There may be significant things to learn about people by looking at what annoys them most.

The problem isn't so much finding good ideas (there is no shortage) as embedding the ones we have into everyday practice.

One kind of good book should leave you asking: how did the author know that about me?

The Arab-Israeli conflict is also in many ways a conflict about status: it's a war between two peoples who feel deeply humiliated by the other, who want the other to respect them. Battles over status can be even more intractable than those over land or water or oil.

The universe is large and we are tiny, without the need for further religious superstructure. One can have so-called spiritual moments without belief in the spirit.

Distress at losing an object can be as much a frustration at the intellectual mystery of the disappearance as about the loss itself.

Most anger stems from feelings of weakness, sadness and fear: hard to remember when one is at the receiving end of its defiant roar.