The high priests of neuroscience

Like all the most influential religious leaders, for every mystery they solve they pose another. Their guidance takes us deeper into the human mind than ever before but their torches only illuminate a fraction of it. The more we explore anima incognita, the more evident it is just how inadequate our maps of it are.

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To die for an ideal

Mandela was not risking his life primarily for an abstract cause or principle. He risked it for his people. His individual life was worth risking because he never existed as a pure individual, only as a member of that people. He stood up for others because it was because of others that he was able to stand up at all.

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Abolish bank holidays

Bank holidays are a British idiosyncrasy that some former members of our empire continue to honour. Other countries don’t have more of them, they have public holidays instead. This is not a matter of mere terminology. A public holiday is a shared civic commemoration of something important for the society that celebrates it.

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