Yesterday's news feeds our fear that our neighbours are more likely than not to be bad eggs: benefit fraudsters, bogus asylum seekers, paedophiles or jihadist terrorists.

For most people their ideal life involves an intimate relationship with another person; one which often has a sexual basis. But there's no logic about it; why shouldn't people choose to live together with someone they just like? 'Of course' if we were too unquestioning about it, and we said 'well, that person has got to be someone of the opposite sex, and it's got to be for life, and divorce is terrible', then we're stuck. But if you don't recognize the importance that kind of bond has for human beings - you can't really understand what is needed to live a good life.

In my experience, those who make the biggest fuss about not spending much at Christmas are generally the ones who buy what they want and eat where they want 12 months a year.

Accepting that the world is full of uncertainty and ambiguity does not and should not stop people from being pretty sure about a lot of things.

Being virtuous is wonderful thing, but feeling virtuous is a shortcut to vice.

As a teenager, I increasingly had questions about religion to which I found no good answers.

To become a stoic is to endorse the truthfulness of its world view and accept its prescription for how you ought to live, not just to like how it makes you feel.