Brown (2009), Dan, The Lost Symbol, Bantam Press 'A brilliantly composed tapestry of veiled histories, arcane icons and enigmatic codes.The Lost Symbol is an intelligent, lightning paced thriller that offers surprises as every turn. For as Robert Langton will discover, there is nothing more extraordinary or thrilling than a secret that hides in plain sight.' 
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Alec Thomson (2026_06_04), See a new map of the universe’s magnetic fields – the largest and most detailed ever made, ' Magnetic fields are a fundamental part of the universe. They govern how small particles – the building blocks of planets, stars, and ultimately galaxies – move through space.
We still don’t know how magnetic fields came to exist in the universe, but we do know they’re everywhere. Earth itself has a magnetic field that compasses and migrating birds respond to.
With radio telescopes, astronomers can use the light from distant galaxies to illuminate these otherwise invisible areas in space.
In our study, published today in Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia, we’ve used Australia’s most powerful radio telescope to create the largest and most detailed map of cosmic magnetic fields ever made.
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Alexis Szejnoga (2013), Persian Perspective on Prima Philosophia: The influence of Avicenns's interpetation of Aristotelian ontology in the De ente et essentia of Saint Thomas Aquinas, Chapter 1: The wider context of the De ente et essentia In this chapter, we will take a look at the context in which the De ente et essentia was written. The first part will focus on historical-philosophical aspects, treating topics like the renewed interest in Aristotelian philosophy, the attention being paid to translations of Arabian works on theology and philosophy, notably of Avicenna and Averroës, and to two philosophical treatises, the Fons vitae and the Liber de causis, which were at the time wrongly attributed to Aristotle and an unknown Christian theologian. In addition, we will look at some bibliographical details of the De ente et essentia: an approximation of the period in which it was written, the rationale behind its structure, a summary of its intent and scope, and its reception among medieval and modern philosophy.' back

Antony Beevor (2026_06_02), Putin’s deliberate brutality in Ukraine has a backstory, ' The deliberate brutality of Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine has raised a debate about its origins. Were killings such as the 2022 Bucha massacre “casual savagery,” as one commentator put it? Or did they derive from an ancient, underlying assumption in Russia that conspicuous cruelty is a necessary weapon of war? [. . .]
The brutality in 1945 and 2026 owe to what could be known as the knock-on theory of oppression. Russian soldiers were so badly treated and humiliated by their officers and NCOs that they took their rage out on the women of Central Europe with gang rapes. The depraved handling of Ukrainian civilians and prisoners of war today has been equally appalling for much the same reason. For the war against Ukraine, tens of thousands of conscripts, in defiance of Russian law, have been tricked or forced into frontline service. Blackmail, threats and outright violence, including summary execution, have been used against citizens of the Russian Federation. [. . .]
The logic of his thinking isn’t helped by listening to his chief ideologues Vladimir Medinsky and Alexander Dugin, both of whom contributed to his so-called endless essay published the summer before his invasion. Medinsky, the minister of culture, and Dugin, a philosopher who looks like an Old Testament prophet, believe that Holy Slav Rus has the right and the duty to occupy the Eurasian landmass from “Dublin to Vladivostok.” That effort apparently is to save the land from transsexuals, homosexuals and all other forms of corruption and perversion. Putin’s support for the sanctity of the Orthodox Church and respect for family life isn’t entirely convincing when one begins to study his own extramarital relationships.
Putin and the Kremlin’s disregard of any criticism from outside is rooted in the old Russian saying: “Nobody judges a victor.” And as long as they think they are winning, nobody has the right to bring up the wars they have started and the atrocities they have committed. Interestingly, when in 1947 the United Nations was debating the new definition of genocide, the Soviet Union fought tooth and nail to prevent it from being applied to anything like the massacre of aristocrats, the bourgeoisie and the kulaks, which included Stalin’s 3.5 million famine victims in Ukraine.
But is the victor never judged? Of course, when things turn against Russia, their patriots feel outraged and embittered that the world is against them. It is back to the old encirclement paranoia that has haunted them since those Mongol invasions. The truth is that no country is as much a prisoner of its past and its complexes as Russia.' per understanding of physics leads to a plausible scientific theology. The natural intelligence inherent in the universe, from cellular organization to ecosystems, far surpasses any artificial intelligence. Comprehending this natural order, the author suggests, would make achieving world peace relatively straightforward. The book contends that modern theologians should recognize the physical world, rather than ancient texts, as the foundation for credible theology. It also addresses the historical entanglement of religion and politics, asserting that the model of creation presented herein fundamentally rejects the imperialistic ambitions that have fueled genocidal holy wars.' back

Asher Kaufman (2026_06_02), In Iran war’s shadow, Israel’s renewed Lebanon campaign risks repeating failed lessons – and occupations – of the past, ' Going into the war in Iran, the Israeli government seemingly had two intertwined goals: to bring down the Islamic Republic and rid Israel of its Hezbollah problem.
The logic went that the Lebanese Shiite group – which has posed a persistent threat to Israel for 44 years – would finally succumb if stripped of its Iranian benefactor. After all, Israeli attempts to destroy Hezbollah through direct military action had not been effective, nor had internationally supported disarmament efforts.
But as the United States and Iran continue to negotiate over an agreement that might put an end to their war, the Israeli-Lebanese front remains as active as ever. Israel has increased strikes and incursions deeper into Lebanon, while Hezbollah is targeting the Israeli military deployed in southern Lebanon and the civilian population in northern Israel.
Worse, from the Israeli government’s perspective, is that Iran has found a way of turning its survival and newfound leverage over the Strait of Hormuz into protecting Hezbollah. Tehran is currently conditioning a potential deal with Washington on a complete halt of Israeli hostilities in Lebanon – a move clearly designed to safeguard the political and military standing of Hezbollah, its primary proxy.
Since full-scale war returned to Lebanon on March 2, 2026, it has had a massive humanitarian cost. As of June 1, over a million Lebanese have been displaced and more than 3,300 killed since the beginning of March. On the Israeli side, 24 soldiers and 4 civilians have been killed in the same time period.
Israel seeks to decouple its Lebanon front from the wider regional conflict, aiming to maintain its military campaign against the Shiite organization independently of broader U.S. negotiations with Iran. But whether it will able to do this is uncertain. The Trump administration has largely excluded Israel from the specifics of its Iranian dialogue while attempting to restrict Israeli operations in Lebanon to strikes in the country’s south and the Bekaa Valley and prohibiting attacks on state infrastructure. The ordering of attacks on Lebanon’s capital, Beirut, by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on June 1 lays bare the limits to U.S. pressure. [. . .]
For the first time since 1983, the Lebanese government has agreed to negotiate directly with Israel over a long-term political agreement, including the possibility of finally demarcating their shared borders. Hezbollah, as expected, has vehemently opposed these negotiations.
What we are seeing currently unfolding in Lebanon is another testament to the failure of the Israeli-U.S. war against Iran. Yet a war that began with lofty promises of a new Middle East may end up with a worse version of the old Middle East – an emboldened Islamic Republic, a new Israeli occupation of south Lebanon and a Hezbollah, while weaker than before, still entrenched as an armed militia outside of Lebanese state control and working in concert with Iran. back

Beth Spacey (2025_06_01), Israeli forces capture Lebanon’s Beaufort Castle, a Crusade‑era site once held by the Knights Templar, ' A 12th-century castle built during the Crusades in Lebanon has been seized by Israeli forces in what’s been described as the deepest incursion into Lebanon for more than 25 years.
The historic site, known as Beaufort Castle or Qalʿat al-Shaqīf, sits atop a striking rocky outcrop in a commanding position on the edge of the Litani gorge, boasting spectacular views across southern Lebanon. It has historically been a very strategic site, especially during the Crusades.
The Crusades is the name given to a series of military expeditions, beginning in the late 11th century, of Latin Christians from across Europe to a range of destinations, most famously the Holy Land..
The Crusades were armed pilgrimages, representing a fusion of ideas about warfare and spirituality.
Crusades would be called for by a pope, who would promise participants spiritual rewards if they took the Crusade vow and undertook these campaigns.
The aims and goals of Crusades changed over time as the geopolitical landscape changed. The First Crusade – called in 1095 CE – had a broad goal of “liberating” the holy sites of Jerusalem from the Seljuk Turks, a Sunni Muslim group in power in Asia Minor at the time. [. . .]
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Clivia Lisowski et al. (2026_05_28), Homing pigeon navigation relies on superparamagnetic macrophages under overcast conditions, ' Three principal theories for magnetoreception in pigeons have been proposed to date. Our findings support a fourth mechanism, on the basis of the collective sensing capacity of superparamagnetic macrophages, located predominantly in the liver, that enables perception of geomagnetic direction. Drawing on established macrophageneuron communication pathways (46, 47), we propose that hepatic macrophages sense changes in Earth’s magnetic field and transmit this information to the brain via afferent vagal innervation. We posit that magnetic sensing requires a cell population–level signal, rather than singlecell detection, to reach the threshold for neuronal activation. Liver macrophages are well equipped for this role, as they accumulate ferric iron during erythrocyte clearance and are closely associated with autonomous nerves. Such nerves, for example, the vagus or sympathetic nerves, generally provide rapid, bidirectional communication between peripheral organs and the brain and are ideally positioned to relay magnetic information sensed in the liver. back

Corriere della Sera, Corriere De Sera, Editor in Chied Luciano Fontana, https://www.corriere.it/lettere-al-direttore/ : risponde Luciano Fontana Online Form: Visit the official Corriere della Sera Lettere portal to compose and submit your message directly through their website.Email: Send your contribution directly to the editorial staff at lettere@corriere.it or lodicoalcorriere@corriere.it.Mail: You can send a physical letter to the editorial headquarters at Corriere della Sera, Via Solferino 28, 20121 Milano, Italy. back

David French (2026_05_31), The Fire of Stupidity Cannot Be Contained, ' What is going on?
The answer lies in part in the interplay between two political sayings that are so oft-repeated that they have become clichés. When they should be top of mind, though, they seem to have lost their impact.
Here’s the first (and you can probably say it along with me), from George Santayana in 1905: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” We can argue about the precise historical parallels, but the echoes of the past are everywhere.
Here’s the second, from Winston Churchill in 1947: “It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried.”
It is no coincidence that authoritarianism is once again appealing to people at a time when two things are happening at once. Liberal democracies are struggling to meet the needs of a substantial portion of their citizens, and entire generations have come of age with no living memory of the totalitarian horrors of the 20th century. [ . . .]
But debating the precise analogues can obscure the underlying truth — we are heading backward, toward the great crimes and mistakes of the past. We know what happens when militarily aggressive great powers seek more territory. We know what happens when a culture indulges — and promotes — conspiracy theories about Jews. We know that even the most utopian forms of authoritarianism devolve into regimes of grinding oppression and profound corruption. Some are always more equal than others. [ . . . ]
When experience ends, education has to begin. You can’t just know what the Holocaust was; you also have to understand the Holodomor. The phrase “the guns of August” should mean something to you, and when you see every great power press on the military gas — with no one pumping the brakes — that should trigger the most urgent concern.
Few things are demonstrating that what’s old is new again more than the rising tide of antisemitism. How many times must ancient lies be debunked? Must it happen every generation, for thousands of years?
So now we face a test. Can we educate ourselves away from disaster? Is there enough knowledge left to penetrate not just the minds, but also the hearts, of people who are deeply discontented?
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Dimitri Gutas (Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy), Ibn Sina [Avicenna], ' Abū-ʿAlī al-Ḥusayn ibn-ʿAbdallāh Ibn-Sīnā [Avicenna] (ca. 970–1037) was the preeminent philosopher and physician of the Islamic world. In his work he combined the disparate strands of philosophical/scientific thinking in Greek late antiquity and early Islam into a rationally rigorous and self-consistent scientific system that encompassed and explained all reality, including the tenets of revealed religion and its theological and mystical elaborations. In its integral and comprehensive articulation of science and philosophy, it represents the culmination of the Hellenic tradition, defunct in Greek after the sixth century, reborn in Arabic in the 9th.' back

Formalism (philosophy of mathematics) - Wikipedia, Formalism (philosophy of mathematics) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'In foundations of mathematics, philosophy of mathematics, and philosophy of logic, formalism is a theory that holds that statements of mathematics and logic can be considered to be statements about the consequences of certain string manipulation rules. . . . Formalism stresses axiomatic proofs using theorems, specifically associated with David Hilbert. A formalist is an individual who belongs to the school of formalism, which is a certain mathematical-philosophical doctrine descending from Hilbert.' back

Large Hadron Collider - Wikipedia, Large Hadron Collider - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world's largest and highest-energy particle collider. It was built by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) between 1998 and 2008 in collaboration with over 10,000 scientists and hundreds of universities and laboratories, as well as more than 100 countries. It lies in a tunnel 27 kilometres (17 mi) in circumference and as deep as 175 metres (574 ft) beneath the France–Switzerland border near Geneva. The first collisions were achieved in 2010 at an energy of 3.5 teraelectronvolts (TeV) per beam, about four times the previous world record. After upgrades it reached 6.5 TeV per beam (13 TeV total collision energy, the present world record). At the end of 2018, it was shut down for three years for further upgrades.' back

List of Newspapers in Italy - Wikipedia, List of Newspapers in Italy - Wikipedia, the free ncyclopedia, back

M. Gessen (2026_05_29), This Is the Formula That Defeated Orban. It Would Defeat Trump, Too., ' Starting early in the morning on the second Saturday of May, first hundreds and then thousands of people gathered in the square in front of Hungary’s majestic Parliament building to celebrate the start of a new political era. This was the square where tens of thousands gathered in 1956 and 1989 to demand an end to the Soviet occupation and in 2006 to protest a discredited government. It was the square on which Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s regime imposed a major redesign more than a decade ago — with traffic rerouted away, a large reflecting pool and raised beds installed, narrow pathways laid down — apparently to ensure that no such mass gathering could take place again. Today it was the square where Peter Magyar, a former Orban loyalist, would be sworn in, promising a rebirth of democracy and liberty after 16 years of autocratic control.
[. . .] The triumph was stunning — unique in our era of democratic backsliding — and it holds clear lessons for the United States.
One obvious lesson of Peter Magyar’s success lies in the scale, reach and relentlessness of his organizing network. “They had 2,000 Tisza islands with between 30,000 and 50,000 volunteers,” Balint Magyar told me, in evident awe. “Just in their call centers, they had 3,000 to 4,000 people in the last week of the campaign.”
[. . .] Previous opposition politicians had described Orban’s regime as “corrupt,” a relatively mild term suggesting some aberration from the government’s intended function. Peter Magyar made no such accommodation. Borrowing a term coined by Balint Magyar, he has called it a mafia state — a fundamentally criminal enterprise. Third lesson: Don’t mince words.
[. . .] That’s a lesson, too: The person best positioned to break the power of Donald Trump would not be an anti-Trump Republican but an outsider to the Democratic establishment, someone who can credibly claim that Trump didn’t happen on his watch — a Graham Platner rather than a Thomas Massie.
[. . .] That’s a fifth lesson: Grass-roots organizations that have little or no connection to electoral politics — in the United States, that might be the networks formed by the No Kings rallies, ICE-resistance groups and so on — can matter as much as or more than those already focused on winning votes.
[. . .] Another lesson lies in the issues that motivated Magyar’s voters.
[. . .] In other words, Hungarians seemed to see the damage that Orbanism had done to the nation as more important than any harm they felt they had suffered as individuals. They were united by a sense of moral outrage — “value choices,” as one person close to the incoming government described it to me.
[. . .] Peter Magyar scheduled his inauguration for Europe Day — the 76th anniversary of the declaration that created the road map for a united continent. Before he was sworn in, the European flag was raised again. But the Szekely flag remained, signaling that Magyar seeks to represent all Hungarian citizens, including those who supported Orban. In some U.S. coverage, Magyar has been labeled centrist or right-of-center. What his politics actually are — and this is another lesson of his victory — is pluralist.
[. . .] Remarkably, in nearby Poland, the only other European country to have unseated an autocratic government, a child sexual abuse scandal and a cover-up also appear to have played a significant role. Perhaps this is because such stories can shed a particularly harsh light on networks of power, and the abuses of power. This, too, is a lesson that can prove useful in the United States. Perhaps it already has.
[. . .] Now, speaking in Parliament, the new Hungarian prime minister offered an extensive and detailed apology to the victims of abuse and those who sought justice on their behalf. And he announced that to reckon with the crimes of the Orban regime, he was submitting legislation to create the National Asset Recovery and Protection Office, which he promised would “be one of the pillars of the 2026 regime change.” [. . .] It’s evident, however, that its goal will be not only to satisfy the desire for retribution but also to separate those who became rich through their connections to the Orban regime from the millions of ordinary voters who enabled it — an essential step toward healing a society that has been ruled by politics of hatred, anger and suspicion. There’s a lesson in that, too.
[. . .] When Magyar emerged from the building to address the assembled crowd, he offered his own lesson of his impossible victory. “Against a machine of power,” he said, “we don’t need another machine of power, but real people who — going from mailbox to mailbox, house to house, in the cold, the frost and the rain — are capable of anything for their homeland, their neighbors, their relatives and their community.”
[. . .] Magyar finished speaking, ceding the stage to Ibolya Olah, a pop star who is ethnically Roma and openly lesbian. She performed “Magyarorszag” (“Hungary”), a ballad that she had not performed in many years because, she had said, its patriotic sentiment had lost its meaning.' back

SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory - Wikipedia, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' Founded in 1962 as the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, the facility is located on 172 ha (426 acres) of Stanford University-owned land on Sand Hill Road in Menlo Park, California—just west of the university's main campus. The main accelerator is 3.2 km (2 mi) long—the longest linear accelerator in the world—and has been operational since 1966.
Research at SLAC has produced three Nobel Prizes in Physics:
1976: The charm quark—see J/ψ meson
1990: Quark structure inside protons and neutrons
1995: The tau lepton . ' back