Universal literacy was a 20th-century goal. Before then, reading and writing were skills largely confined to a small, highly educated class of professional people.

Nothing is perfect. Life is messy. Relationships are complex. Outcomes are uncertain. People are irrational.

So, if falling crime rates coincide with the rise of violent video games and increasing violence on TV and at the cinema, should we conclude that media violence is causing the drop in crime rates?

The yearning for strong leadership is more about strength of purpose - clarity of vision - than about merely 'getting tough'.

But the rule seems to be that the bigger and more life-changing the decision, the less it will seem like a decision at all.

No one welcomes chaos, but why crave stability and predictability?

Still, most of those effects occur in the context of harmless play and it is patently obvious that children are not normally turned into aggressive little monsters by TV or video games, since most children do not become aggressive little monsters.