The strongest predictor of unhappiness is anyone who has had a mental illness in the last 10 years. It is an even stronger predictor of unhappiness than poverty - which also ranks highly.

It is now possible to quantify people's levels of happiness pretty accurately by asking them, by observation, and by measuring electrical activity in the brain, in degrees from terrible pain to sublime joy.

In the polls, over 80% support the right to die and have done for the last 25 years. Even 80% of practising Catholics and Protestants support it, plus 76% of Church Times readers.

The best care on earth cannot prevent us all dying in the end.

People want the right to die at a time of their own choosing. Too many families have watched helplessly as a relative dies slowly, longing for death.

But instead of standing up for reason, our government is handing education over to the world of faith.

This is indeed a clash of civilisations, not between Islam and Christendom but between reason and superstition.