status. [Homophily (i.e., "love of the same") is the tendency of individuals to associate and bond with similar others.]' back

Roger Cohen, Trump Fast-Forwards American Decline, ' I can think of no better guide for reflection than William Burns’s book, “The Back Channel,” his wonderful memoir of a life in diplomacy. Burns, a former deputy secretary of state and ambassador to Moscow, was, by general consensus, one of the finest Foreign Service officers of recent decades, a man of unusual judgment and prescience.' back

Susan E. Rice, Susan Rice: How Trump Can Avoid War With Iran, ' President Trump’s decision to withdraw from the nuclear deal and impose crippling sanctions, when Iran was in full compliance, was foolish and, predictably, has backfired. But we are where we are. Finding a way to leverage his massive mistakes while demonstrating the will and capacity to climb down is our least bad option.' back

Sydney Opera House - Wikipedia, Sydney Opera House - Wikipedia. the free encyclopedia, 'The Sydney Opera House is a multi-venue performing arts centre in New South Wales, Australia. It was conceived and largely built by Danish architect Jørn Utzon, opening in 1973 after a long gestation that began with his competition-winning design in 1957. The NSW Government, led by Premier Joseph Cahill gave the go-ahead for work to begin in 1958.' back

Terry Eagleton, The Frontman: Bono (In the Name of Power) by Harry Browne - review, 'Bertolt Brecht tells the tale of a king in the East who was pained by all the suffering in the world. So he called his wise men together and asked them to inquire into its cause. The wise men duly looked into the matter, and returned with the news that the cause of the world's suffering was the king.' back

Top End Wedding - Wikipedia, Top End Wedding - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' Top End Wedding is a 2019 Australian romantic comedy film directed by Wayne Blair and starring Gwilym Lee and Miranda Tapsell, the latter of whom also co-wrote the film and serves as executive producer of the film.' back